Is this year the year, or will the Cubs and Sox fool us again?

Both the Cubs and White Sox will play in the World Series this year.

April Fools!

With Opening Day nearly here, Chicago baseball fans are looking at the 2009 season with hope and optimism. Cub fans hope Milton Bradley will make the National League's best team in 2008 even better, while devotees of the Pale Hose can't wait for Carlos Quentin and Alexei Ramirez to build on their breakout 2008 seasons and lead the team to postseason glory in 2009.

Maybe all that will happen. Or maybe the teams will make us feel like fools once again.

In honor of baseball's imminent return, we offer on this most deceptive of days a little trivia quiz about our two teams.

Do you know which of the following statements are true, and which are designed to make you look foolish?

White Sox

1) The team once wore shorts during the 1976 season.

2) To bolster attendance, the White Sox played a series of "home" games in enemy territory, Wrigley Field, during the 1968 and 1969 seasons.

3) Burly former White Sox slugger Greg Luzinski, a graduate of Notre Dame High School in Niles, now operates a barbecue restaurant, Bull's BBQ, at U.S. Cellular Field.

4) For awhile, the infield at old Comiskey Park was AstroTurf.

5) Former shortstop Harry Chappas never wore shorts, but was a cult hero for a short time despite his short-lived baseball career. Why? Because he was so tall.

6) Lamar Johnson, first baseman and member of the South Side Hitmen squad from 1977, showed off the breadth of his talents when he sang the national anthem before a June game against the Oakland A's, then jacked two home runs to help the Sox win.

Cubs

1) Famous for once losing a line drive under his cap, outfielder Larry Biittner opened a doughnut shop in Lake Zurich that was featured in the movie "Wayne's World."

2) A certain Cubs infielder (Hint: He wore No. 23) was such a good musician that he once played the national anthem on his trumpet at Wrigley Field.

3) Hall of Famer Bruce Sutter is the first member to be depicted on his Hall plaque sporting a full beard.

4) Mike Schmidt of the Phillies made a family miserable when he cranked three of his four home runs for the day off father and son pitchers in an April 1976 game against the Cubs.

5) In what may have been an effort to reverse the Curse of the Billy Goat, Cubs pitcher Steve Trachsel cursed at a goat that walked past him while he warmed up in the bullpen in 1994.

6) Former Cubs broadcaster Steve Stone was traded to the Cubs from the White Sox in the same deal that sent current Cubs broadcaster Ron Santo to the White Sox from the Cubs.

• Daily Herald staff writers Burt Constable, Mike Spellman and Barry Rozner contributed to this article.

Answers

Sox

1) TRUE: One of then-owner Bill Veeck's less-successful ideas. (There should be no bare knees in baseball.)

2) FALSE: Just as bad, the games were played at County Stadium in Milwaukee.

3) FALSE: "The Bull" does operate a barbecue joint, but at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia, the city in which he played for 11 years as a member of the Phillies. Come back to Chicago, Bull! Our arteries need the clogging!

4) TRUE: AstroTurf was installed in 1969 and removed in 1976. It's a good thing, because the turf would have made Veeck's "shorts day" very painful.

5) FALSE: Chappas landed on the cover of Sports Illustrated because he was actually really - surprise! - short, topping out at 5-foot-3.

6) TRUE: The A's manager said later that should Johnson sing again before a game against his team, they'd pitch around him.

Cubs

1) FALSE: Biittner did lose a ball under his cap in right field, and he did open a doughnut shop in Lake Zurich, but the fictitious doughnut shop in Wayne's World was named after Blackhawk legend Stan Mikita.

2) TRUE: While he couldn't play nearly as well as Ryne Sandberg, old No. 23 Carmen Fanzone did perform the national anthem and even played the jazz fluegelhorn with Johnny Carson's Tonight Show band after his baseball career ended.

3) TRUE: If I could grow a beard as thick as Sutter's was back in the day, I'd have it bronzed, too.

4) FALSE: Schmidt did victimize related pitchers that day, but they were brothers: Rick and Paul Rueschel.

5) TRUE: But it didn't work. The season ended early in a prolonged strike. The Cubs finished 49-64. And they're still looking for that first World Series title since 1908.

6) TRUE: Another interesting Stone fact: He's the only person who has played and broadcast for both Chicago baseball teams.