In 1935, British historian and politician Herbert Albert Laurens Fisher, obviously not writing about the Chicago Cubs 2003 season, but nonetheless expressing an essential truth about it, noted:
“I can see [in the course of history] only one emergency following upon another . . . and only one safe rule for the historian: That he should recognize in the development of human destinies the play of the contingent and the unforeseen.”
On Thursday the very icon of the unforeseen, the notorious Bartman ball which some say torpedoed the season, will be destroyed in the hope of lifting a hex from Wrigley Field and those who play and watch and wince there.
Long-suffering Cubs fans might argue that, although the interference with that ball was unforeseen, the fact that something would go awry was not. The inevitability of doom is as deep and intuitive for such fans as the knowledge of when to go south is for goldfinches.
Tickets go on sale Friday for what arguably might be the most horrific Cubs season ever.
That’s not what logic says. Logic says look at that pitching. Look at the winning ways of the manager. Look at building on a surprisingly successful season last year. Look at the high expectations expressed by the experts.
Cubs fans say, “Look out!”
High expectations flash “Danger Ahead” to those who have seen even the most modest expectations annually dashed.
This year, any high point in a game, any laudatory mention in a sports column, any hint of any sort that things are going well will be accompanied by the little voice in the back of the head saying “Oh, oh. Here it comes.”
And what if the shoe of despair does not to fall, what if the Cubs go unscathed through the season and win the World Series?
Sisyphus of Greek mythology was condemned by the gods to an eternity of fruitless labor–roll the rock up the mountain, roll it up again tomorrow, and again, and again. What if the rock stayed in place at the top of the mountain? Sisyphus would win.
Then what?
He was the guy who never succeeds. His whole identity was to be the guy who never succeeds. Now who is he? Just another winner.
It’s not at all logical. But it’s so Cubs.
