Yeah, yeah...I know. We just got past Thanksgiving, Christmas is right around the corner AND I'm still licking my wounds caused by my beloved Cubbies. But for whatever reason, I'm kinda jonesing for some Cubs baseball!
Now, being a baseball fan & a huge Cubs fan, I usually get antsy for some baseball in or around early to mid January. Whether it's because the Cubs broke my heart again this year or the fact that I'm not over the heartbreak of the playoffs or because I'm looking forward to the MLB Network kicking off on Jan 1 '09, my baseball craving is at an all time high !
With that said let me share a great story regarding one of the world's greatest cubs fans courtesy of MLB.com:
Cubs fan Goodman sang of pain, love
Late songwriter's anthems still played at 'ivy-covered burial ground'
Baseball Perspectives
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Mike Bauman
Steve Goodman, also known as Chicago Shorty, wrote "Go Cubs Go," which is played at Wrigley Field following every Cubs victory.
This one's for Chicago Shorty. In fact, this one's pretty much by Chicago Shorty.
This being the time of giving thanks, we're going to give thanks today for the memory of the late, great singer-songwriter Steve Goodman, a tiny man with a big voice and a bigger heart. His sense of humor was in tune, too. Maybe that helped, because he was a true blue Chicago Cubs fan.
A bit of Goodman lives on now, every time the Cubs win at Wrigley Field, with the playing of his boisterous little ditty, "Go Cubs Go." This year, some members of the Chicago media took pains to be critical of the song. Big deal. It's simple, it's upbeat, it's bouncy, it's written by a Chicagoan, it's perfect for the situation at hand, but it's not his best work, all right? And you could tell, because his best work was better than anybody else's best work.
In the broader popular culture, Goodman might be best known for writing "City of New Orleans," one of the finest, most touching slices of Americana in song that you're ever going to hear. As the folksinger Arlo Guthrie told the story countless times on stage, Goodman handed off the song to him and asked him to give it to Johnny Cash. As Guthrie relates the story, he didn't see Cash for some time, possibly because he was consciously trying to avoid him. Guthrie knew a great song when he heard it. "City of New Orleans" became a big hit for him, and his rendition of the best railroad song in the long history of railroad songs was worth the effort.
Goodman, for those of us who had the privilege to know him even a little, had a career far bigger than that one song. He had a beautiful, rich voice, and his stage presence was much bigger than his stature would seem to allow. His songwriting had a unique sensibility about it. It was evocative, it was intelligent, but it had a common touch to it. He was like a musical Studs Terkel in that way. He put out a series of albums that always contained wonderful songs, and typically met with more critical acclaim than commercial success. If you ever had a chance to see him in one of those cozy old venues like the Earl Of Old Town, nothing else existed while you watched, just Goodman and his songs.
But like a lot of people, in a lot of different walks of life, Goodman had this lifelong affection/obsession regarding the Chicago Cubs. What set him apart was his ability to write songs about what often came down to a heartbreaking situation. You wish that Goodman had been alive this autumn to find the lyrics and the music to suit the 97-victory season, best-record-in-the-National League, followed by three-games-and-out in the postseason, six runs scored, no games won, oh, no, not again. A situation so Cubs as that, all hope and glory followed by defeat and despair, could use a Goodman song.
But maybe it already had a Goodman song. More than "Go Cubs Go," the Goodman song that embodied the Cubs fan experience was and is "A Dying Cub Fan's Last Request." This is the chorus:
Do they still play the blues in Chicago
When baseball season rolls around
When the snow melts away
Do the Cubbies still play
In their ivy-covered burial ground?
When I was a boy, they were my pride and joy
But now they only bring fatigue
To the home of the free
The land of the brave
And the doormat of the National League.
The current Cubs may have moved beyond "the doormat of the National League" description -- the song was written in the early 1980s -- but the emotion once again remained valid this October. This is a song about a man who is dying, who is bitter that his lifetime dream of the Cubs' ultimate success has been repeatedly crushed. And yet, of course, it is also hilarious.
What the dying Cubs fan wants is a Wrigley Field funeral. It is a trademark of Goodman songs that the general theme and the specific detail are both completely in order. For instance:
It's a beautiful day for a funeral,
Hey, Ernie, let's play two!
Somebody go get Jack Brickhouse to come back,
And conduct just one more interview.
Have the Cubbies run right out into the middle of the field,
Have Keith Moreland drop a routine fly
Give everybody two bags of peanuts and a Frosty Malt,
And I'll be ready to die.
The record is going to sadly show that, after a long battle with leukemia, Goodman died at age 36 in 1984, just before the Cubs clinched a division title.
But it is no stretch at all to say that Goodman's spirit lives on in all of the music he left us. And in this particular song, he left us with the ability to take disappointment and defeat and turn them into a series of smiles. That's a human triumph. And it is Chicago Shorty's never-ending gift to his fellow Cubs fans.
Mike Bauman is a national columnist for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
Now, this little ditty descriped and explained oh so well in the above article has become a tradition on the Kev Show every opening day !
Please enjoy this little tribute to the 2008 Cubs, that yes, once again fell short: (and no, I did not put it together!)
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