Constable: Why I'm saying farewell to my Cubs season tickets
The Chicago Cubs' season officially ended Sunday with a 9-0 loss against the hated St. Louis Cardinals. But the Cubs have been saying goodbye for a while.
They said goodbye to 72 years of coverage on WGN, the station that made the Cubs lovable across the nation. They said goodbye to Gary Pressy, the organist who accompanied an array of 7th-inning stretch singers and brought his own charm to games during the past 33 years. They said goodbye to the Daily Herald's Bruce Miles, our talented Cubs beat reporter for the past 22 years, who is leaving the Cubs beat and moving into semiretirement. They said goodbye to manager Joe Maddon, who fans — while convinced we could have done a better job managing Game 7 of the 2016 World Series — owe gratitude as the skipper who brought us five straight winning seasons, four postseason appearances, two division championships, a pennant and that once-elusive World Series championship.
Lastly, I said goodbye to my share of Cubs season tickets I've enjoyed for 20 years. Same as Maddon, I'll be replaced.
Since I saw my first game in the 1960s, Wrigley Field always has been an oasis for me. I was there for the Sandberg Game, the Bote Game, that game when Pete Rose tied Ty Cobb's hit record, and that game named after a fan who tried to catch a foul ball. I relished the chance to cheer Banks and Williams, Jenkins and Santo, Dawson and Maddux, Bryant and Rizzo, and I put hope in Dunston and Durham, Baez and Beckert, and Madlock and Morales.
Even during all those years with bad teams, spending an afternoon at Wrigley was an escape from worldly pressures. That's changed.
Revelations that Joe Ricketts, the patriarch whose money allowed his offspring to buy the franchise, sent mean-spirited, racist emails and sent donations to mean-spirited, racist political organizations make it more difficult to hand over my hard-earned money. His son Todd, the Republican National Committee finance chairman raising money for Donald Trump's 2020 campaign, still is embroiled in allegations that he cheated taxpayers by falsely paying far less in taxes than he should have on his Wilmette house, which is the kind of rich guy sleaziness that turns me off.
Compounding my frustration, the Rickettses are moving all Cubs games off free TV and onto a new network owned by Sinclair Broadcasting, an enemy of all those journalists unfairly labeled the enemy of the people. I can't give them money when they are out to ruin my profession.
Wrigley has changed, too. I remember day games where I could sit near the field, hear the players and chat with fellow fans (on occasion Bill Veeck) between innings — and even between pitches. Now the video board advertisements fill the silence. Instead of talking about whether Bump Wills could be a great second baseman, building a case for Corey Patterson to be an MVP or just marveling at the three homers Tuffy Rhodes hit off Dwight Gooden, fans spend a lot of time today looking at their phones or taking selfies.
Perhaps I should have led with this reason, but when I was a carefree bachelor in my 20s, dropping $3 on a bleacher seat didn't seem indulgent. Now, the average price of a ticket at Wrigley Field is nearly 20 times higher at almost $60, according to statista.com, and I'm not making 20 times the annual salary I did in my 20s. For a guy paying on three college loans and driving a 12-year-old car with 244,000 miles on it, even a share of Cubs season tickets is a luxury.
But I'm not bitter or angry. The Cubs, and Wrigley Field, have given me a lifetime of wonderful memories with my parents, my friends, my wife and our sons. My mom caught a foul ball during the final game of the 1984 season. My tickets allowed my wife and our son Will the chance to see the Cubs in 2016 clinch the pennant for the first time since World War II, after which Cubs catcher Willson Contreras took a selfie with Will. My press pass allowed me to see the 1989 Cubs drop three straight in San Francisco, win a 2016 World Series game in Wrigley Field and raise a championship banner the next spring, something my dad never saw in his 87 years.
I'll still try to get to a game next season at Wrigley Field, something I've done every year since I got my driver's license, except when I boycotted the 1995 season as a protest of the strike that disrupted the 1994 season. I'll still check out the Cubs highlights on my computer. I'll still hate the Cardinals, hope the White Sox do well, keep my Maddon bobblehead and root for Rizzo, Baez and whatever current players survive the expected purge.
But after a lifetime of “Wait until next year” and focusing on the future, I'm content with looking back fondly on my past with the Cubs and giving thanks for what we had.