CLEVELAND — It was the wise Satchel Paige who warned, "Don't look back; something might be gaining on you."
Don't the Cleveland Indians, who let a three-games-to-one World Series lead slip away to the Chicago Cubs, know it. Didn't the Los Angeles Dodgers, who fumbled a two-games-to-one National League Championship Series lead, learn it. Weren't the San Francisco Giants, who allowed a 5-2 lead in Game 4 of the NL Division Series to dissipate, guilty of it.
It took 108 years for the Chicago Cubs to catch up to the rest of baseball in the month of October.
But now that they're champions, ...
CHICAGO — The old girl is dressed to the nines. Wrigley Field, on deck to host her first World Series game Friday night since Oct. 10, 1945, is crackling with energy.
And when the Chicago Cubs take the field to face the Cleveland Indians in Game 3, this shrine of a ballpark, which has produced so many memorable afternoons and, later, evenings, will author a first: An African-American wearing a Cubs uniform will play in a World Series game in Wrigley Field.
The Cubs have not been here since Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in 1947.
Which means, well, gasp, yes.
It is ...
CLEVELAND — Don’t worry. Hitting savant Kyle Schwarber isn’t Superman all down the line. In some respects, he’s just like you and me.
Take the private plane that winged him back to the Chicago Cubs on Monday night, his first trip to the majors since the devastating knee injury in early April. OK, so the private plane part might not be like you and me. But the accompanying boredom was.
"It was a long three hours," Schwarber said.
Three hours and a million miles. That’s how long his trip back to the big leagues was this week. Private plane or ...
CHICAGO — So, 71 years later, this is what it looks like when the Chicago Cubs storm into the World Series…
Anthony Rizzo hitting everything Clayton Kershaw threw him on the screws: a double, a long ball, a fly ball in the first inning that Los Angeles Dodgers left fielder Andrew Toles plumb dropped. Was that a goat impeding his vision?
Kris Bryant hungrily taking a seven-decades-sized bite into Kershaw’s 95 mph cheese and looping an RBI single to right field just two batters into the bottom of the first, immediately flipping the switch from anxiety to anticipation.
Javier Baez alertly doing it ...
CHICAGO — The Chicago Cubs led the league this year in, among other things, wins, winning percentage, run differential and multitasking.
Yes, that's right. Multitasking.
Do you feel pretty accomplished when you knock off three things at once? Look at Javier Baez, who this year became just the fourth Cubs player since 1913 with at least 20 starts at second base, third base and shortstop. He also started twice at first base, vacuumed the Cubs clubhouse after each game and refilled the team's Gatorade supply daily.
Well, those last couple of things might be a bit of an exaggeration, but the way Baez ...
CHICAGO — "Antonio!"
Anthony Rizzo, padding across the carpet in the Chicago Cubs' home clubhouse three hours before game time, grins as he moves toward Grandpa Rossy, whose suddenly thick Italian accent works nicely with his graying beard and warm smile.
"Antonio!"
They embrace. This is their daily greeting. David Ross, 39, retiring after this year and the glue of a team tighter than the Wrigley Field seats, stresses the importance of saying hello to everybody each day.
"You've gotta invest in people, right?" Ross says. "You're not going to be very good if you don't invest in human beings. I think that's really ...
One year ago this spring, Kris Bryant, Addison Russell and Co. had no idea where the keys to the batting cage were.
OK, so that's an old joke. But it's a good one: Veteran tells rookie, "Go get me the keys to the batting cage." So the wide-eyed rookie dutifully bounds off to find them.
There are no keys to the batting cage.
Get it?
The young Chicago Cubs get it. They get most things. They did when they won 97 games last year and raced all the way to the National League Championship Series. And they certainly do now.
What was supposed to have ...
The legend has grown to such gargantuan proportions that maybe the best way to welcome the kid to Wrigley Field as he makes his major league debut this weekend, finally(!) summoned from Triple-A Iowa, is to begin by separating the Man from the Myth….
True Fact No. 1: Kris Bryant has been earning cash for home runs since he was in Little League.
Absolutely true story. The man who is about to rock the Chicago Cubs' world told it to me himself, a few days before the Cubs made him the second overall pick in the 2013 draft.
It started at home near ...
MESA, Arizona — These are the New Cubs: A funky, brilliant manager concerned between spring drills with the "dining experience" at his new restaurant. An MVP-candidate first baseman whose bold prediction of a division title reverberated throughout the spring. A Rookie of the Year candidate who...
You want the Rookie of the Year candidate third baseman who bludgeoned Cactus League pitching this spring as if he is the second coming of Babe Ruth? Hello, Kris Bryant.
Or the Rookie of the Year candidate outfielder from Cuba with the thoroughbred body who reminds the new manager of Vladimir Guerrero? Hello, Jorge Soler.
Or perhaps a ...
SAN DIEGO — From his 20th-floor room here in the Grand Hyatt hotel, from his first winter meetings as the manager of the Chicago Cubs, Joe Maddon's view is breathtakingly spectacular.
Out the window is a gorgeous and expansive panorama of the San Diego Bay, sun sparkling on the water. Down below and to the right is Kansas City Barbeque, the iconic joint that served Tom Cruise and Co. in key scenes in the 1986 blockbuster film Top Gun. And sharpening into focus on the horizon is Jon Lester, the ace free-agent left-hander who the Cubs will sign later this evening.
There is a ...
