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October 25, 2005
BY RICK TELANDER SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST
If the White Sox win this World Series, trouble looms.
Right now we live in a city united by failure.
There are always sporadic rumblings of unrest. As there have been since the Failure of 1969 and even back to the Gambling of 1919.
But when Cubs fans and Sox fans meet, neither group has the trump card that yells, "Ha, ha, ha!''
After a combined 185 years of never winning the World Series, there can be no overriding muscle to any argument for superiority on either side.
As has been mentioned before in this column, the Sox generally have played a complacent, even remote, second fiddle to the Cubs because they're not quite as devoted to ineptitude as the North Siders.
There's room in the heart, science has proved, for only one prime Lovable Loser.
Still, the Cubs and Sox have been like different compartments on the same sinking ship.
Now a World Series championship threatens to destroy the delicate balance that has allowed the teams to exist in relative harmony for generations.
In short, when the Sox win, the Cubs will stand alone.
And the conflict will begin in earnest.
It won't be that the Sox will have done something unbelievable as much as it will be the Cubs who will have continued to do something unbelievable.
The second-closest team to the Cubs in World Series failure is the White Sox. When the Boston Red Sox won in 2004, they eliminated themselves and their 1918 curse from the pity parade.
If the White Sox (crown-less since 1917) win, no other team can even approach the Cubs' failure since 1908.
You see, winning the World Series, while a marvelous accomplishment, does not make one singular.
The Angels, Diamondbacks and Marlins have won the Series in recent years.
Heck, the Marlins (anybody think they're a special organization?) have won it twice since 1997.
The Toronto Blue Jays have won it twice -- a team from the North Pole, for goodness' sakes!
The Oakland Athletics have won it four times since 1972.
Even the Twins, a team Major League Baseball tried to fold, have won a pair of World Series crowns.
Incredible ineptitude
What is singular is not winning the World Series.
For nearly a century.
That, folks, is what will cause the furor.
In a matter of days, Sox fans might have -- for the first time ever -- the ammo to hurt their enemies across the line.
To help make my point about the impending conflict, I have drawn a map called "A Chicagoan's View of the United States.''
Although it isn't labeled, the dividing line between peoples, as all Chicagoans know, is Madison Street, indicated by a dotted line in the center of the map.
Not only is Madison Street the North-South zero-hundred boundary that equally splits the kingdom of Chicago like a chain saw from Lake Michigan to Iowa, it is also a latitudinal chasm that splits team allegiances like a cracked coconut.
In a sense, Madison Street is an asphalt mullet: business up front, party in the back.
And Sox fans -- whose ballpark is 71 blocks south of Wrigley Field -- will be partying like crazy when their team wins.
When the Cubs-Sox interleague games are played next season, beware the signage that will eviscerate Cubs fans at U.S. Cellular Field.
Forget "Cork!''
Try "Neutered!''
Because they will stand naked against the arrows on their pedestal of pity, Cubs fans will retreat to viciousness to attempt to harm their long-docile foes.
Territorial battle
They will try to harm Sox fans by saying cruel things about their gender, their income, their backgrounds, their hairstyles -- even though a recent study in this paper showed fans of both teams are virtually identical in almost any category you choose.
Still, the world will be divided into two fervid camps -- Cubs people and Sox people.
The Sox-controlled territory -- with cells in various remote outposts such as Miami, Mexico and Las Vegas -- will be dwarfed by the Cubs-controlled lands.
That won't make the conflict easier.
Cooperation and compassion between camps will vanish.
The "good old days'' will be a distant memory.
The Cubs-owning Tribune Co. will be forced to do one of three things: build a World Series championship team itself, embrace loserdom and actively market it or sell the Cubs.
Until then, tension will reign.
And Madison Street will be the Mason-Dixon line of baseball: whimper in front, gloat in the back.
BY RICK TELANDER SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST
If the White Sox win this World Series, trouble looms.
Right now we live in a city united by failure.
There are always sporadic rumblings of unrest. As there have been since the Failure of 1969 and even back to the Gambling of 1919.
But when Cubs fans and Sox fans meet, neither group has the trump card that yells, "Ha, ha, ha!''
After a combined 185 years of never winning the World Series, there can be no overriding muscle to any argument for superiority on either side.
As has been mentioned before in this column, the Sox generally have played a complacent, even remote, second fiddle to the Cubs because they're not quite as devoted to ineptitude as the North Siders.
There's room in the heart, science has proved, for only one prime Lovable Loser.
Still, the Cubs and Sox have been like different compartments on the same sinking ship.
Now a World Series championship threatens to destroy the delicate balance that has allowed the teams to exist in relative harmony for generations.
In short, when the Sox win, the Cubs will stand alone.
And the conflict will begin in earnest.
It won't be that the Sox will have done something unbelievable as much as it will be the Cubs who will have continued to do something unbelievable.
The second-closest team to the Cubs in World Series failure is the White Sox. When the Boston Red Sox won in 2004, they eliminated themselves and their 1918 curse from the pity parade.
If the White Sox (crown-less since 1917) win, no other team can even approach the Cubs' failure since 1908.
You see, winning the World Series, while a marvelous accomplishment, does not make one singular.
The Angels, Diamondbacks and Marlins have won the Series in recent years.
Heck, the Marlins (anybody think they're a special organization?) have won it twice since 1997.
The Toronto Blue Jays have won it twice -- a team from the North Pole, for goodness' sakes!
The Oakland Athletics have won it four times since 1972.
Even the Twins, a team Major League Baseball tried to fold, have won a pair of World Series crowns.
Incredible ineptitude
What is singular is not winning the World Series.
For nearly a century.
That, folks, is what will cause the furor.
In a matter of days, Sox fans might have -- for the first time ever -- the ammo to hurt their enemies across the line.
To help make my point about the impending conflict, I have drawn a map called "A Chicagoan's View of the United States.''
Although it isn't labeled, the dividing line between peoples, as all Chicagoans know, is Madison Street, indicated by a dotted line in the center of the map. Not only is Madison Street the North-South zero-hundred boundary that equally splits the kingdom of Chicago like a chain saw from Lake Michigan to Iowa, it is also a latitudinal chasm that splits team allegiances like a cracked coconut.
In a sense, Madison Street is an asphalt mullet: business up front, party in the back.
And Sox fans -- whose ballpark is 71 blocks south of Wrigley Field -- will be partying like crazy when their team wins.
When the Cubs-Sox interleague games are played next season, beware the signage that will eviscerate Cubs fans at U.S. Cellular Field.
Forget "Cork!''
Try "Neutered!''
Because they will stand naked against the arrows on their pedestal of pity, Cubs fans will retreat to viciousness to attempt to harm their long-docile foes.
Territorial battle
They will try to harm Sox fans by saying cruel things about their gender, their income, their backgrounds, their hairstyles -- even though a recent study in this paper showed fans of both teams are virtually identical in almost any category you choose.
Still, the world will be divided into two fervid camps -- Cubs people and Sox people.
The Sox-controlled territory -- with cells in various remote outposts such as Miami, Mexico and Las Vegas -- will be dwarfed by the Cubs-controlled lands.
That won't make the conflict easier.
Cooperation and compassion between camps will vanish.
The "good old days'' will be a distant memory.
The Cubs-owning Tribune Co. will be forced to do one of three things: build a World Series championship team itself, embrace loserdom and actively market it or sell the Cubs.
Until then, tension will reign.
And Madison Street will be the Mason-Dixon line of baseball: whimper in front, gloat in the back.
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