And In The Beginning...

Former NL MVP Dale Murphy once said that “Playing baseball is not real life. It's a fantasy world. It's a dream come true.”

Clearly, Dale Murphy never played for the Cubs.

It’s trendy nowadays to either belittle the Cubs, as they so seemingly deserve, or crown them champions of one pennant or another before they’ve even sniffed the grass at Minute Maid Park. Thirteen years ago I started an experiment called “What Life Is Like As A Cubs Fan,” and it’s safe to say that the results have been mixed.

Drewtopia seems to be one of them.

Instead of withholding all of the anger, resentment, unadulterated joy and occasional sighs of relief, I’m going to be sharing it here for those with stomachs big enough to handle it. Consider this a place you can go if you want to watch me take literary target practice against Alfonso Soriano’s hop or Prince Fielder’s belt size.

Hell, Dale Murphy, you’re even invited as well.

I’ll stay true to myself and my convictions as a disgruntled, often-naïve Cubs fan until someone decides to offer me enough money to stop. So, here are some of my unrivaled predictions and rants, minutes before the Cubs take the field for the 2009 season. Enjoy:

I promise not to be a jaded Cubs fan this year. I said this last year, and by the end of June I joined every disillusioned media outlet by claiming that they had a shot. That this was the year. That the Lollipop Guild from the Wizard of Oz wasn’t terrifying. Nope. Not anymore. No more lies. I’ll admit the Central is for the taking, but the last thing I need is to spend another October night in a bar drinking cheap beer with lonely Royals fans. I’m going to give realism a shot.

Len Kasper and Bob Brenly will be deserving of their own reality TV show by the end of the season. Seriously. This is one of the best tandems in baseball. If FOX was willing to give Temptation Island a shot and NBC is still fondling the animal nesting on Donald Trump’s head, then these two can at least score a deal on The CW or Bravo.

Hope does NOT spring eternal. I don’t care who you are or what prescription drug you’re siphoning off from your friends at the local pharmacy, the Seattle Mariners are not going to win it all. Neither are the Brewers. Or the Pirates. Or anyone else from the NL Central, including the Cubs. At some point, to minimize the heartbreak and prevent yourself from aimlessly wandering around Chicago after Game 3 and trying to make it to Canada by walking through Lake Michigan, you have to come to terms with reality. The Cubs have a legit team this year, but I’m willing to say on Day One that this team isn’t going to do it. It doesn’t matter that our record is 0-0 and we have just as good a chance as anyone. Hope is a commodity that teams with airtight bullpens enjoy.

[Side Note: By eliminating the Cubs from contention on Day One, I’m hoping that A) The Baseball Gods accept the fact that I’m playing the role of the realist this season and reward me with a few unexpected surprises, maybe even a postseason win, or B) The bullpen reads this, uses it as bulletin board material and joins the Pantheon of Historic Bullpens, or C) I don’t pin a few months worth of hope on a team that hasn’t been able to consummate its marriage to its fans in over 100 years. It’s my three-pronged minimize the suffering assault]

I will never, under any circumstances, name or blame 2003’s most misunderstood fan. Stick with Alex Gonzalez botching the double play ball or Dusty not keeping tabs on Prior. Blaming the other guy is almost as bad as admitting to playing Magic: The Gathering. Seriously.

I will only confess my love for the Cubs 10 times this season. The Cubs do for your love life what Lisa Lampanelli would do for internet porn: unnecessary disaster. I’ve dated White Sox fans. I’ve dated Cubs fans. It doesn’t make a difference. No girl ever wants to be slotted behind a baseball team on your Things I Love lineup card. Admitting that is almost as helpful as the natural male enhancement tools being advertised between the hours of 2 and 5 am on Saturday mornings. This one is really for the best.

I’ll take it easy on Derrek Lee. Professional sports is a “what have you done for me lately” world, and lately Derrek Lee hasn’t done much offensively. Defensively, he’s about as good as Brett Michaels is at finding ways to keep his career alive [Insert shameless Rock of Love Season Finale plug here]. This is where you find out who the true Cubs fans are and who is a fan of the Cubs themselves. What I mean by that is this: we all remember what Lee did for this team in 2005. That was a morbid year, and Lee legitimately contended for the Triple Crown at one point in the season. He’s an advocate for his family, even going as far as starring on an episode of ER when they agreed to highlight a disease that his daughter was suffering from. He tried to beat the Padres by himself. Literally. Ask Chris Young. The list goes on-and-on. I feel terrible pushing for Micah Hoffpauir [try spelling that without Wikipedia] at first base, but the truth is he’s hitting and should probably see A LOT of at bats this season. But Derrek Lee is a gamer, and no matter what Hoffpauir does or Lee doesn’t, I can’t turn on him. I’m getting soft in my old age. Plus, there’s always the hope he’ll pull a Kyle Farnsworth on someone. Just maybe.

I WILL turn on Alfonso Soriano. And so will the rest of Chicago if he drops a single fly ball because of that godforsaken hop that screams BRANT BROWN every time I see him do it. For those of you who don’t remember who Brown was, just ask Ron Santo. He’ll relive that one for you. Back to the matter at hand: the kid has all of the talent in the world, but his head is a mess. His fundamentals are about as sound as Nicholas Cage’s film career; you know they’re out there, but they aren’t doing the public any good. Enough. Soriano is making more money than God and A-Rod combined. No? Not really. But he’s making too much to continue to be mediocre. I can live with the Moonwalk to first base if it means three-homer games on occasion; I can’t live with the hop and poor plate approaches, especially if/when he finds himself in the lead off spot.

I will continue to unequivocally hate Notre Dame without exception and hold Jeff Samardzija to an unbelievably high, unfair standard. We all have our targets. Some choose the Yankees. Some choose Duke. Some choose dairy products. I chose Notre Dame. Deal with it.

If in fact they do win it all, and they’re not playing Cleveland in the World Series, I hope they bring Kerry Wood back in some capacity. He wasn’t Santo. He wasn’t Banks. But to my generation, a generation plagued with steroids rumors and Clue-like scenarios, he was a landmark. He was the Cubs. I’ll even pay for his World Series tickets if it means he gets to be there when they do it. After all, he should be the one on the mound closing it out at Wrigley Field. You can hold me to that.

And there you have it. Let’s see what 2009 has in store for legions of unhealthy, disillusioned, but always entertaining Cubs fans.

Welcome to Drewtopia.