Davis: I knew Cougars before they were The Cougars
I was there for Opening Day.
Opening day of 1991, that is. It was a raw, blustery April day, and several of us Daily Herald types decided a field trip to see the new minor league baseball team's debut would be a hoot. My most vivid recollection was my not-yet-2-year-old son Rob toddling up the concrete steps, falling and cutting his lip. Not a happy camper. In fact, we all were pretty miserable, and most of us left by about the third inning. No clue if the new team, the Kane County Cougars, won.
Turns out that's not important. The point of Cougarball for the past 25 years is that the show is more important - and entertaining - than watching minor leaguers attempting to make "The Show." The newspaper hadn't officially set up shop in the greater Geneva area in 1991, but we covered the Cougars, perhaps more as an entertainment novelty than serious athletic competition, such as, say, high school football.
Turns out that approach was in sync with the Cougars philosophy. I'll never forget one feature story we did in which the team boss told us how he'd greet the fans after a game, ask if they had a good time and whether they knew the score of the game. The answers inevitably would be "Yes" and "No clue." The Cougars guy seemed to revel in that.
As you'll see in Robert Sanchez's Page 1 story today, that's been an amazingly successful recipe for the Cougars, which became the first team in Class A ball to draw 11 million spectators. I've contributed a bit to those figures. In later years and in better weather, a Cougars game was the party for Rob's 8th birthday or thereabout. He and his buddies got to stand on the dugout while "Happy Birthday" was sung to him by who-remembers-who. Another fond memory is doing a face plant while trying to throw a radar gun-timed pitch so hard that I wouldn't be shown up by Rob's 8-year-old friends.
In fact, the more I think about the games I've attended, I realize all the memories are, indeed, about the sideshow. It might not be the worst idea to keep your head in the game, though: Today's story also points out 130 Cougars have made it to The Show. The first ex-Cougar I recall achieving semi-superstardom was Dontrelle Willis. But he's been followed by the likes of Miguel Cabrera, Adrian Gonzalez, Josh Beckett and Kyle Schwarber. Wonder if Schwarby ever jacked one onto Kirk Road?
Got to a bunch Wolves games, too, and as Sanchez's story notes, this team employs a different strategy for success: It's all about winning. Never a losing season in 21 years, and four championships. I wasn't at the Wolves first game, but I was at the Allstate Arena, then the Rosemont Horizon, when the team captured its first Turner Cup in 1998. And unlike all those Cougar games, I recall the score and the opponent: 3-1 over the Detroit Vipers. (Oops. Just looked it up; it was a 3-0 shutout.) Rob was at that game, too. I asked him for his most vivid memory of the game. He replied (via text, of course; he's 26 now): "Hahaha. Getting coated in some moron's beer that he tossed in the air after we scored the winning goal." I had forgotten that detail; it's quite possible I was the moron.
Despite the success of the Cougars and the Wolves, the history of pro sports in the suburbs is more one of failure, as Sanchez's story further notes. In fact, as I look at the long list of teams that didn't survive or moved away, I realize I simply didn't do my part to keep these franchises afloat. I attended one Schaumburg Flyers game. No recollection of the game, of course, but I do remember a decent Beatles knockoff band playing in the lounge afterward.
I saw the Chicago Rush, too. It was fun, with good seats close to the action. But I was there on a ticket someone had given me, and I never had an impulse to return on my own dime.
It gets worse. My attendance is zilch for the many other teams that are trying or have tried to make a go of it in the 'burbs.
But there's always next year. Go Bulls NBA Development League team to be named!
Jim Davis, jdavis@dailyherald.com, is news director for the DuPage and Fox Valley editions. Follow him at facebook.com/jimdavis06 or @twitter.com/dhjimdavis