Yes, it's true, I'm not doing an update of EveryCubEver this season. On the other hand, I do plan on featuring every Hall of Fame Cub on or around their birthdays this year right here on this blog. And those entries will be from EveryCub Ever.
Two Cubs Hall of Famers were born this week. Cap Anson (April 17, 1852) and Greg Maddux (April 14, 1966).
Cap Anson 1852–1922
(White Stockings 1876-1897)
He still holds Cubs career records for most hits, most runs,
most doubles, most RBI, and highest batting average (with
2000 or more at-bats). He won three batting titles and six NL
championships. Anson is quite simply the greatest player
in Chicago Cubs history, and probably the most important
player in 19th century baseball. Cap was 45 years old when
he retired in 1897 and was famous all over the country. He
toured as a Vaudeville Act, drawing big crowds wherever he
went. He had business cards made up that read: “Greater
Actor Than Any Ballplayer, a Greater Ballplayer Than Any
Actor,” according to the book Cap Anson: The Grand Old
Man of Baseball by David Fleitz. During his retirement he
was treated as royalty in Chicago. He was elected Chicago
City Clerk. One of his biggest fans was President Warren G.
Harding. Harding even invited Anson to the White House.
In 1939, seventeen years after his death, Cap Anson was
inducted into the Hall of Fame. However, that’s only part of
Anson’s legacy, and the rest of the story isn’t pretty. In 1882
in a game against Toledo, Anson demanded that a player be
taken out of the game because he was African-American.
Five years later, Anson refused to allow his team to take the
field if a Black player was on the opposing team. The Giants
tried to sign an African-American player, and Anson led the
charge in getting the other owners to block that move and
any other move that would have allowed African-Americans
to play. In essence, Anson was the reason for the color line
in baseball. To be fair, the ban wouldn’t have happened if the
other owners and players weren’t also racist, but Anson was
the most vocal, and he was the biggest star in the league, so
nobody wanted to defy him. He hated “darkies,” as he called
them. He actually thought he was magnanimous toward
African-Americans because he hired a “little coon who could handle a baton” (his words) to be the team mascot. As great of a player as he was, Cap Anson left a stain on this great game, a stain that wasn’t erased in the league until 1947, and in Chicago until 1953.
Early in his Cubs career, Greg Maddux acquired one of the
best baseball nicknames, Mad Dog. Maddux’s nickname is
a combination of truth and irony. His looks are deceiving:
a slightly-built boyish-looking player with a soft and
unassuming voice. He hardly looked like a Mad Dog. He
was, however a tenacious Mad Dog on the mound who
mercilessly used every flaw he could find in an opponent.
Maddux was not all warm and cuddly. He was quite simply
the best pitcher to ever come out of the Cubs farm system
(no one else is even close), and is in the Hall of Fame for his 350+ wins, 3000+ strikeouts, and 4 Cy Young awards. He
won 133 of those games and that first Cy Young with the
Cubs (’92). But to Cubs fans, Mad Dog also symbolizes what
is wrong with the Cubs. They let him go in free agency for a
petty amount of money, and he had his greatest years with
the Braves, winning three Cy Youngs and a World Series. In
fairness to the Cubs, they realized they made a mistake by
letting him go. They tried to atone by bringing him back at
the end of his career, and retiring his uniform number when
he left the game. His #31 flies from the flagpole in Wrigley
Field. They also hired Maddux in the front office as a special
assistant to the general manager. Their genuine regret
seems to have been taken as an apology by Greg. When it
came time to choose which cap he would wear in the Hall of
Fame, he opted not to wear the Braves cap even though he
probably should have. He said his years in Chicago meant
too much to him to snub the Cubs. Oddly enough, Maddux
only holds one Cubs career record. He balked more times
(22) than any other pitcher in Cubs history.
Historical note: On the day that Oprah Winfrey gave
out 300 cars to her studio audience (2004), Maddux was
pitching at Wrigley Field for the Cubs. He won his 14th
game of the season by throwing seven shutout innings.
