Constable: Songs, cancer moment keeps Game 4 in perspective
The World Series is steeped in history, with every moment measured against the past. For the Chicago Cubs and their 71-year drought of even playing in the fall classic, everything is a first since at least 1945. Other efforts are compared to 1908, when the Cubs last won it all.
History says it's unlikely the Cubs, who lost 7-2 on Saturday to fall behind the Cleveland Indians 3 games to 1 in the best-of-seven series, can win Sunday's game at Wrigley and two more in Cleveland to still claim the title. But we fans use hope as our currency and remain invested in the 2016 Cubs. Even in the Game 4 loss, Cubs fans had moments.
"Not very often do our two worlds collide, but it's always a special moment for Ben and I when they do!" tweeted @JuliannaZobrist, the wife of Cubs starting left-fielder Ben Zobrist. A professional singer, she pumped up the crowd with her pregame rendition of "God Bless America." Her Twitter profile says, "I love honesty, chicks with brains, wearing weird things and kissing Ben Zobrist," which probably earns her 75 percent agreement from the Wrigley crowd.
Between Julianna's live performance and her new version of "Bennie and the Jets" that her husband used as his walk-up music before batting with two runners on base, fans could picture the Cubs' Zobrist seizing the moment and being the hero. But he struck out. History notes that Julianna Zobrist isn't the first wife of a Cub to sing at a World Series. Acclaimed jazz signer Sue Raney, wife of former 1970s Cubs' utility infielder Carmen Fanzone, sang the national anthem at the 1978 World Series in Los Angeles.
History also says that no Chicago team has won a game at Wrigley Field this late in October since 1968, when Gale Sayers ran for 143 yards to help the Bears beat the Minnesota Viking 26-24. An early 1-0 Cubs lead, thanks to a Dexter Fowler double and an Anthony Rizzo single, was erased in the second inning when Cleveland's Carlos Santana crushed a home run over the right-field wall and the Indians picked up another run thanks to a pair of Kris Bryant errors.
The 41,706 fans at Wrigley, who couldn't decide whether to cheer on their team with a chant of "Let's go, Cubs!" or pester Indians' ace pitcher Corey Kluber with derisive chants of "Klu … Ber," soon realized Kluber was having a chilling effect on cold Cubs' bats.
You can go back to 1945 for a fan who knows how that feels. Eighty-six-year-old Pete Petran of Mount Prospect was just 15 when he persuaded his parents to let him attend Game 5 of that series at Wrigley.
"I had a hard time talking her into it. I told her all the guys were going. She wasn't a Cubs fan and she didn't know what the Cubs were," said Petran, whose parents were immigrants from Austria-Hungary. "We slept on the sidewalk at Sheffield and Waveland all night. My mother made me some sandwiches.
"And then we got front-row tickets in left field."
Petran thinks his ticket cost about $2, which wasn't a big deal since he made 6 cents a line setting up pins by hand in a local bowling alley and could pocket $1.80 in two hours on league nights. During the war years, even Major League Baseball ran a tight ship.
"If you caught a ball, you had to give it back," Petran remembered. At his World Series game, "we talked to Hank Greenberg during batting practice," Petran said. Greenberg, the Tigers star, hit the last World Series homer at Wrigley Field until Santana clubbed his. Indians' second-baseman Jason Kipnis added a new chill when he hit the first 3-run World Series homer at Wrigley since Babe Ruth did it in 1932. Retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, 96, was in the Wrigley crowd for both historic homers.
Happy to finally be at a World Series, fans of the Cubs got a reminder that endangered championship dreams aren't the worst thing. At the end of the 5th inning, players, umpires, coaches and fans held up placards with the names of loved ones affected by cancer. The emotional Stand Up To Cancer moment was the Cubs' highlight of Game 4 and a memory that will last longer than the memory of how Fowler's late homer pulled the Cubs to within 5 runs.
That all belongs to history now. Fans still hope the Cubs can match a moment from 1985. That year, the Kansas City Royals came back from a 3-1 deficit to win the World Series on the road.
It's been a fun year so far. The Cubs might as well make it historic.