Chicago Cubs Fan Frustration

When baseball season begins in April, fans across the country can pretty much count on two things. One – that the New York Yankees will have the highest-paid team in the league and two – that the Chicago Cubs won’t end their almost 100-year World Series drought and bring the north side of Chicago a baseball championship.

Many excuses have been made over the years for the Cubs’ demise. The Curse of the Billy Goat in 1945 is said to have haunted the Cubs for years since the day bar-owner Billy Sianis brought his pet goat into the World Series game against Detroit, only to be kicked out by the ushers at the owner’s request. To the non-Chicago Cub fan, this may be an impractical explanation for the Cubs’ World Series deficiency over the years, but to all Cubs fans alike, it lingers on in the back of their minds with no reason to leave unless a championship is won.

A more sensible “curse” that irks Cubdom is the one that saw a fan interfere with a foul ball in the 2003 playoffs against the Florida Marlins. Who’s to say that if this fan, who will remain nameless just in case a Cubbie fan is reading and gets the urge to punch his computer screen, didn’t interfere that the Cubs would have won anyway? They certainly had the game in their favor, but it’s something we’ll never know.

In case all of you baseball enthusiasts out there didn’t know. The ball that was used at the time of the fan interfering was bought by a Chicago restaurant owner with the objective of destroying it, hoping to end the Cubs dreadful run at a championship.

According to Merriam-Webster’s Medical Dictionary the word frustration is defined as the condition that results when an impulse or an action is thwarted by an external or an internal force. It’s almost mandatory to relate to this word if you’re a Cubs fan. An external force, such as the Billy goat or the infamous fan that was innocently reaching for a souvenir at a playoff game will aggravate Cubs fans for years, kind of like a child that won’t stop crying in a movie theater; extremely annoying.

Internal forces, like the injuries that all-star caliber pitchers Mark Prior and Kerry Wood suffer every year, drive Cubs fans crazy. Should the Cubs trade the two pitchers and try to get something of value in return? Chances are, once they are shipped away, they’ll be twenty-game winners for another contending team, which, in itself, would continue to build added frustration among Cub Nation.

In an effort to revitalize the drive for a World Series rings, Cubs management spent over $300 million in salary after the 2006 season. They signed one of the most recognized and feared hitters in the league, Alfonso Soriano, to an eight-year deal. They also shored up their starting rotation by adding left-handed free agent Ted Lilly and second basemen Mark DeRosa, who is coming off of a career year. Packaged together with first basemen Derek Lee, third basemen Aramis Ramirez and animated starting pitcher Carlos Zambrano, the Cubs have all of the tools to end their World Series depravity, but will the curses and misfortunes continue to strike endless frustration for the city and its fans?

They also roped in one of the most familiar baseball coaches in recent memory; “Sweet” Lou Piniella. Piniella’s fiery attitude is probably his most well-known attribute, but he also brings the baseball knowledge and a swagger to the game that Cubs fans hope will turn the “Loveable Losers” into the “Wonderful Winners” of the north side.

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