That's a direct quote from a 75 year old Cubs fan after Chicago finally won the World Series. Finally. There were people who lived their whole lives never seeing their team be World Champions.
65 year olds, 75 year olds, 85 year olds, and even older.
If I heard it once I heard it a thousand times, "I wish my dad was alive to see this. Wish my mom was alive to see this. I wish my grandparents were alive to see this."
Stats that you know--the last time the Cubs won the World Series was in 1908. The last time they were even in it was 1945. I didn't have to look the last two dates up, every Cubs fan knows them.
And while we're at it let me just say we were all zombies, happy zombies, on Wednesday after the way too late shenanigans of Game 7 on Tuesday night.
Man, that was a game.
It's not often you find me on my bed, watching TV, alone, screaming and raising my arm in the air when a team scores. But there I was as the Cubs scored first. With a home run no less.
Cubs up early, here come the magnificent Indians. Two things, it seemed every time the Cubs got ahead, Cleveland battled back. And every time they did, the Cubs seemed to step on the gas to go ahead again.
Back and forth like two heavyweight boxing champions.
One side story. I watched a good part of the game with my 13 year old son. He would drift into the room to see his nuts dad roar at the game. It was great watching baseball with my kid. Wonderful. But I did have tell him that in baseball they're called runs, not points.
The Cubs were up 6-3 and lo and behold all of a sudden it was 6-6. How'd that happen? Over the years their fans have seen so many inventive ways to lose. Was this going to be one of them? It seemed like they would win then all of a sudden after nine innings it was tied.
Everyone was biting their nails.
We were on our way to extra innings when...
There was a rain delay. Are you kidding me? I turned off the TV, it was way late and my nervous system couldn't take any more. I figured I'd find out in the morning who'd won. I know, I know, I'm a schmuck but when my wife found out she said, "What? Turn it back on. You have to watch the whole thing!"
I'm afraid of my wife so I did.
Turns out the delay was only about 15 minutes.
Long story short, the Cubs scored two in the top of the tenth, the Indians scored one in the bottom of the inning before succumbing. Final score Cubs 8 Indians 7. I was so glad I saw it.
The 108 year wait was over.
The Cubs were World Champions at last.
It's been a couple of days since that happened. A couple of glorious days. An observation, those guys on that Cubs team will never pay for dinner in a restaurant in Chicago again.
Ever.
Some fan will be happy to pick up their tab.
They also dyed the Chicago River Cubs Blue to celebrate the win. They dyed the river blue. Bears repeating.
And the victory parade was unbelievable. It seemed like all of Chicago was there with big, happy, goofy, grins on their faces.
It's been the year of comebacks by teams down three games to one. And Cleveland has been in the middle of both of those magical comebacks. I wrote earlier about the Cavaliers, with King James, coming back from a 3-1 deficit to beat the Golden State Warriors for the NBA championship.
Well, the Cubs clawed back from being down 3-1, as well, to win their championship. And they did it in Cleveland.
The Chicago Cubs are 2016 World Champions.
That bears repeating as well.
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