Chris - My Cardinals Conversion

Baseball has been part of my life for a long, long time. My Grandpa O’Brien used to play catch with me in his backyard, starting when I was 5 or so years old. That grew into taking me to see the Quad City Angels, our local Class A minor league team, with my brother Kevin. When Kevin turned 8 he started playing baseball, an activity that became the focus of our family‘s summer activities for years. I enjoyed the games immensely, never putting any thought into why — there was just an appeal to watching night after night all summer long. Then my pre-teen hormones realized just how fun watching baseball, or at least Kevin‘s teammates, could be.

Boys also are what made me a Chicago Cubs (yes, that’s correct) fan one Saturday in June 1983. My family was at my Grandma’s house and the Cubs and Cardinals were playing the NBC game of the week. Although I‘d been to some games at Wrigley Field with my family, I wasn‘t a Major League Baseball fan nor paying attention to the game. The Cubs had the bases loaded when Kevin announced he‘d give everyone $5 each if the player coming to bat hit a home run. This caught my interest. I watched — and I‘ll be damned if number 7 didn‘t smack the ball over the ivy-covered Wrigley wall. As the camera zoomed in for a close-up when he crossed the plate, I realized just how cute number 7, Jody Davis, was. A Cub fan was instantly created. (Of course I never got the $5.)

My devotion took off from there. 1984 — when the Cubs won the division and went to the playoffs — was an incredible season, although as a new fan I didn‘t quite realize the historical rarity of it. The Cubs became a daily part of my life, as I made a point of watching or listening to every game I could. The radio was my salvation during the long days of working in a factory during college summers. In 1986 I heard Harry Caray interview Ned Colletti, then the Cubs director of media relations (now the Los Angeles Dodgers general manager), and Harry asked how many people worked in the department. Ned detailed the personnel, mentioning a summer intern. I thus had a goal.

Youthful determination and tremendous luck combined to get me that very internship in 1988. I worked from January to June and for the first night game (both the rainy one on 8/8/88 and the official one the following night). It was an experience. Parts of it were great: I loved walking to work down Clark Street, going through the door and then making my way around inside Wrigley Field. It was exciting to meet and work with the Chicago media people and with broadcasters Harry Caray, Steve Stone and Dewayne Staats. It was thrilling to meet the players when the occasion arose. (Never would I have guess then Jamie Moyer, now 47, would be the only one still playing 22 years later!) There was exhilaration to doing research, especially when necessitated by the game in progress – this was in the pre-Internet days, so I would page through old media guides and reference books in Ned’s office to find out a statistic or the last time something happened. Answering the phone was fun, since there were such a variety of calls and requests each day. (Amazing the number of people who call the Cubs to get an answer for a bet.) But parts of it were very eye-opening. Hearing a Cub player complain about how broke he was when he probably made $500,000 a year compared to my $500 a month as an intern was a bit hard to take. I interviewed for a permanent position that opened up in the publications department that seemed very promising, yet learned a valuable life lesson: the most qualified person doesn’t necessarily get the job. As the months went by, I realized it was all so ... ordinary, not all that much different than the temporary office jobs I‘d held the previous summer. Incident by incident added up to make me realize baseball is a business, not the ideal I'd romanticized it to be. I was too naive to know it before then. But baseball was no longer fun like it used to be.

I did pay attention to the Cubs the rest of the 1988 season. After that, however, I mostly avoided it for many years — until Harry Caray died in February 1998. Seeing the news coverage instantly brought me to tears. Memories flooded back and I was surprised how much I missed what was once such a big part of my life. In April, I watched the Cubs opening day game. Slowly I found myself being drawn back into the Cubs and, by July, they were a part of my daily routine again. In August, I went to a game at Wrigley Field for the first time in five years and, after finally putting the strange memories of my internship aside, was completely caught up in that whirlwind season. September was unbelievable, with the Cubs playing the Cardinals when Mark McGwire made baseball history with his 61st and 62nd home runs, and Sammy Sosa's own 61st and 62nd homers less than a week later. It was impossible not to be touched by what was happening.

On Opening Day 1999, I was at Wrigley with some friends and Sammy was directly in front of our upper deck seats. During the game I was disturbed to see him paying no attention to the game and looking around when people would call his name, which was frequently. He would do his famous kissy gesture and wave. I watched the other outfielders, thinking maybe the lag between pitches gave them time to relax, but they were focused on the game. And as the afternoon continued, it was disappointing to see no one around us paying attention to the game at all. It was a big outdoor sports bar and the more people drank, the more obnoxious they got. A fight broke out over people throwing peanuts and some were thankfully kicked out. The Cubs lost the game, just the start of their plunge to the depths of the National League Central that year. My attention waned from the day-to-day concentration of 1998. The renewed gladness at again being a Cub fan didn't last.

That September, I went to a Cardinals-Cubs game at Wrigley with a friend who loved Mark McGwire. We got to the ballpark early, hoping to see him take batting practice, and found ourselves among a group of 100 others around the first base dugout. We watched Cardinal after Cardinal take his turn in the cage for nearly an hour, as both the crowd and our expectations grew. The most surprising thing was the silence, as an almost reverential hush filled the air. Even Sammy racing across the infield elicited only a small cheer from the rightfield bleachers. Only when the Cubs grounds crew began removing the batting cage did the crowd disperse. There was still such quiet — no booing, no complaining, no yelling. All that changed when the game started, of course. There were home runs, although not by Mark or Sammy, and the Cubs won 5-3. But watching batting practice was unlike anything I‘d ever experienced, all due to that unmistakable aura that surrounded Mark McGwire without even being on the field. It definitely made an impact.

As the season ended, my uncle Jim (a die-hard Cardinals fan) began e-mailing me articles about the many trades and acquisitions the Cards were making. I‘m not sure why he did this, other than he recently purchased a computer and spent hours online reading newspapers from across the country. I would respond to these articles with messages like, "Hey, the Cubs got a new manager." But it was growing difficult not to be impressed with what I was reading about the Cardinals. They also had a disappointing 1999 but were being very active in the off-season, completely revamping their pitching staff, acquiring a leadoff hitter and more. At the same time, I watched what the Cubs were doing — it wasn‘t much, which was disappointing considering the 1999 season. Why wasn‘t there ever a real push to improve and win consistently? Why did the Cubs have to continually be so Cub-like?

Then strange thoughts that even a year before would have been laughable began running through my mind: could I stop liking the Cubs? The “lovable loser” routine was getting old. What would it be like to really believe a team can do well, and support a team like the Cardinals that is serious and has a chance? But, then again, how could I give up on the Cubs — especially after all I‘d been through with them? And what was I doing thinking about a team such as the Cardinals? Names like Tommy Herr and Jack Clark would pop into my head — I hated the Cardinals all those years as any Cub fan should, and especially despised those players — to chase those thoughts away momentarily. But, quite surprisingly, not completely.

A trip to Busch Stadium for the second and third games of the 2000 season (against the Cubs) sealed the deal on becoming a Cardinals fan. It wasn't necessarily that the Cards pounded the Cubs in both games. It was more the atmosphere at Busch that did it: everyone wearing red, fans so knowledgeable and friendly and paying attention and even keeping score. So what if it was a cookie-cutter round stadium – there had definitely been improvements made (like no more Astroturf) since I’d been there with my family in the 1980s. Plus it had those cute arches ringing the top of the stadium. All in all, just being there felt comfortable and right.

But following the Cardinals proved to be a challenge in northwestern Illinois. Being located two-and-a-half hours from the Chicago area and four hours from St. Louis makes this Cubs country, so television and radio broadcasts are plentiful. The Cardinals are on a somewhat local station – one from a town about 30 miles away that was usually clear on my car radio, though not necessarily inside my house. I spent the 2000 season mostly listening to radio broadcasts, although that gave me the opportunity to learn and appreciate the Cardinals from Jack Buck when the team was home. Hearing Joe Buck on the radio with his dad was pleasurable also, and I loved hearing Joe and Mike Shannon do road games. It was a treat when they played the Cubs or Braves or were on ESPN or Fox – finally, a chance to see these guys on television! In August I went to a game in Milwaukee with some friends and was publicly acknowledged (by a beer vendor) as a Cardinals fan for the first time. What a thrill!

And it was a thrilling season to be a Cardinals fan – all the off-season moves paid off with a division win and a trip to the playoffs. I took the afternoon off work to watch game one of the division series, then stared at the television in disbelief at Rick Ankiel’s meltdown. The Cardinals easily took care of the Braves that series, which was amazing. My team was moving on in the playoffs – new territory for me! The NLCS was easier to take, though. I knew how to handle my team losing in the post-season.

In the spring of 2001, I invested in DirecTV to have the opportunity to watch the Cardinals regularly. A local station started bringing the Sunday games several years ago, meaning the Cardinals are now readily available to me on television – quite the upgrade from 2000.

Becoming a Cardinals fan came surprisingly easy for me, but this conversion caused much controversy and ridicule from my friends, co-workers and family (except for Jim, of course). That was fine; winning beats all. More than once, however, I was told that I’d be back following the Cubs when they made it.

So how did I handle the 2003 post-season? I was sick over the Cubs dash through the division series and into the NLCS. As the games went along and even the local press coverage increased, I was in a constant state of panic – what was going on? The Cubs really couldn’t make it to the World Series, could they? I was silently rooting against them. On the day of game six, a co-worker taunted me about how tonight was going to be the night. All I could say was that I hoped Mark Prior pitched the worst game of his career. Of course I had to watch the game, and it became a nightmare for me as it went along. Then, of course, the tide turned. As the Marlins scored run after run in that fateful Bartman inning, I had to share the moment with someone who would understand my emotions: Jim. All we could do was laugh. The next morning, arriving at work, I didn’t say a word to my co-worker – I didn’t even have a chance. “It’s all your fault!” she yelled at me. I talked to Kevin later that day and told him there was still game seven that night. “Doesn’t matter,” he said. “They won’t win.”

The next year, of course, the Cardinals prevailed in the NLCS (and I had the thrill of attending games one and two) and went on to the World Series. A team I was following kept winning and reached the next step! However, that’s where my memories of the 2004 season end … And the pinnacle of my Cardinals fandom so far is 2006. Game seven of the NLCS, the most simultaneously excruciating and exciting game ever, sent them back to the World Series. And when Chris Carpenter was pitching in game three of the World Series, while the Tigers were making error after error, it suddenly hit me: my team was going to win this! Every year, at some point in the playoffs, there’s a moment when I instinctively know what the outcome is going to be. And this time, those 83-regular-season-win Cardinals that the sports media couldn’t stop mocking were going to be World Champions!

Needless to say, becoming a Cardinals fan has been completely worth it and enjoyable beyond belief. It’s not just because of the Cardinals’ success during these 10 seasons I’ve been a fan – although seven trips to the playoffs, five to the NLCS, two to the World Series and one World Championship doesn’t hurt. But it’s more that feeling I noticed at Busch Stadium in April 2000, the one that was comfortable and right. This is the best baseball decision I could have made.