Have a nice weekend

I won't be posting on the blog for the rest of the weekend because I'm heading out of town and going to New Orleans with the family.

Just One Bad Century will still be going strong in my absence (brand new material every day), but this blog and my Father Knows Nothing blog won't return until Tuesday...when my actual body returns to Chicago.

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

This week in...

1929

The Cubs are in the midst of a pennant winning season.

*On the day that the big 3 hitters in the Cubs lineup all homer (Rogers Hornsby, Hack Wilson & KiKi Cuyler) to beat the Pirates 4-3 in Wrigley Field, President Herbert Hoover authorizes the building of the Boulder Dam. It's later renamed "The Hoover Dam."

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1969

The Cubs are in the midst of one of their most memorable seasons.

*Ron Santo knocks in the winning run in the bottom of the ninth (with a sacrifice fly) to beat the Pirates 5-4 in Wrigley Field on the same day that Warren Burger is sworn in as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.


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1984

The Cubs are hoping to make the playoffs for the first time since World War 2.

*Jody Davis walks with the bases loaded and the Cubs beat the Pirates in the bottom of the eleventh inning at Wrigley Field. Meanwhile, Susan Lucci is trying to decide which dress to wear for the Daytime Emmy Awards, certain that she couldn't possibly lose the Emmy for the fifth year in a row.


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1989

The Boys of Zimmer are taking Chicago by storm.

*The Cubs get crushed in San Francisco by the Giants (12-2) at the same time Susan Lucci gets crushed at the Daytime Emmy Awards...losing for the tenth year in a row.

Ryno says Sammy doesn't belong in the hall

And he was Sammy's teammate for many years. Don't forget that Ryno also issued veiled slams at Sammy during his Hall of Fame speech.

More about Ryno's comments here.

Rollie Hemsley

Nobody remembers good ol' Rollie Hemsley, but Charlie Grimm used to tell a great story about the Cubs backup catcher.

Rollie almost got Charlie fired on his first day managing the Cubs.

The story is here.

Rollie was born on this day in 1907.

Kevin Gregg

SUCKS.

Olympic Day in Chicago

If you like a little local snark, check out this piece in the Beachwood Reporter.

I contributed to this tribute to today's "Olympic Day" in Chicago.

More Ryno Talk

Thanks to Chicagoist and Cubhub for also posting my YouTube video of my recollections about that game 25 years ago today.

Status of Cubs sale

Don't know if Sam Zell is doing this to put pressure on the Ricketts family, but there's a new bidder (actually one of the previous bidders, re-entering the negotiations.)

All of the details are here in Crain's.

E-mails, we get e-mails

From "MB"



"Great post on the Samdberg game. I had no idea McGee hit for the cycle that day! Those were unbelievable Cardinals teams. I was there too-SRO on 1st base side most of the game with my sister & dad. We jockeyed for empty seats with a bunch of sailors from Great Lakes, who looked as if they just arrived at the ballpark from the set of a 1950's Jerry Lewis Navy movie. It's almost hard to believe how effortless it was to go to a Cubs game then. Saturday afternoon; national TV game; Leon Durham's Sports Illustrated cover had just been published; "hey, let's drive in to the city without tix and go to the Cubs game!" Do people still do that? I think Cubs season attendance peaked at just over 2.1M in 1984. It was less than 1.5M the prior year. Now 3M+"

25 years ago today...

...Ryne Sandberg became a national celebrity. I was there. It was my favorite day ever at Wrigley Field.

A funny observation...

Fewer dads staying home

According to this article, I'm becoming an endangered species.

Here's an excerpt...

"Thirty-one percent of working dads would leave their jobs if their spouses or significant others earned enough money to comfortably support the entire family. Although that's a sizable percentage, it's a slight drop from last year's 37 percent and a significant drop from 2005's 49 percent."

69% would rather work? And they say that Germans have a ridiculous work ethic.

Super Barack

John Dillinger

John Herbert Dillinger was born on this day in 1902.

Sure, he was a notorious bank robber, but he was also something else: A fan of the Chicago Cubs.

He attended his last Cubs game just a few weeks before he was gunned down outside the Biograph Theater; exactly one month after his 32nd birthday.

(The movie about his life, starring Johnny Depp, opens on July 1)

Father Knows Nothing

I just posted my latest Father Knows Nothing column at NWI Parent. It's about my latest Father-Son outing to Wrigley Field. I call it "A day at the ballgame"

And by the way, dads, Happy Father's Day to one and all.