Ernie Banks' reputation as THE greatest Cub has been apparent for so long, even evident during his days as an active player, that it has become a cliché, obscuring his true magnitude. He is not a first tier Hall of Famer (e.g. Aaron, Ruth, Mays), but is at the top of what may be called the "second class", and that's not intended as a slight. However, he was definitely headed for that first tier in the early years of his career, only to be derailed by serious injury. Indeed, a large part of Ernie's greatness is that he overcame that obstacle to achieve as much as he did.

Ernie's public presence, invariably sunny, and his instantly recognizable catchphrases ("The Cubs will be fine in nineteen sixty-nine!", "Let's play two!", and he is personally responsible for dubbing Wrigley Field "the Friendly Confines"), has also served to shroud his greatness; it is part of the cliché that he is the greatest Cub as much for all of this, as for his baseball performance. This is a shame, as his achievements on the field can, and do, speak for themselves.

A fairly obvious question forms and must, thus, be asked: how real is the "Mr. Cub" persona? The greatest athletes have no illusions about what is required, mentally and psychologically, as well as physically, to achieve and maintain such a high level of performance. Even so self-effacing a personality as Ryne Sandberg displayed the competitive drive, and near killing instinct, that all players need at that level; it was apparent, however subtly, in everything he did on the field. Nothing in Ernie's outward demeanor, at any time, has ever betrayed any of these qualities.

If what Banks showed all of us in public is absolutely genuine, the only way he could have been as great is to have been the athletic equivalent of a savant. In the absence of any cracks in the façade, it can be viewed as a Potemkin village, hiding a much more intense and profound personality, one that Ernie had no intention of displaying before his fans.

Bill Bryson, a well-respected chronicler of modern life, in his recent book "The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid", tells of meeting Banks one day in Chicago, when he was accompanying his sportswriter father on a road trip; this anecdote clearly shows the image Banks wanted to present, especially to a child:

The photo you see at the top of this profile was taken the day Banks arrived at Wrigley Field for the first time, in 1953, before the game face became permanent. You can see his physical power in those hands and forearms, and in the wrists that Jack Brickhouse spoke of on Cubs telecasts so many times; they are the source of those five hundred twelve home runs.

But there is no sunshine in this countenance. The smile isn't forced or unnatural, the eyes are wary and searching. This is the Banks of Texas and Kansas City, the one who had to fight for the position he'd just reached, in a manner no one who wasn't a black man during that time and place can possibly understand.

Ernest Banks was born in Dallas on January 31, 1931. Or maybe he wasn't -- in the last few years, some unconfirmed research has indicated that he might have been born on that date in 1925. Ernie's mother is still living, aged 95, and perhaps the birth date was altered in order to save her the embarrassment of people knowing she had given birth at age 19. We may never know the truth, but if in fact he is six years older than he always has claimed to be, then he had a 100-RBI season at the age of 44, in 1969, long after he was a dominant player, still good enough for fifth in the National League that year. (From here on, I am assuming that his "official" 1931 birth date is correct.)

After Jackie Robinson had broken the color barrier in the major leagues, the Negro Leagues began a fairly rapid decline; but in 1949, they were still quite active. That is when a teenage Banks was signed by Buck O'Neil for his Kansas City Monarchs, still the dominant team in black baseball -- and via a recommendation from none other than the Negro League immortal and Hall of Famer, Cool Papa Bell. From O'Neil's book "I Was Right On Time":

And so, that is how Ernie Banks became a Cub (imagine -- based on O'Neil's account, he could just have easily become a member of the White Sox), and also how Buck O'Neil began a decades-long association with the Cubs, an association that brought to the North Side players such as George Altman and Lou Brock, and later, through the draft, players O'Neil had scouted like Oscar Gamble, Lee Smith, and Joe Carter.

In the early 1950's, when not every team had integrated (the last holdout, the Red Sox, would not have their first black player till 1959), teams generally signed two black players as their "firsts". Why? In a sad legacy of racism, it was thought that many white players would not accept a black roommate on the road. Thus, the Cubs also signed second baseman Gene Baker, and both made their major league debuts, the first black players for the Chicago Cubs, in September 1953; Banks on September 17 and Baker on September 20. They would be the Cubs' doubleplay combination for three full seasons, 1954, 1955 and 1956, lasting together until Baker was traded to Pittsburgh early in 1957. In 1954, Banks' 19 HR, 79 RBI, .275/.326/.427 performance was good enough for second place in Rookie of the Year voting (won by Wally Moon) and sixteenth place in MVP balloting, the first of eleven seasons in which he would receive MVP votes. He also was selected (in those pre-fan voting days) to eleven All-Star teams.

Banks was fast becoming a star. Athletic and rangy, he was an early prototype of the sort of shortstop that we have seen over the last twenty-five years in, for example, Cal Ripken and Derek Jeter, hitting for average and power. In the photo above, you can't see his fingers, but anyone who saw him play, particularly on television where you could see closeups, will remember those fingers, moving to and fro on the handle of the bat, just waiting to get locked into position to slam another double or triple or home run.

In the field, while his range factors were above average, so were his error counts -- but he worked hard to improve this, and by 1959, he made only twelve errors in 519 total chances, while still having a superior range factor of 5.13. From his debut, he played in 424 consecutive games until the first of a series of injuries that would prevent him from the top-tier stardom he seemed destined for, a broken hand in 1956. The 424 consecutive games Banks played from the start of his career remains the National League record for such things today (the major league record is now held by Hideki Matsui, who played in 519 consecutive games from the start of his major league career in 2003, until he himself was injured last May).

After he returned from the hand injury, Banks began another consecutive-game streak, which ran for 717 straight games starting on August 26, 1956, and ending on June 23, 1961, when knee problems were beginning to end his time at shortstop and force him to other positions. Ernie sat out that June game voluntarily; the streak and the nagging injuries had apparently begun to press on him.

It was in the years before those knee injuries that Ernie appeared to be heading for the top rank of the record books. From 1955 through 1960, he hit forty or more home runs five times in six seasons. Since then -- a span of forty-six seasons -- only Sammy Sosa, Ken Griffey Jr., Harmon Killebrew and Alex Rodriguez have accomplished that feat; Hall of Famers such as Willie Mays and Henry Aaron, Banks' contemporaries, never did. In 1955, he hit five grand slams, a record that stood for thirty-two years (and still stands as the NL record). The climax to all this production was the back-to-back MVP awards he won in 1958 and 1959, the first time a National Leaguer had won two in a row.

Looking back on those awards from a 2007 perspective, they are even more impressive than they must have seemed at the time. The Cubs were mediocre clubs both those seasons -- losing 82 games and finishing 20 games out of first place in '58, losing 80 and winding up a closer, but still poor, 13 games behind in '59. But Ernie dominated. In 1958 he led the league in: games, at-bats, SLG, total bases, HR, RBI and extra-base hits, and finished second in OPS, and for good measure, second in triples with 11, though he was never much known for having any baserunning speed. He got sixteen of the possible 24 first-place MVP votes. He became only the third Cub to hit forty homers in a season, after Hack Wilson and Hank Sauer, and it would take another twelve years (until Billy Williams hit 42 in 1970) for anyone else to join that exclusive club (since joined by Dave Kingman, Andre Dawson, Ryne Sandberg, Sammy Sosa and Derrek Lee).

He repeated this performance in 1959, including a career-high 143 RBI, eighteen more than anyone else in the majors; he nearly singlehandedly put the Cubs in contention. As late as July 29, 1959, the Cubs stood over .500 at 50-49 and only five games out of first place, but they faded and finished sixth.

Ernie's non-stop power barrage continued in 1960; he led the major leagues with 41 HR, his fourth consecutive forty-homer season. On April 29 against the Cardinals, Ernie's 232nd career HR broke Gabby Hartnett's team record. Just to put an exclamation point on that date, he hit another home run in that game, and drove in all six Cub runs ... in a 16-6 loss. His average declined a bit that year, to .275, and with the Cubs' even poorer performance (a 94-loss season), he finished fourth in MVP voting. At age 29, he had hit 269 career HR, and had averaged 41 HR over the previous six seasons -- had he continued at that pace, he would have broken the 500-HR plateau in 1966, and perhaps headed on towards 600.

But Ernie never made it there. And a clue as to why can be found if you look up his "most-comparable hitter" at age 29. There you find the name... Nomar Garciaparra.

And that's a good comp not only on a statistical basis, but also for another reason, because both Nomar and Ernie suffered career-altering injuries right about that juncture, turning a superstar player into someone just "above average". It appears that Nomar is following precisely the path that Ernie did in resurrecting his career, becoming a very good everyday player, though not at nearly the performance level he had established prior to being hurt (and following the same path across the diamond, too, moving from shortstop to first base). In May 1961, Ernie, off to a decent .281/.360/.529 start, but with only 7 HR and 15 RBI through 33 games, suffered a knee injury that forced him out of the infield. He was moved to left field on May 23, and even played a handful of games at first base before finally, as noted above, benching himself on June 23, ending his streak of 717 consecutive games played. At the time it was the fourth-longest such streak in history, and stood as the Cubs' club record until Billy Williams broke it on June 18, 1968. When Ernie returned, he went back to SS for the rest of the year, but failed to hit 40 HR for the first time since 1956, finishing with 29, and 80 RBI. In an otherwise unremarkable season-ending game on October 1, 1961 at Wrigley Field, in front of 4,325, Ernie Banks played his 1125th and final game at shortstop.

Installed as the Cubs' regular first baseman in 1962 (he also, inexplicably, in that bizarre College of Coaches year, played three games at third base, and played eight others there in 1966), he returned to near his MVP levels with 37 HR and 104 RBI, but his average dropped to .269; he never again hit over .276, nor had an OBA higher than .328, for a single season. The 104 RBI, good for eighth in the NL, are actually fairly impressive for a last-place team that lost 103 games and scored only 632 runs.

In 1963, Ernie had hit 14 HR, though with poor production of .244/.296/.488, when on June 15 he was diagnosed with subclinical mumps. He tried to battle through the rest of the season, but hit only four more home runs and didn't play after September 11. It was the worst year of his career; he finished at only .227. The Cubs had briefly contended that year (standing fourth, 5.5 games out, as late as August 2), the year I attended my first major league game (the Cubs got shut out on three hits -- Ernie had one of them), and finished over .500 for the first time in seventeen seasons. One is left to wonder what they might have done in 1963 had Banks been in his form of three or four years prior.

Two years later, Ernie hit his 400th career HR on September 2 at Wrigley Field off the Cardinals' Curt Simmons, who had also given up Willie Mays' 400th HR and who, a year later, would become Ernie's Cub teammate. And on the final day of the 1965 season, October 3, Ernie and Don Kessinger turned a triple play, the Cubs' third of that year. They lost anyway, 6-3 to the Pirates at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

And then, at age 35, Ernie's life and career were to change irrevocably, with the Cubs' hiring of Leo Durocher as manager for the 1966 season. As you can imagine now, forty years on, Durocher's irascible temperament and Ernie's sunny disposition were a deadly mix. Leo didn't like Ernie and was bound and determined to find a replacement for him. Keep in mind that in the mid-1960's, thirty-five was considered ancient in baseball terms. Nearly all the over-35's in that era were pitchers (example: of the twenty oldest players in the majors in 1966, fifteen were pitchers), and Durocher kept trying "kids" at first base, to try to find Banks' "replacement". For example, John Boccabella, a catcher, played there 30 times in '66. Ernie hit only 15 HR and there were whispers that maybe Durocher was right.

But Banks had turned himself into a good defensive first baseman, and his contributions there weren't unnoticed. In 1967, the Cubs leaped into true contention in midseason and Ernie hit .276/.310/.455, his highest batting average in six years, and drove in 95 runs. The following year, his power stroke came back -- oddly, in a pitcher's year -- and he hit 32 HR in 1968, good for third in the National League.

The 1969 season dawned brightly for both Ernie and the Cubs. On Opening Day, April 8 at Wrigley Field, Ernie hit two homers and drove in five runs, and Willie Smith's extra-inning walkoff launched the ballclub on what we all thought was going to be "the" year; at age 38, Ernie didn't have much baseball time remaining.

On June 30, 1969 in Montreal's Jarry Park, Ernie was cheated out of a home run in one of the freakiest ways in baseball history. It had rained hard for hours before the game that night in Montreal. Jarry Park, in its first major league season and with poor visibility on a good day, had that visibility made much worse by the poor weather and field conditions. In the second inning, Ernie hit a long fly ball which appeared to leave the park. However, it wasn't counted as a home run; read this bizarre PBP:

You're reading that exactly right -- the umpires believed Expos RF Rusty Staub and ruled that the ball went UNDER the fence, thus giving Ernie only a ground-rule double. Had that been credited properly as a home run, Banks would have hit his 500th career HR on May 9, 1970, a game on a sunny Saturday attended by 33,168 (myself included -- this began a whole series of events where I missed seeing major milestones, including Lou Brock's and Robin Yount's 3000th hits, by one), instead of the following Tuesday, May 12, a gloomy, chilly, rainy day, where only 5,264 saw Banks lace a Pat Jarvis pitch into the LF bleachers for baseball history. Asked afterward what he was thinking when he hit it, Ernie said:

Click here to hear Vince Lloyd's WGN radio call of Ernie Banks' 500th home run (opens .mp3 audio file)

Ernie was reaching the end -- he was a backup now, playing in only sixty-two games in 1970 and hitting only twelve HR, and became a player-coach in 1971, with only 83 AB and three home runs, the final, five hundred twelfth, coming on August 24, 1971, off Jim McGlothlin of the Reds. It was around that time that some Cubs players, chafing under Durocher's yoke and frustrated that, as good as they were, they hadn't won, started publicly calling for Leo to be fired. In early September, P. K. Wrigley took out full-page newspaper ads blasting those players, ending with the quote, "If we could only find more team players like Ernie Banks." But Banks' knees could not stand up to the rigors of major league baseball any longer. He played his final major league game on September 26, 1971 at Wrigley Field, the Cubs' last home game of that season, in front of 18,505 appreciative fans, batting cleanup. I'd love to tell you that, like Ted Williams, he hit a home run in his last at-bat, or at least got a hit and was removed for a pinch-runner to an ovation. Unfortunately, Ernie's career ended more prosaically -- with a popup to third base. His final hit was an infield single in the first inning that day; the Cubs lost 5-1. His 2528 games played, fortieth all-time, is the most for any player who never played in the postseason.

As he approached retirement, Ernie didn't seem to know what he wanted to do after baseball. He continued the coaching duties he had begun in 1971 through the 1973 season, though with somewhat undefined duties (primarily, however, he coached first base). On May 8, 1973, manager Whitey Lockman was ejected in the third inning and Ernie took over for the rest of the game, technically becoming the first black manager in baseball history.

He also briefly tried his hand at broadcasting, at which he was, well, not very good. I will never forget one of the nights that he filled in as an evening sportscaster on WGN-TV's nightly news. It may be difficult for many of you to wrap your minds around the fact, in these ESPNized days, that in the early 1970's WGN would not allow taped highlights of Cubs games to be shown on other local stations' newscasts -- and for years, the other stations in town had to send a separate single camera to Wrigley Field to record their own highlights. This was done in an effort to try to boost the ratings for WGN's own news programs. Anyway, Ernie sat down on the news set one night after he himself had homered, and when the appropriate highlight was about to be aired, he said, memorably: "In the third inning, I came up.", followed by Jack Brickhouse's call of his home run.

After that, the Cubs put him on the payroll as a roving goodwill ambassador, something you'd think would be a natural job for Ernie. And he was good at it. Too good, in fact -- Ernie's problem was that he was both too nice and too disorganized. Any time a group would invite him to speak, he'd say yes, leading, inevitably, to him not showing up somewhere because he'd booked two engagements at the same time.

In 1977, Ernie was elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility, named on 83.8% of the ballots. In the unenlightened days of Wrigley ownership, the Cubs didn't believe in retiring uniform numbers, though no one wore Ernie's #14 after he finished playing [want a good trivia question? Who was the last player to wear #14 before Ernie? Paul Schramka, who played in two games in April 1953 and never returned to the majors. Others who wore #14 were: Guy Bush(1932), Zack Taylor (1933), Charlie Root (1934), Larry French (1935-41), Ken Raffensberger (1941), Lou Novikoff (1942), and Vallie Eaves (1942)]. Finally, after the Cubs were sold by the Wrigleys, Ernie's #14 was retired, the first Cub uniform number to be so honored, on August 22, 1982.

Since then, Ernie has spent his days being the image he created, Mr. Cub. In 1984, he was asked to throw out the first ball before game one of the NLCS -- and he did so, but not until he had bowed deeply to everyone in the ballpark, including us in the bleachers, thanking those who had supported and loved and cheered for him for his nineteen seasons as a Cubs player, more years spent in the uniform as a player than anyone other than Cap Anson and Phil Cavarretta.

Ernie Banks' rankings on the all-time Cub lists (ML rank in parentheses where in the top forty):

Games: 2528, 1st (40th)
At-bats: 9421, 1st (39th)
Runs: 1305, 5th
Hits: 2583, 2nd
SLG: .500, 7th
Total bases: 4706, 1st (27th)
Doubles: 407, 3rd
Triples: 90, 7th
Home runs: 512, 2nd (17th)
RBI: 1636, 2nd (22nd)
Bases on balls: 763, 8th
Extra-base hits: 1009, 1st (25th)
Intentional walks: 198, 1st (11th)

As noted at the top of this profile, it's hard to tell whether Ernie's happy-go-lucky, sunshiny personality is really who he is, or whether he's using it as a mask to cover hurts in his personal life (at one point in his life, he went through a bitter divorce in which he lost virtually all the memorabilia from his baseball career), hurts he cannot bring himself to think of or speak of. He appears cheerful and bright, but may hide unspoken storms beneath.

Reports circulating at the Cubs Convention last month from people who saw Ernie were a bit distressing ... they said he was starting to repeat stories over and over, and sounded a bit weary and confused. He is now seventy-six years old, and perhaps nearing the end of a memorably spent life -- a life filled with accomplishment and joy brought both to himself and millions of Cub fans who admired his play on the field and his cheerful demeanor off it. For both the sunshine and the statistics, Ernie Banks is, and perhaps shall forever be, the greatest Chicago Cub.

Memories. Ernie at the plate, in the Wrigley sunshine, immortalized forever:

Courtesy of Jeff Suntala

Ernie Banks' career stats at baseball-reference.com

Chicago Daily News negatives collection, SDN-009578. Courtesy of the Chicago Historical Society. Photo taken in 1911.

Profile by BCB cartoonist Mike

Cap Anson was a larger-than-life figure who came to personify major-league baseball during its first quarter-century. He is generally recognized as the greatest 19th-century player, and his accomplishments on the field remain impressive over one hundred years after his retirement. He played 27 years at the highest levels the game then had to offer, and was a regular the entire span. He was the embodiment of the National League its first 22 seasons, all played for Chicago.

Anson is probably the single most important figure in Cubs history, and one of the handful of most important in the game's history. He was the preeminent figure in Chicago sport for nearly half a century, remaining a national celebrity long after his retirement from the majors. In that time he progressed from "Baby", to "Captain", to "Pop". The team was named the "White Stockings" by its founders, but its succeeding apellations were acquired based on Anson's trials and tribulations. They became the "Colts" when Anson's veterans were sold, and the "Orphans" when he left, in bitterness and anger.

Anson's life is the saga of the America he lived in. Born on the frontier, he became an urban sophisticate, a world traveler, a paragon of the virtues and values of his era; including great flaws for which history would be unforgiving. Our modern judgments of Anson, as a player and a man, would have astounded his contemporaries, and differ dramatically from what they were even a generation ago. It is an object lesson on the transience of even the most secure credoes and reputations.

Strictly as a player, Anson has cause to be ranked first in this list. That Ernie Banks remains on top is a reflection on Anson's and Sosa's negatives. Sammy's are well enough known. The baseball of Anson's time is not to be compared, in athletic quality or competitiveness, with the game that developed later. Ernie remains the number one man, in our considered opinion.

Henry Anson, and untold thousands like him, built the Midwest, and the families that they raised there, in their image. Born in New York, raised in Michigan, and wed in Ohio, he looked west to make his life. He packed his wife, Jeannette, and two small sons into a prairie schooner and set out for Iowa. He housed his family temporarily in Illinois while he made his final search alone.

The frontier of the 1850s is more usually regarded as the Great Plains and beyond, but most of the new states carved out of, and alongside, the old Northwest Ordinance were equally wild and unsettled. Iowa had been admitted to the Union only five years before. The Black Hawk War had been fought in the area only twenty years before. The Sac and Fox tribes had ceded their land rights by treaty less than a decade earlier. The chieftain Keokuk, a rival of Black Hawk's whose accommodations with the whites would allow Henry Anson and his family to live on the land they chose, had died in his namesake village only three years previously.

Henry Anson chose a tract almost exactly in the center of the state, on high ground along the divide between Linn Creek and the Iowa River. There, in summer, 1851, he raised a log cabin and established his claims. He returned to Illinois to retrieve his family, and they arrived at the homestead that autumn. In that log cabin, Henry's third son was born April 17, 1852, the first white child born in the area. He was named Adrian Constantine, in honor of two Michigan villages in which his father had lived in his youth. Melville and Sturgis, the older sons, had been born in Ohio. Melville would die in Iowa before 1860, aged about ten.

Henry Anson named his settlement Marshall. When informed, at the establishment of the post office, that a Marshall already existed in Iowa, he expanded the name to Marshalltown. He had hoped to found the future state capital, but Marshalltown would become a county seat instead. Henry was not the first settler of any kind, a Potawatomi chief, Che Meuse (adopted name Johnny Green), was living in the area, and proved invaluable in assisting Anson and his followers in their ventures and progress. The children of Che Meuse's tribe would become the first playmates of the young Anson brothers.

Iowa had been admitted to the Union under provisions of the Missouri Compromise of 1820, slavery was illegal there. But the Iowa legislature, as a territory and later as a state, passed restrictive "black codes", forbidding immigration of free African-Americans, and denying basic rights to those already present. All the new states of the Midwest enacted, or had enacted, similar laws. Illinois, though admitted as a free state, (before the Compromise), allowed previous slavery to exist under a "grandfather clause" until 1845. Iowa would not allow the vote to blacks until 1865, and at that was the first midwestern state to do so. These were the values, and the attitudes, prevalent even within the free territory of the North. They were the common currency of Adrian's upbringing, alongside the more usual traditional values of the time.

As the privileged son of the founding father of the region, Adrian Anson grew up confident, secure, and arrogant. The town grew with, and around him; his father was farmer, surveyor, land agent, justice of the peace, hotelier, and county supervisor. Young Anson romped in the woods with his Potawatomi pals. It was a boyhood of the sort later found in storybooks. Adrian was headstrong by nature, and was a wild, overbearing child. He was also a physical prodigy, large from an early age, finding satisfaction only in athletic challenge and competition. Chores and responsibility, essentials on the frontier, were beneath his youthful dignity.

Jeannette Anson died in 1859, and Henry's sister Emily moved to Marshalltown to help raise the brothers. In an effort to impose some structure onto his sons' characters, Henry Anson sent them to Notre Dame, and later to State University in Iowa City. These sojourns did nothing to tame Adrian's nature, he was asked to leave both institutions after brief stays. (Both allowed, at that time, prep enrollments as young as 14, Adrian's age when he entered ND). Adrian and Sturgis played ball for these colleges, and joined the town team, the Marshalltown Stars, upon returning home.

The Stars, anchored by Henry Anson and his sons, became a local powerhouse, winning the Iowa state championship in 1868. Adrian was second team until 1866, and his desire to make the "varsity" changed his attitudes and behavior. Adrian had now found his passion, to which he would bring his energy, newfound discipline, and moral code. But there was nothing in Marshalltown to further the professional ambitions of a ballplayer, Adrian would need a chance from elsewhere. And then, in the summer of 1870, one came marching straight into town.

In 1870 the Forest City professional baseball club, based in Rockford, Illinois,led by Albert Spalding, the greatest pitcher of the day, embarked on a tour of the Midwest. They stayed two days in Marshalltown, and played two games with the local team, winning by the surprisingly competitve (by Forest City standards) scores of 18-3 and 35-5. They were impressed by the play of the Ansons, and sent contract offers to all three after the tour was completed. Henry had no intention of leaving the town and businesses he had founded, and Sturgis, too, preferred to make his future in Iowa. But Adrian saw his life's chance, and in the spring of 1871, aged barely nineteen, he began his professional career in Rockford, at a salary of $66 per month.

Rockford belonged to the newly-formed National Association, regarded by many historians as the first major league. It was certainly recognized at the time as a league outranking all others. Spalding had departed for the east coast, playing for Boston; and Rockford, deprived of its biggest star and gate attraction, finished last in its initial, and only, NA season. Rockford was the smallest, and most westerly, of the Association's cities, and hence the most vulnerable. The team folded at the close of `71, after compiling a 4-21 record within the league. Anson had emerged as the team's undisputed star, leading the club by a wide margin in almost every batting category. Anson was offered a position on the Philadelphia Athletics for 1872, at a huge raise, and accepted. In the fall of 1871, Anson became a big-city boy for good, moving to Philadelphia, at the new salary of $1250 per season.

Anson played for Philadelphia 1872-75, the remaining years of the NA, and became, over that time, one of the biggest stars in the game. As baseball itself gained in popularity, the quality of players, salaries, and facilities followed suit. Philadelphia was competitive in these years, but Boston, led by Spalding, was the power of the league, winning all four pennants `72-'75.

Anson was an all-purpose infielder in these earliest days, but his reputation, then and later, would be made with his bat. In his last year at Philadelphia, his salary rose to $1800 per season. He also acquired his first experience as a manager, piloting the Athletics at the end of the season on an interim basis.

In the summer of 1874, Anson was part of the Spalding-organized exhibition tour of England, Scotland, and Ireland, an attempt to proselytize the game in what was hoped to be fertile foreign soil. The Boston and Philadelphia teams made the trip, playing in Liverpool, Manchester, London, Sheffield, and Dublin. The two teams would play one another in a competitve baseball game, then combine to play a cricket match against a local British team. The English were not impressed by baseball ("Why, it's only rounders", said the future Edward VII), but were taken with the American skill at cricket, the "colonials" won several of the matches.

The tour was a financial loss, but it gave Anson a taste of travel, and a sense of the possibilities within his profession for organizational and leadership roles. He and Spalding renewed acquaintances, and a long-lasting and productive friendship began.

Spalding was plotting a professional coup, along with the owner of the Association's Chicago franchise, William Hulbert. The NA had developed fatal flaws; drunkenness, gambling, and bribery had become common. Hulbert and Spalding were convinced that big-time baseball had a future, provided its financial and moral tone could be elevated. They saw themselves as the men to do so, saviors of the new game.

Hulbert assembled representatives of seven other potential ownership groups in New York City in February, 1876, and presented his proposal, and constitution, for a new league. The National League, with a membership of eight clubs, was founded February 2, 1876, adopting Hulbert's constitution almost without change. The NL forbade use of alcohol by players, or its sale at parks. It forbade gambling, with a lifetime ban imposed on players caught "fixing" games. It forbade scheduled games on the Sabbath. All these measures were necessary at that moment, but most would become anachronisms within a few years. Hulbert handed the presidency of the league to a figurehead for the first year, then assumed it himself in 1877, turning the Chicago team presidency over to Spalding.

Hulbert and Spalding's first order of business was to assemble a strong hometown team represenatative of their ideas. Spalding himself joined the Chicago club, bringing Boston stars Deacon White, Cal McVey, and Ross Barnes with him. Spalding then recommended Anson to Hulbert. Anson was an attractive catch; a young star, retaining the local fame from his Rockford days, and he had already made a reputation as a moral standard-bearer. Anson did not smoke or gamble, and was a publicly devout man. He was not (yet) a teetotaller, he indulged in an occasional good time. (During one such indulgence, in Philadelphia, he was dressed down by his future wife, who encounted him, inebriated, on the public way).

Hulbert offered Anson a salary of $2000, and a contract was signed. But a complication arose, Adrian's fiancee in Philadelphia, Virginia Fiegal, daughter of a prominent businessman,   refused to move to Chicago. Anson went so far as to offer Hulbert $1000 for his release, but was turned down. The differences were eventually smoothed over, Adrian and Virginia were married in November, 1876, and took up residence in Chicago. Their marriage was happy and lasting, although tinged by personal tragedies. The couple had seven children; four daughters survived, three sons died in infancy.

The Chicago White Stockings of 1876, with Spalding as manager and pitcher, won the first NL pennant handily, not necessarily a healthy result for a brand-new league. It hurt the gate, and led to the league's first crises; New York and Philadelphia, assured of losing money,  refused to make their final road trips. Louisville players were caught throwing meaningless games. New York and Philadelphia were expelled from the league, the Louisville players were banned. The NL made up the gap by recruiting teams from smaller eastern cities, and was back to eight clubs by 1879.

Anson played at third base in 1876, batting .343. But Spalding was the star, with a record of 47-13, pitching, as was the custom, almost every game. Anson had solid seasons in `77 and `78, hitting .337 and .341, playing several positions in the field. But the team declined sharply.  Spalding's arm finally broke down in `77, and he retired from the playing field in `78, moving permanently to the front office. The aging stars imported from Boston faded quickly, by 1879 Anson was the only remaining player from the original 1876 roster.

Hulbert, Spalding, and Anson were forming a triumvirate of sorts within the league. The two executives promoted their ideas of professional conduct from the front office, Anson from the field. But the league was unhealthy away from the diamond. Five of the original eight franchises had folded or been expelled by 1879, replaced with clubs in cities like Troy, Worcester, Hartford, and Syracuse, places incapable of financially supporting the highest quality teams. In 1879, the NL, although still declaring itself the only "major" league, was in fact of no higher quality than most of the minor leagues with which it competed. The very idea of "major league" baseball was in peril. Anson, from his perspective, saw things his ownership did not, and itched to try his remedies, but neither Spalding nor Hulbert was yet ready to give him the position of authority from which he could implement his ideas.

Robert Ferguson had been made Chicago manager in 1878, succeeding Spalding, leading the team to a fourth-place finish. Ferguson's leadership had not impressed, and Spalding was finally ready to hire Anson to the position he had long desired. Anson assumed his duties as manager May 1, 1879.

Anson now began to implement his ideas on the field, and had the ear of the front office for his ideas elsewhere, and Spalding listened. The Chicago club began a systematic program to identify, and sign (sometimes raid), the best players from other teams and leagues. Anson would often scout potential signees personally. On the field, Anson imposed a regimen of strict discipline, disobedience would sometimes be remedied by physical force. In short order, Anson built the greatest team in history to that time, helped in no small measure by the fact that he was himself entering his prime as a player. This was his one and only period as an innovator, and the league imitated and emulated him, to the benefit of all. After 1880, the NL claim to bring "major" was no longer in doubt. New York and Philadelphia were readmitted in 1883 with new franchises, and the smaller venues were gradually eliminated.

Anson, in his prime, looked and acted the very picture of an athlete. He was the biggest man physically in the NL for most of his tenure. He stood 6'1", 220 lbs, all of it muscle, an imposing presence. He was handsome, and stylish in dress and carriage. The manager was the only person, at that time, allowed to address the umpire, and Anson made the most of this, his too-frequent arguments were often deliberately theatrical and sometimes comic. He was not above using his status as the league's most important star to gain leverage with umpires or team officials.

Anson was a right-handed batter and thrower. Although immensely strong, he did not use his power for distance hitting (he occasionally took a full cut, with sometimes spectacular results). Anson was a place hitter, standing with legs together, flicking his bat forward with his forearms and wrists, sending sharp line drives to all parts of the field. His hitting accuracy led to the development of the first hit-and-run plays. His plate discipline was extraordinary, he struck out only once in `78, twice in `79. He never struck out more than thirty times in any season. No record exists that he was hit by a pitch his entire career. In the field, Anson was merely adequate, one of his first moves on becoming manager was to place himself permanently at first base. His mobility declined sharply as he aged, but when younger, he was one of several first sackers who initiated playing off the bag, a true fourth infielder. He is sometimes credited as the first to use signs, and the first to devise backup positions for his fielders.

The 1879 White Stockings challenged for the pennant, but faltered at the finish, as Anson missed the final weeks with a kidney infection, incurred, he thought, after an evening of mild alcoholic indulgence. After this, Anson, with the zeal of a convert, added temperance to his list of manly Christian virtues.

1880 was Anson's first full year as manager, and he took the field with a team built with his own hands. Catcher Mike "King" Kelly, pitchers Fred Goldsmith and Larry Corcoran, and outfielders George Gore and Abner Dalrymple were all new arrivals, some personally scouted by Anson. Anson, in fact, had an embarrassment of riches, especially in pitching. Corcoran and Goldsmith could each have been primary starter. So, before the season ended, Anson did something which, remarkably, no one else had thought to do at the major-league level, he alternated them in the lineup, the first rotation. The results were incredible, the 1880 White Stockings breezed to the pennant with a record of 67-17, including a 21-game winning streak June 2-July 8. The .798 percentage is highest in NL history.  Anson batted .337, second on the team to Gore. Corcoran pitched the first no-hitter in team history August 19.

Anson's abilities as a run producer led the Chicago Tribune to propose a new stat, runs-batted-in. It would take years to become official, but research would reveal that Anson led the NL in RBI eight times, still the major league record. Chicago's success led to a peace agreement of sorts within the league. The reserve clause was instituted in NL contracts beginning in 1880, Anson's raids would be a thing of the past.

1881 was another pennant-winning year, and the finest of Anson's career as a player. He batted .399 (the only player ever to finish at exactly that), the first of his two batting titles, with 82 RBI. He led the league in hits and total bases. The White Stockings threepeated in 1882, this one a close race, a three-game margin over the rising Providence Grays.

Chicago finished second in `83, fourth in `84; the league had caught up with them, and Fred Goldsmith was declining in effectiveness.  Anson continued his stellar performances, hitting .308 and .335. 1884 was a great freak year in Anson's career, made possible by a change in the ground rules at Lakefront Park, the White Stockings' home from 1878-84. (When you admire the "Bean" in Millennium Park, you are standing where the infield used to be). Balls hit over the short LF fence (180 feet down the line in 1884), were scored home runs this season only, they had previously been ground-rule doubles. Third baseman Ned Williamson hit 27 homers that year, the record Babe Ruth would eventually break in 1919. Anson had his only double-digit total of home runs (21). On August 6 he became the second player in history to hit three home runs in one game (Williamson had done it May 30). In so doing he also became the first to hit five in two games (still the record, often equalled), as he had hit a pair August 5.

Anson appeared ready to return to the top in `85.  The "Chicago Stone Wall", the greatest infield of its day (Williamson, Burns, Pfeffer, Anson, third to first), was in place. Mike Kelly was the best catcher in the league. Corcoran was primary pitcher, but backup John Clarkson, a product of an Anson scouting trip in `84, would lead the White Stockings to the pennant after Corcoran broke down early in the season. Anson considered the `85-'86 teams the best he managed.

Anson, and his team, were now national figures. They were a hustling bunch, hell-raisers off the field, much at variance with Anson's stated principles of virtue. As long as the team won, and did not defy him in public, he was content to try to shame them into reform. Spalding once hired a Pinkerton detective to shadow Kelly during one nocturnal, multi-tavern binge. The report was read, in Kelly's presence, during a team meeting. When asked for his comment, the "King" replied: "I have to offer only one amendment. In that place where the detective reports me as taking a lemonade at 3 a.m., he's off. That was straight whiskey. I never drank a lemonade at that hour in my life." One supposes Anson saw no humor in the reply.

In 1882 the American Association, the self-proclaimed "beer and whiskey league", had begun play as a declared second "major league". They offered alcohol and Sunday games, and their rising popularity forced the NL into change. Hulbert had died suddenly in April 1882, clearing the way for accommodations that likely would not have been made had he lived. A postseason championship, the "World Series", was negotiated, and was held between the two leagues 1884-90. The World Series of 1885, between Chicago and the St. Louis Browns, was a competitive joke, neither team took it seriously. It ended in a tie, 3-3-1.

Anson's last great innovation was yet another attempt to reform his rowdy bunch by example. In 1886 he began an annual team preseason "spring training" regimen in Hot Springs, Arkansas.  This was, in Anson's words, a means to "boil out the fat" accumulated over the winter. In time, he would have his doubts about the practice, feeling it counterproductive to train in warm weather, and return to play in cold.

Chicago won another flag in 1886, one of Anson's best years. He batted .371, with 187 hits in 125 games. His 147 RBI were his career high. He had his greatest day at the plate August 24, against Boston, at the West Side Grounds; five hits, including two homers, with six runs scored, in an 18-6 victory. This would be Anson's last pennant, he had won five over seven seasons.  He was now 34 years old, and had been a major-leaguer sixteen years. Most players were through by this point in their careers, but Anson had more than a decade left.

The `86 Series was the most competitive of the early matchups, renegotiated formats and gate receipt sharing (winner take all), assured a difference in attitude and play. Chicago lost the Series, to St. Louis, 4-2. Spalding blamed the defeat on the nocturnal carousing of some of his stars, and Anson reluctantly agreed to a housecleaning. It was a profitable one, Kelly was the first to go, sold to Boston after `86 for the mind-boggling price of $10,000. Gore and McCormick were also sold. Clarkson, though still in his prime, was sold to Boston, for the same price as Kelly, early in 1888.

The leaner, younger team now began to be called the "Colts", and had promise, new stars Jimmy Ryan and George Van Haltren anchored a solid team. Chicago finished third in 1887, despite great years from Clarkson (his last in Chicago), and Anson. Cap officially won the batting title, hitting .421, though `87 is one of the seasons that maddens today's researchers and editors. Bases on balls were scored as hits that year only. Most references recalculate the `87 averages, and Anson "drops" to .347, second behind Sam Thompson's .372.

Anson won an undisputed batting title, his second and last, in 1888, hitting .344. Ryan emerged as a major star, and would remain one the rest of the 1800s. The Colts finished second. In the following off-season, Anson embarked on what he would consider the high point of his life.

Spalding's World Tour was a magnificent fiasco, a round-the-world excursion in which the Colts, and other NL all-stars, would play exhibitions in New Zealand, Australia, Ceylon, Egypt, and Europe. It was a money-loser for Spalding, and for Anson, who had also invested; but left lasting impressions and memories. Anson devotes nearly a third of his memoirs to an account of this trip. Anson had a falling out with fellow investor John Hart, who acted as financial manager, and this had important consequences later.

Today, the bulk of Anson's reputation rests on two incidents that occurred during exhibition games in the 1880s. The White Stockings, as did all major league teams, played numerous exhibitions on their travels before, during, and after the regular season. It was a welcome source of revenue for host and guest.

On August 10, 1883, the White Stockings played a scheduled exhibition against the Toledo Blue Stockings.  The Blue Stockings' star catcher was Moses Walker, a black, established and well-regarded in Toledo. On this particular day, Walker was injured, and not in the lineup. Anson, not knowing this, decided to make a scene during the traditional pregame lineup exchange. He announced, in his most theatrical and bellicose manner, that his team would not take the field if Walker did. Toledo manager Charlie Morton, insulted, responded that Walker would indeed play, after all, and any withdrawal by Anson would forfeit his share of the gate receipts; as the Blue Stockings would play against a team of nine fans, if necessary, to ensure a game. The two managers argued for over an hour before Anson conceded and took the field. Money had defeated "principle".

The game went on, with Walker in center field. Anson was roundly criticized in the local press, and when Toledo joined the American Association in 1884, Moses Walker, and his brother Welday, would become the first black major-leaguers. The White Stockings would return to Toledo for another exhibition in `84, and this time Anson insisted on a written pregame agreement banning the Walkers. He got it.

There would be no further blacks in the majors, though there were several in the minors throughout the mid `80s. The brand-new Sporting News, already an influence in the game, wrote racist editorials calling for bans based on color. On July 14, 1887, the White Stockings played an exhibition against the Newark Little Giants. The Giants boasted an all-black battery; George Stovey, one of the best pitchers of the day, with Moses Walker behind the plate. Newark, unlike Toledo, did not respect its black players, there had been ugly incidents during the season, before Chicago's arrival.

"Get that n***** off the field!" shouted Anson as Stovey strode to the mound to warm up. Newark management did not have the fortitude displayed by Toledo, and Anson got his way. That very day, as it happened, the owners of the International League, to which Newark belonged, voted to ban future signings of black players. Later that year, in another well-publicized racial incident, Charles Comiskey's AA champion Browns would refuse to play a scheduled exhibition aginst the Cuban Giants. Although the "color line" was never formally put in writing within the majors, by 1897 all of Organized Baseball abided by it.

Anson had no power to draw those lines in the leagues' names, or vote on the bans. But his arrogance and theatrics in both incidents; and passages in his memoirs in which he describes, in despicable terms, the Colts' black mascot, Clarence Duval, have damned him by modern standards. To say that Anson is the father of segregated baseball is a serious overstatement; to say that he significantly influenced, by his example, those who did draw that line, is not.

Racism was called by its name in Anson's time. He had the choice to overcome it, but didn't. His personal bombast has not helped his case in history, the self-appointed paragon falls harder than the mere bigot. Whether Anson changed his attitude with time is an open question, as will be seen. In recent years, as the history of segregated ball and the Negro Leagues has received long-overdue attention, Anson's behavior in these affairs has come to be considered his primary legacy.

Following the World Tour, Spalding and Anson signed an unprecedented ten-year contract. Anson was 36, and his days of innovation were well behind him. He would begin a long, slow decline as a player, and as an authority figure. He was increasingly seen as stubborn, out of touch, old fashioned. His relationships with players and management would steadily deteriorate. But he was still a star on the field, and at the gate. He was a draw until the end of his playing days, the grand old man of the game.

He now was the all-time leader in games, runs, hits, doubles, and RBI. He was the oldest player in the league from 1892. He could hit, but his speed and fielding range were all but gone. In 1892 Anson became the last first baseman in the NL to don a glove. He was increasingly critcized in the press for his age and declining skills, and there were yearly speculations as to his retirement as a player.

By early 1890, Spalding had made Anson a shareholder, with a thirteen percent stake in the team. This was the year that the new Brotherhood of Professional Base Ball Players broke with the National League over the reserve clause and formed their own organization, the Players League. Anson, the consummate company man, derided the league and its members loudly in the press, gleefully predicting the imminent demise of player-run ball. Again his bombast exceeded his power, the PL indeed folded after one season, through no fault of Anson's, but he was perceived as a ringleader in the failure. Once more he had placed himself, ultimately, on the wrong side of history.

Anson's and Spalding's refusal to accept the return of "traitors" would cost them. The young stars who had provided second or third place finishes for the Colts in 1887-89 would shun Chicago; and the team, though competitive for a short while longer, would fall into mediocrity until after the start of a new century.

The Colts finished a surprising second in 1890 and `91, but Anson had now declined noticeably, 1891 was his first professional season under .300 (.291). On September 4 of that year, in response to a particularly scathing newspaper article denigrating his age, Anson took the field in Chicago wearing a long white wig and white stage whiskers, to the delight of all. Gratified by the response, Anson wore his costume the entire game.

Spalding reorganized the Chicago front office in 1891-92, and signed a new contract with Anson. Cap's thirteen percent ownership was retained, but one year was removed from the contract's length. Spalding also pulled a bit of subterfuge. Anson's salary was to be paid, in part, from profit-sharing. The Colts were, at this time, building a new park, the second West Side Grounds, and as Spalding well knew, no profits would be declared, after construction costs. Anson received little or no compensation from team profits in any of his final seasons.

Of equal importance, Spalding hired John Hart as team president, and officially retired, although as majority owner he continued to exercise veto power behind the scenes. Anson and Hart already had a history, and this new relationship intensified their mutual dislike. They fought constantly. Anson felt himself under siege, from the front office and his young players, who chafed at his strict discipline and interference in their off-field behavior.

The Colts in 1892 held first place into mid-September, when Boston, riding the crest of an 18-game winning streak, overtook them and won the pennant. Anson would always believe that Boston's opponents threw games to deprive him of the championship, an act of revenge for the collapse of the Players League. In 1894, Anson made a remarkable playing comeback, hitting .388 at age 42, his last big year. His team faded badly, finishing no higher than fourth 1893-97.

1897 was the last year of Anson's contract, and the Chicago faithful sensed the end. Cap had, at any rate, announced that `97 would be his last year as a player. May 4, the home opener, was "Cap Anson Day", Anson was presented with gifts and fan testimonials. He singled his first at-bat, following a standing ovation of several minutes. Cap continued as a regular, playing 114 games, batting .285, with 75 RBI, at the age of 45. The last day of the season, October 3, was a doubleheader against St. Louis. Anson homered twice in the opener, a 10-9 Colt loss. Anson is the oldest player with a multihomer game. Cap held, at one time, the records for the oldest player to do virtually everything on the diamond, but this is the only one that remains. In the nightcap, Anson's last major league game as a player, he stole a base in the 7-1 victory. The Colts finished ninth, the worst placing of Anson's managerial career. After season's end, Anson berated his players and ownership in newspaper interviews, placing his chances for retention as manager in jeopardy.

Anson and Spalding took a trip together to England in the winter of 1897-98; according to Anson, their differences were settled and his position as manager affirmed. But Anson arrived home to find Tom Burns already named manager, plus a request from Spalding for his resignation. Anson refused to resign, and was "fired", receiving his unconditional release February 1. For the next several years the team would be called the "Orphans" in the press.  In nineteen seasons as Chicago manager, Anson's record was 1288-944, a .577 percentage. He won five pennants, and finished second five times.

Anson was hired to manage the New York Giants for 1898, but it proved a poor match, his brief tenure was a constant squabble with players and ownership. Cap was fired after posting a 9-13 record. It was his last job in major league ball.

By some accounts, Anson earned over $300,000 in his career, a huge sum of money in that era. But the end of his playing days found him in poor financial shape, his reduced compensation in his final Chicago years took a toll. Spalding, perhaps in an effort to assuage a guilty conscience, offered to organize a subscription testimonial, then a popular method of raising cash for individuals and groups, worth $50,000. Anson, feeling betrayed and insulted, refused. "The public owes me nothing, and I am neither old nor a pauper. I can earn my own living as hitherto, and, moreover, I am by no means out of baseball." He still retained his stake in the Chicago club, but this did not translate into income.

Anson's numbers, 19th century ball or not, are extraordinary, especially considering the much shorter schedules of his time. Exactly what his career totals are depend on your source, and how that source handles the NA (major league or not?), and the 1887 season. Most references use NL totals only, and recalculate 1887 to modern standards. The totals used here are from the SABR Book of Lists (a work-in-progress), and represent the "latest and greatest" research. It also follows the conventions just mentioned. Following the total is Anson's all-time Cubs rank, followed by his all-time major league rank, in parentheses, if significant:

.300 seasons: 19, first; (NL record).
Games: 2253, second.
At-bats: 9084, second.
Average: .331, fourth; (24th).
Runs: 1722, first; (21st).
Hits: 3012, first (23rd).
Total bases: 4145, third.
Doubles: 529, first (27th).
Triples: 129, second.
Extra base hits: 751, fifth.
RBI: 1880, first; (10th).
Walks: 952, third.
Stolen bases: 247, tenth.

Anson, indeed, was not finished with baseball, and he would remain a public figure the rest of his life. Cap had always admired Spalding's rise as a business tycoon, and strove to match it. He had no business acumen, however, and his attempts to prosper after his playing days were sad and comic, by turns.

He made attempts to return to Organized Baseball. Anson, in 1900, had an opportunity to purchase a Western League franchise, and move it to Chicago's south side, but this was vetoed by Spalding, whose permission was required by the rules of the National Agreement. This act sundered the relationship between the two men. Had it gone through, the history of Chicago baseball would have been changed significantly, as the Western League would become the American League later that year, and its Chicago franchise, established in defiance of the National Agreement, would be Charles Comiskey's White Stockings, moved from St.Paul MN. Also in 1900, Anson was recruited to serve as president of a renewed American Association, but the league was stillborn, unable to secure sufficient financing. Later that year, Anson would publish his autiobiography, A Ball Player's Career. It includes this passage, which could have been written for today's blog:

Anson would never again attempt to find employment or ownership in Organized Baseball. He invested in a billiards parlor and a bowling alley, both were sports at which he excelled. He won an American Bowling Congress national championship in 1904, as captain of a five-man team. Both the parlor and the alley failed, or were sold, by 1909.

And, there was "Capt. A.C. Anson's Ginger Beer", (a soft drink). It proved a dramatic brew, but let's allow Cap to tell the story in his inimitable fin de siecle style:

Some of the original porcelain bottles survive, treasured and expensive collectibles.

Anson also tried politics. In 1905, he was approached to run for Chicago City Clerk on the Democratic ticket, a relatively harmless office.  He was elected, but proved to be as inept an officeholder as a businessman. Despite his personal popularity, he was not renominated by his party for a second term, and failed to win nomination for county sheriff in a 1906 Democratic primary.

In 1905, Anson cashed his major league shares, in order to settle debts and try one last fling in business. In 1907, his term as clerk completed, he purchased a semipro team, renamed it "Anson's Colts", and built a small ballpark on the south side. The Colts played in a organization called the City League, and also took on independent teams, providing the backdrop for a final enigma.

One of the Colts' frequent opponents was their south-side neighbor, the Chicago Leland Giants, an all-black team, and one of the finest teams, of any kind, in the nation. There were never any incidents, even when Anson himself took the field, as he did from 1908, in a last-ditch effort to boost the box office. At 56, he could still hit (hand-eye is the last thing to go), but was a statue in the field.

On these occasions, he would meet, and converse cordially, with Andrew "Rube" Foster, manager and part owner of the Giants. Foster, a seminal figure in baseball history, would found the Negro National League in 1920. There is at least one posed photo of the two, neither seems uncomfortable in the other's presence. Whether, as in Toledo, Anson modified his behavior for the sake of much-needed cash; or had undergone a genuine change of attitude, cannot be known. Cap left no definitive late-life testimony. Anson sold the Colts in 1909, he had now nearly become the pauper he denied being in 1898.

The National League offered a pension to Anson, but he refused it. In 1910 he declared bankruptcy, and in 1913 he lost his home and remaining property. Adrian and Virginia lived with a daughter until Virginia's death in 1915.

Anson had tried the stage, briefly, in the `90s, and had some success. His friend Ring Lardner wrote a short skit, "First Aid For Father", and with this, and other scenarios, Cap now toured vaudeville circuits, sometimes accompanied by his daughters. It was small-time, but it paid enough to stave off charity. Anson retired from the stage in 1921.

In January, 1918, the Sporting News asked Anson to name his all-time team. Though Ty Cobb was in his prime, and Honus Wagner had just finished a career in which he had broken many of Cap's NL records, Anson named no one from the new century. He submitted: catchers, Buck Ewing and Mike Kelly; pitchers, Amos Rusie, John Clarkson, and Jim McCormick; first base, himself; second base, Fred Pfeffer; third base, Ned Williamson; shortstop, Ross Barnes; outfielders, Bill Lange, George Gore, Jimmy Ryan, and Hugh Duffy.

Early in 1922, Anson, well-known as an amateur golfer, was elected president of the new Dixmoor Golf Club on Chicago's south side, his last employment. He had remained an avid sportsman throughout the years. Approaching seventy, Cap was still active and energetic.

He was suddenly stricken that April, collapsing on the street during his daily constitutional, and died of heart failure following surgery, April 14, 1922, three days short of his 70th birthday. Finally beyond pride, Anson was buried, at National League expense, in Oak Woods Cemetery on the south side. Virginia, buried with her family in Philadelphia, was moved to lie beside him. The funeral was lavish, attended by politicians, ballplayers, league officials, and the new Commisioner of Baseball, Kenesaw Landis, an old friend of Anson's. A long procession allowed the public to pay respects. A few years later, a small city street was renamed Anson Place, still the only Chicago thoroughfare formally named for an athlete.

The National League paid for Anson's monument, dedicated at Oak Woods in 1923. Elegant and understated, adorned by carved wreaths and crossed bats, it is one of the finest baseball-themed memorials. Anson had once suggested that his epitaph read: "Here Lies a Man Who Hit .300". The League had more dignified ideas. Beneath the formalities of name and dates, the inscription reads:

HE PLAYED THE GAME

In 1939, the Committee on Old-Timers voted Anson into the new Baseball Hall of Fame, along with Spalding and four others. Anson's plaque was among those enshrined in Cooperstown at the Hall's dedication, June 12, 1939.

Cap Anson's career stats at baseball-reference.com

Profile by BCB cartoonist Mike

We assume there was no suspense concerning the identities of the three remaining players on this list. We'll leave you guessing one more day about #1.

A good argument can be made for any of these final three ranking first, and there was a time, just before his massive fall from grace, when a consensus had emerged that Sosa had, indeed, become the greatest Cub. Time and perspective may yet confirm that judgment; the author was certainly convinced, a few years ago.

Based on numbers and performance alone, Sosa should be first. His ranking at #3 reflects the continuing doubt surrounding the legitimacy of his accomplishments, the manner and method of his leavetaking, and the redeeming fact that those accomplishments, despite caveats, are of worthy and often heroic stature. In Cubs history, only Anson and Banks achieved the synthesis of identity between athlete and team as did Sosa.

If, as the canard goes, journalism is the first draft of history, a blog is anybody's darn guess. Sammy, after all, may not be finished.

In the current atmosphere of suspicion, even Sosa's birthdate has been questioned. Officially, he was born November 12, 1968, in San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic. The date is almost certainly true; it survived the post-9/11 crackdown on foreign workers' data that resulted in additions of up to several years to many Latin players' ages (including, incidentally, Alfonso Soriano). Those who signed and nurtured Sosa in his first professional years had no doubts about his age. At one early point, it would have been much to Sosa's advantage to be "older", and he didn't take the opportunity.

He was born Samuel Peralta Montero, the fifth of seven children, into poverty almost unimaginable to those who would pay to see him perform. Sammy was seven when his father died, and acquired a new surname upon his mother's second marriage.  The combined family eventually grew to eleven children. One younger brother, Jose, would play in the Cubs' minor league system.

A poor boy with athletic gifts, Sammy saw sport as his means of ascent. He initially attempted boxing, but quit at his mother's request. Sosa would later claim his boxing instructor assaulted him.

Sammy took up baseball with school teams at fourteen, and began playing in local leagues soon after. Within a year he had attracted enough attention to receive a professional offer, from the Phillies. MLB nullified the deal, as a new rule forbade contracts with prospects younger than sixteen. Had Sosa been fudging his age, the pretense would have been dropped at that time.

Omar Minaya, scout for the Texas Rangers, signed Sosa in 1985, following Sammy's sixteenth birthday, for a bonus of $3500. Sammy was "skinny and malnourished", according to the reports Minaya filed, but he possessed the rarest qualities, top-notch hand-to-eye coordination and bat speed. On those abilities alone, the Rangers took a four-figure chance.

Sosa rose quickly through the minors, despite considerable flaws in his game, most notably a lack of plate discipline. He made his major league debut for the Rangers (leading off) on June 16, 1989. On June 21, he hit his first major league home run, off Roger Clemens, at Fenway Park.

Sosa had played 25 games for the Rangers when he was traded to the White Sox, with pitcher Wilson Alvarez, for Harold Baines and Fred Manrique, July 29, 1989. Sosa hit .273 with three home runs in 33 games with the Sox in `89.

Sammy played the full schedule in 1990, batting .233 with 15 home runs and 70 RBI, though with an alarming 150 strikeouts. He spent some time in the leadoff spot, but primarily batted fifth or lower. The team was experimenting with a raw talent. He proved his value in a year in which the young Sox made a stirring run at the division title, only to falter in September. Despite the Ks, Sosa was the only AL player that year to record double-digits in doubles, triples, home runs, and stolen bases.

Sammy wasn't Sammy yet. In hindsight, it can easily be seen that Sosa was a quintessential late bloomer. The culture shock must have been immense in his first pro years. The persona that reached maturity in `98 grew hand in glove with the player. It is certainly no coincidence that Sosa the player grew apace with Sosa the act.

Those who hang at both parks (more than local lore would have you believe), remember a tall, lanky, wiry dude (and that is the word), who projected an air of too-much confidence. He was comfortable as a professional, if not quite as a public figure. He fell in with fellow countryman Melido Perez, as might be expected. Sammy, for a time, even wore the same curly perm Melido affected. They seemed a good match, Perez was a player of occasional brilliance who seemed unable to realize his talent.

That perception was an error in Sosa's case. His work ethic and passion was evident to everyone, thus his inability to live up to potential was particularly galling to management and coaches. Larry Himes, Sox GM, had a special regard for Sammy's future. Himes had, after all, traded one of the greatest and most popular Sox stars of all time to acquire him. This faith would pay huge dividends, but in a direction the Sox could never have imagined.

A harbinger, perhaps, of hard times came during the winter of `90-'91. Sosa was charged with spousal abuse, allegedly after his wife refused his demand for a divorce. The charges were later dropped, and an understanding of some sort was reached. The marriage survives to this day; the couple has four children.

In 1991, Sosa hit .203 in 116 games, with 10 home runs and 98 strikeouts in 316 at-bats. He also served a month-long stint in the minors that summer. The Sox tried him all through the lineup, looking for something to click. There was now a general sense of incurable underachievement regarding Sosa, and his future with the Sox was doomed. He was ripe for trade bait by the end of the season.

The Cubs and Sox have made relatively few trades in their mutual histories, and most of those of small import. The exchange made on March 30, 1992 would have been notable even had Sosa never developed. The Cubs, now led by newly-hired (and ex-Sox) VP of Baseball Operations Himes, traded George Bell to the White Sox for Sosa and pitcher Ken Patterson. Both clubs got value, Bell spent two decent seasons as south side DH, and was a regular most of the division title year of `93.

And, of course, the Cubs got Sammy. It was received bleacher wisdom that the Cubs had traded an old head case for a young one. How right we were.

Sammy has left a lot of regret in the wake of his departures. George W. Bush, managing partner of the Rangers at the time of the first Sosa trade, made it a laugh-line at campaign appearances eleven years later ("my greatest mistake"). Jack Gould, who made the second Sosa trade on behalf of the Sox, would make similar statements. But no one could have foreseen the magnitude of Sammy's rise. Larry Himes has taken the credit, but if he really saw what Sosa was to become, it was a flash of genius not evident elsewhere.

Sosa's first Cub season was a near disaster. Expos pitcher Dennis Martinez broke Sosa's right hand June 13, Sammy returned to the lineup July 27. But he fractured an ankle three weeks later, returning again in mid-September. In 67 games in `92, Sammy batted .260 with eight home runs. The Cubs did what the Sox had done, first trying Sammy toward the top of the lineup as a possible power/speed man (Sosa would have eight leadoff homers in his career), then dumping him in the middle of the order.

In 1993 Sosa finally, and suddenly, became a power hitter, more than doubling his previous season high with 33 home runs. Also stealing 36 bases, he became the first Cubs member of the 30-30 club. During this season, Sammy was moved to a more conventional power spot in the lineup, and stayed there.

Now began the "Selfish Sammy" years, as we called them in the bleachers. Sitting directly behind Sosa in right field, we had a thirteen-year ringside seat for what was arguably the biggest show in team history. Over the next few years, all the Sosa hallmarks would fall into place. "Sammy's Spot", the perpetual bare patch in the outfield grass, the bunny-hop during home runs, the over-deliberate batters box dance between pitches, the love tap, the charge into right field to open home games.

There was a method to the act, Sammy improved as a player, almost never missed a game, and became the face of his team. Certain elements of his game now came into sharp focus. Sosa produced in astounding white-hot bursts. Of all the members of the 500-HR club, Sammy hit homers in the fewest individual games. His 68 multi-homer games are third in history, and he played in far fewer games than the two players ahead of him. His six three-homer games are tied for first (John Mize). But it seemed all for the stat books. His strikeout totals remained phenomenally high. He would not adjust.

Sammy would always be, first and last, a hitter. Speed was incidental to his game. His stolen bases were the product of the raw swiftness of his youth, he never learned to run the bases well. His fielding was adequate at best. He had, probably, as strong an arm as any outfielder of his time, but he was as likely to nail the backstop as throw out a runner or hit a cutoff man. His running and fielding never received the intensity he would now bring to his batting.

All of what was to come nearly took place in, of all things, a Boston Red Sox uniform. During the offseason following the 1994 player's strike, Sammy had agreed to a free agent contract with the Red Sox. Before he could actually play his home games at Fenway Park, the commissioner's office ruled that any such contract negotiations were null and void, and by the time the strike had been settled and the 1995 season was to begin Sammy had changed his mind and chose to remain a Cub.

Sosa had his first 100-RBI season in `95, as well as his second 30-30 year, the only two such seasons in team history. He also made the first of his seven All-Star appearances.

1996 seemed to be the year Selfish Sammy might become history. More clutch singles were in evidence. Strikeouts were still high, but all other aspects of Sosa's production increased. The season was peppered with small spectaculars. On May 16 Sosa became the first Cub to homer twice in the same inning. On June 5 he had his first three-homer game, driving in five runs, almost single-handedly erasing a four-run deficit in a winning cause.

On August 20, Sosa had 40 home runs and 99 RBI, well on his way to an historic year. He got his 100th RBI that day, a bases-loaded hit-by-pitch that broke his wrist and ended his season. Still fresh in fan memory was the similar injury suffered by Ryne Sandberg in `93, from which the future HOFer had never fully recovered.

Sosa returned to play a full schedule in 1997, but got off to a slow start, redeemed somewhat by a late-season surge. He hit 36 home runs and drove in 119. But his .251 average and 174 strikeouts (the team record), seemed to herald a disappointing return to bad form. Nonetheless, he signed a contract extension through 2001, worth $42 million, one of the most expensive deals in the game.

At this time, Sosa and new team hitting coach Jeff Pentland formed a strong relationship. Pentland is widely credited as the man who got Sammy to listen, focus, and adjust, as he had never done before.

What happened in 1998 was not entirely unexpected, the power game had been building incrementally since the early `90s. In `94, Ken Griffey jr had been on pace to break Maris' single-season home run record before the strike halted play in August. Subsequently, Griffey, Mark McGwire, and Matt Williams had each hit 60 or more homers in 162-game spans, spread over two seasons. In 1996 McGwire had hit 52 homers, in `97, he hit 58. McGwire had long been considered the best potential threat to the record, but he was frustratingly injury-prone. With two fairly healthy seasons behind him, all that was seemingly needed was one calendar year of uninterrupted production. 1998 began with the anticipation that this most hallowed record was due to fall. But no one saw the magic coming, or the direction from which it would come.

There was no magic the first two months. McGwire started hot, setting records for home runs in April, and for the end of May. On May 25, Sosa entered play with nine home runs, McGwire with 24. On that day Sosa had his first multi-homer game of the year, hitting a pair in Atlanta. It was the start of the greatest concentrated home run binge in history.

Sammy hit a record 21 home runs in the next thirty days (5/25-6/23). He shattered the record for home runs in a calendar month, hitting 20 in June (Rudy York, 18, July 1938). Along the way, Sosa also had streaks of 21 homers in 24 games, and 14 in 15 games, (6/1-6/15), the latter capped by a three-homer game against the Brewers at Wrigley June 15.

At the end of June it was a race, although Sosa would pass McGwire only twice, and both times very briefly. McGwire had only two slow spots in his season, the first from late July through early August. On August 19, with the Cardinals at Wrigley, McGwire watched Sosa pass him for the first time, Sammy's 48th home run. Mac hit two home runs of his own later that game, retaking the lead, which he would not relinquish until after Maris' record was broken.

By now it was a circus, in the best sense. Batting practice, when the Cardinals were in town, was a spectacle. McGwire always bunted the first BP pitch thrown him, (nearly always perfectly down the line), and took a few relaxed cuts before turning things loose. Then the moonshots would fly onto and across Waveland, into a crowd that filled the street shoulder-to-shoulder. Sosa's BP displays were lower-keyed, he did his serious prep work in the batting cages beneath right field, hidden from view.

For us ballpark lifers, it was paradise. We knew we were witnessing the greatest baseball season in decades, and by the grace of whatever one believed in, most of it was happening before our eyes in Wrigley Field. There had been a small crash of recognition, a reporter had already spotted the used vial of supplement (a legal one, to be sure), in McGwire's locker, but for the moment, joy was still unfettered.

Double joy for Cubs fans, the wild card had turned into the most dramatic race of its kind. From mid-August to the end, the last forty-five days of the season, the Cubs, Mets, and Giants fought it out, no team gaining more than a single-game lead in all that span. Sosa was not only performing the greatest power feats in team history, he was doing so under the ultimate pressure.

The act was now at its zenith. The fans, and the country, devoured it. Only those forced to deal with it at close quarters on a daily basis, Sammy's teammates and the beat press, were jaded. The press, especially, thought they scented more than a whiff of the fulsome. They knew Sosa and McGwire were not friends, and met only on the playing field. Mark Grace, the congenital wiseacre, had a few bon mots at Sammy's expense. But the public saw only the entertainment, played to perfection. Sosa was now a national figure, and performed the role as well as anyone could. McGwire sometimes lost his cool; Sammy, never.

Feats, and records, dropped like rain. Sosa had set an anti-record, 4428 at-bats, and 247 homers, before hitting his first grand slam, July 27, at Arizona. He hit his second slam the next day, the first Cub to slam in consecutive games, the 18th player ever. On August 31 he caught McGwire at 55, a home run at Wrigley against the Reds. On September 2, Sosa tied Hack Wilson's 68-year-old team record with his 56th home run, also at Wrigley (it had been the NL record until McGwire passed it the day before). Sosa broke Wilson's record September 4 in Pittsburgh.

On September 8, in St. Louis, McGwire hit the season-record-breaking 62nd home run, of course, against the Cubs. Sosa joined the plateside celebration, sharing a bear hug with his rival. A perfect moment by two men who had grown into their roles. Here, perhaps understandably, McGwire began his second slowdown, and it set the stage for what, we all agreed, was the best weekend we'd ever spent at a ballpark.

Friday, September 11, the Brewers came to town for three games. Every game was critical now. The weather all three days was hot, sunny, and magnificent. Friday was a tough loss, 13-11, redeemed somewhat by Sammy's 59th home run. Saturday's game was even crazier. Sosa's 60th homer came in the seventh inning, a three-run blast that brought the Cubs close, 12-8. The Cubs hit six homers that day, two of them pinch-hit, including Orlando Merced's walkoff in the ninth, for a 15-12 win.

Sunday topped everything that had gone before. Sosa tied McGwire, and thus the in-flux major-league record, with two titanic blasts onto Waveland, numbers 61 and 62. The Cubs won, 11-10 (on a Mark Grace extra-inning walkoff HR), retaining a one-game wild card lead over the Mets.

On September 16 in San Diego, with the score tied 2-2 in the eighth inning, Sosa came to bat with the bases loaded. With the crowd screaming for a long ball, Sammy delivered, his third slam of the season, and 64th home run. He obliged the ecstatic throng with a curtain call. "I thought I was at a road game", was the disgusted remark attributed to several Padres players the next day. Sosa and McGwire had transcended team loyalties.

Sosa passed McGwire for the last time September 25, his 66th home run, also his last of the season. McGwire tied him within an hour, and hit two home runs in each of the remaining two games of the year to finish at 70. Sammy went homerless the last three games, but the Cubs made the playoffs in an almost comically unlikely manner, backing into a wild card tiebreaker after both they and the Giants lost dramatically, within moments of one another, on the final day. The Cubs won the deciding 163rd game of the season against the Giants, at Wrigley, 5-3. Sosa went two-for-four, both singles, scoring each time.

The Cubs, utterly spent, were promptly swept by the Braves, the eventual pennant-winner, in the first postseason round. The season was left on the floor before the playoffs began.

Sosa was the near-unanimous MVP; only the two St. Louis writers cast first-place votes for McGwire. The summary of a truly great season: 159 games, 134 runs, 198 hits, 66 home runs, 158 RBI (the only league-leading stat), .308 average, .647 slugging percentage. Sosa's 86 extra-base hits were the most in the NL in fifty years. His eleven multihomer games tied Hank Greenberg's record for a season.

Sammy remained busy in the offseason, performing highly praised charity and relief work in the Dominican, which had been devastated that summer by Hurricane Georges. Sosa had become, and remains, a Dominican national hero. Dominican flags could be seen in every ballpark in which he appeared during his glory years. During home games, his national colors were a fixture atop a lamppost on Waveland. Today, it has to be one of the sublime ironies of existence that Sammy, and his family, must often live and travel under guard within their native country. His astonishing rags-to-riches life has made him a paragon, but also a potential target.

Although several superb seasons, and the best individual year of all, were still to come, `98 would be Sosa's peak as a star. The act began to show its seams. The expanding ego, the clubhouse entourage, the boombox played at earsplitting volume even during Joe Girardi's migraines, wore down the goodwill built with such care. Sammy knew he was special, and he pushed it, undermining team morale and his managers' control.

He was hardly the only difficult player loved for his performance. 1999 would have been heroic had it followed any other year. Also, the Cubs began a two-year tenancy in the cellar, depriving Sammy's feats of dramatic backdrop. Sosa became the first player to have two 60-homer seasons on September 18, although McGwire would pass him at the end, again leading the league with 65 homers to Sosa's 63.

Sosa made noise in the offseason, asking for a contract renegotiation, though signed through 2001. The Cubs put him on the market, but withdrew his availablity in the face of obvious fan discontent. Don Baylor was hired as manager, and vowed that Sammy would steal more bases and play better defense under his regime. Neither would happen. Sosa had reached his maximum size, and was no longer built for speed. For what it's worth, the 1990 White Sox media guide lists him at 6'0", 175 lbs, the 2004 Cub guide at 6'0", 220.

McGwire had now entered his career-end decline, and Sosa led the league in homers for the first time in 2000, hitting 50. He also won the Home Run Derby in Atlanta during All-Star week, belting drives of almost cartoonish length. The Cubs, however, finished the year with the worst record in the majors. The team took no chances in the offseason, signing Sammy to a four-year, $72 million deal, the fourth-richest to that time.

The Cubs challenged in 2001, and again Sosa had his backdrop, this time for the greatest offensive season by any Chicago Cub in history.

On May 16, Sammy hit his 400th career home run in a loss to Houston at Wrigley. Sosa had two three-homer games within two weeks in August, the first game a loss, the second a 16-3 win over Milwakee at home. In that second game, Baylor pulled Sosa after six innings, depriving him of a excellent chance to hit a fourth homer. On August 26, another multi-homer game produced Sammy's 50th and 51st roundtrippers, his fourth 50-HR season, and fourth consecutive, both tying major league records. On August 28, Sammy tied Willie Mays' NL record for home runs in August (17), in an extra-inning loss to the Marlins. Continuing a year-long theme of frustrating losses during heroic games, Sosa became the only player to have three three-homer games in one year in a September 23 defeat at the hands of the Astros, 7-6.

On October 2, the Cubs were eliminated from the wild card, and again Sosa made history, belting his 60th home run, the only player with three such seasons. He would remain hot to the end, including a bizarre inside-the-park 63rd homer at Wrigley October 6, a game in which he had three hits, three runs, and three RBI.

Sammy outdid himself, in an ultimately maddening year for his team. His 64 homers were second to Bonds' record 73; in none of Sosa's 60-HR seasons would he lead the league. His 103 extra-base hits set a team record (97, Wilson, 1930), his 160 RBI the most in the NL since 1930. His 425 total bases (Cubs record), fourth in NL history, were the most by anyone since 1948. And his strikeouts, 153, were the lowest of his monster years.

2002 was a miserable season in almost all respects. The team lost 95 games, costing Baylor his job and making Bruce Kimm, his replacement, a laughingstock despite his candor. Sosa got off on the wrong foot immediately, asking Bonds, during a joint spring training appearance, for "permission" to break his new home run record. It was not the sort of talk the team wanted to hear. Again Sammy thrived amidst the general horror, and was well on his way to another historic individual effort. A sign of the inflated times came June 18, against the Rangers at Wrigley, when, in the first such occasion, four members of the 400-HR club played in the same game (Sosa, McGriff, Palmeiro, Juan Gonzalez). Only Palmeiro homered that night.

Soon after he had a notable binge; on August 10, in Colorado, Sammy hit three three-run homers in consecutive innings to tie the club record for RBI, nine, in a game (Heinie Zimmerman, 6/11/1911). It was his record-tying sixth career three-homer game. He followed with a grand slam and five RBI August 11, and another homer August 12 in Houston. The five home runs in three games tied another Cubs record.

Only a few days later, on August 18 at Wrigley, during a meaningless game against the Diamondbacks, Sosa and Mark Bellhorn, chasing a flare hit by Damian Miller, collided in short right, knocking heads with a sickening impact. As both players lay prone in the grass, Miller circled the bases for an inside-the-park home run. There was no DL time as a result, but Sammy played the remainder of the season at much diminshed levels. It cost him a 50-HR year (49), and a long wait for his 500th career home run (ended the year at 499). For those of us who watched Sosa on a daily basis, this was the beginning of his physical decline as a player. He was never again the same.

Dusty Baker was hired as manager for 2003, and Sosa and the Cubs began a strange season, the last decent year of an already badly strained relationship. Baker did nothing to seriously interfere with Sammy's increasingly irritating clubhouse lifestyle. Although he was still the big man in the lineup, the team leaders would be veteran imports Eric Karros, Kenny Lofton, and, ironically, Miller, who displayed no deference to Sosa and showed the team how to win despite distractions.

Historic milestones were due to be paid in `03, and Sosa collected on the first April 4 in Cincinnati, his 500th home run, off Scott Sullivan in the seventh inning. Sammy was the 18th member of the 500-HR club. Sosa would collect his 500th Cubs home run June 8, and his 2000th hit August 22.

On April 20 Sosa was beaned by Salomon Torres in Pittsburgh, a horrifying incident in which even the high-tech metal lining of his batting helmet was left in pieces. Without that protection, Sammy would have suffered, at minimum, a disabling, career-ending injury. He was back in the lineup two days later, after passing a CAT scan, only to be hit again, less dramatically; one of three Cub batters hit in the same inning by Padres pitcher Brian Lawrence. The beaning is usually cited as the start of the decline evident the remainder of Sosa's career, but that decline had already begun the season before.

Sammy's recovery, in confidence and plate presence, after the beaning, was slow and painful, he was obviously tentative and overmatched. This was further complicated by a twenty-day stay on the disabled list (May 10-20), his first since 1996, for surgical removal of an infected toenail. On June 1, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a unanimous resolution of congratulation in honor of Sammy's 500th homer, praising him as a role model for the nation's youth.

Two days later, in the first inning of the Cubs-Devil Rays night game, June 3 at Wrigley Field, Sosa's bat shattered as he hit into a groundout, revealing obvious corking. Crew chief Tim McClelland (the same umpire who had tossed George Brett in the "pine tar" incident), ejected Sosa. Sammy would receive an eight-game suspension, reduced to seven games on appeal. MLB examined all 76 bats then in Sosa's possession; even the Hall of Fame tested bats donated by Sosa in previous years. All were clean, no other bat of Sosa's, then or otherwise, has been found to be illegal.

The "official" explanation, finalized after some embarrassing trial and error, was that the incident resulted from accidental use of a batting practice bat. The bat was notably different in appearance from Sammy's usual, and if it were the only corked bat he owned, he could not possibly have misused it in error. He was, in cold fact, caught as red-handed as could be. His reputation took a major and irreparable hit.

Sammy returned to the lineup to have a solid second half, finishing with 40 homers and 103 RBI in 137 games.

Sammy batting vs. the Expos in San Juan, Puerto Rico, September 11, 2003. Photo by Al

But, for once, the team was center stage, and Sammy went to his second postseason. Sosa was 3-for-16 in the division series against the Braves, and hit .308 during the LCS against Florida. In that homer-happy series, there were two great Sammy moments, a game-tying, two-out, ninth-inning homer off relief ace Urbina in Game One; and a gargantuan centerfield shot, off the roof of the TV camera shed, in Game Two.

Sammy's final Cubs season would begin with one last burst of fun. On April 18, 2004, in his 64th multi-homer game, Sosa passed Ernie Banks for the team record in home runs, hitting his 513th and 514th Cub clouts.

On May 16, he began a month on the DL after sustaining one of the most bizarre injuries imaginable, throwing out his back after two violent sneezes in the visitors clubhouse in San Diego -- shades of Jose Cardenal's eyelid. Yet it was legitimate, fully witnessed by trained observers of the fourth estate.

In yet another maddening year, the Cubs finished horribly, losing seven of the final eight games, botching a wild card bid that had seemed easily within their grasp. Sosa had spent the majority of the year in deep slumps, yet managed another 30-homer season (35). But he had become something he had never been; unreliable, physically and mentally.

Sosa had been informed he would not start the season's last day, October 3, at Wrigley. He arrived late, in violation of one of Baker's few rules, and then left early, without permission. Security cameras confirmed his departure five minutes after game time. It was a final, unpardonable act of professional contempt.

Cubs players, after the game, held a ceremony of defiance and liberation. Sammy's boombox was destroyed by a teammate's lumber (legend says Kerry Wood, though no one has ever officially `fessed up). It was a symbolic and prescient act. Despite the near impossibility of a trade, given the structure of Sosa's contract, the Cubs actively sought a deal, and Sammy's representatives proved cooperative in arranging details.

On January 28, 2005, the trade was announced. Sosa went to the Baltimore Orioles in exchange for Jerry Hairston, Jr., and a couple of miscellaneous minor leaguers. Sammy waived his guaranteed 2006 salary, and the Cubs paid $7 million of the $17,875,000 owed for 2005. It was considered cheap at the price.

Sosa's 2005 was a season of injury, absence, and long slumps. He batted .221 with 14 home runs, his lowest totals since 1992. On December 7, 2005, the Orioles declined arbitration, making Sosa a free agent. Sammy declined non-guaranteed offers from the Nationals in 2006, and sat out the season. His recent signing of a minor-league deal with the Rangers confirmed his desire to return to the majors: "I still have a lot of passion for the game and I'm in shape. I want to get to 600 home runs before saying goodbye".

On January 30, only a couple of weeks ago, Sosa and the Texas Rangers, his original team, announced agreement to a non-guaranteed minor league contract. Sammy will end a 17-month layoff with his first appearance in spring training.

Some accounting of Sosa's cumulative accomplishments, not otherwise mentioned in this article, needs to be given, in their entirety they are without a doubt the most remarkable batting stats by any player who has worn the red and blue.

Career home runs: 588 (5th), Cubs home runs: 545 (1st).
Consecutive 40-homer seasons: 6 (NL record).
Consecutive 30-homer seasons: 9 (3rd).
Most 150 RBI seasons: 2 (NL record).
Most homers, 3 cons. years: 179 (1998-2000); 4 cons. years: 243 (1998-2001), both NL records.

Homers in consecutive years, all major league records:
5 years: 292, 1998-2002.
6 years: 332, 1998-2003.
7 years: 368, 1996-2002, 1997-2003.
8 years: 408, 1996-2003.
9 years: 444, 1995-2003.
10 years: 469, 1994-2003.
Cubs ranks: games 1811 (10th), at-bats 6990 (8th), runs 1245 (6th), hits 1985 (9th), total bases 3980 (4th), long hits 873 (3rd), RBI 1414 (3rd), walks 798 (6th), strikeouts 1815 (1st), slugging pct .569 (2nd).

On March 17, 2005, Sosa appeared before the House Government Reform Committee, under subpoena, to testify concerning steroid use in major league baseball.  He shared the table with Mark McGwire, Jose Canseco, and Rafael Palmeiro.  Sosa, as did Palmeiro, denied usage; McGwire gave ambiguous, noncommittal reponses that destroyed what little then remained of his credibility.  Palmeiro would later test positive, and make no attempt to return to the majors.

Sosa chose to testify in Spanish, his first language (a not uncommon practice when under oath and subject to possible penalty).  All knew Sammy was perfectly competent in English, and the act laid an egg in Congress.  Despite Sosa's denials, the testimony served to diminish his reputation further.

Of all the players tarred with the steroid brush, Sosa remains the most enigmatic. He never quite attained the comic-book bulk of the others. He never tested positive. There is no anecdotal or investigative account of his usage, as there is for Palmeiro, McGwire, and Bonds. Whatever happened, if it did, happened in the Dominican, and stayed there.

Sosa was the only player in the majors to diminish, every year, in home runs, RBI, and batting average in the span 2002-05, a damning pattern of decline. Only McGwire, Sosa, and Bonds achieved and maintained their historic levels of performance during the unregulated years, they are undoubtedly the greatest sluggers of their generation. But McGwire and Bonds had already established HOF credentials before performance enhancing became rampant, Sosa almost literally came from nowhere. No player, perhaps, has ever risen so high so swiftly, and then declined to his previous level, as swiftly.

But the deeds were done, the numbers are permanent, and awesome in any circumstance. What to do with it? If a definitive answer exists among the myriad suggestions, this author has yet to hear it.

Years after `98, Al and I had our attention called to a book entitled Baseball's Best Shots, a compendium of photos taken from all eras of the game. One spread is a shot of the right-field bleachers at Wrigley during a seventh-inning stretch in `98 (probably the game of September 18). A typically festive, half-dressed, half-bombed crowd gone half-bonkers over what they were seeing.

Except, that is, for two figures, in one corner of the image, bent over a pair of scorecards; literally the only people in the frame whose faces are not visible. Yes, it's us; and we agree, as do our baseball friends, that it's our perfect portrait.

I'd like to remember `98 that way, a season of joy, a season for the ages, fit for groupies and students alike, our season.  But I can't, not anymore.  It was stolen from us, under false pretenses, and time has not assuaged the anger.

A second draft of history was delivered, by proxy, last month; the baseball writers' vote for the Hall of Fame. Mark McGwire, on the ballot for the first time, received 23.5 percent. If Sosa has indeed played his last game, it will be delivered, in person, from the same source, in January, 2011.

Sammy Sosa's career stats at baseball-reference.com

Profile co-written by BCB reader TheBeerBaron and Al; the personal references within are TheBeerBaron's

To many baseball fans outside of the Chicago area, a player with a career hitting line of .285/.344/.452 (.796 OPS) would be regarded as slightly above average -- not really a player worthy of enshrinement in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. To fans of the Chicago Cubs, this line represents one of the greatest players to ever grace the friendly confines of Wrigley Field and a modern day baseball legend -- Ryne Sandberg.

The fondest memories of my early childhood predominately revolve around the Cubs' most notable second baseman. Ironically enough, the then not-very-notable January 27, 1982 trade of Ivan DeJesus to the Phillies for Sandberg and Larry Bowa occurred less than six months before my exact date of birth. My own personal affliction for the Chicago Cubs began courtesy of Ryne Sandberg. Nearing my fifth birthday in May of 1987, I became aware of Sandberg simply because of the similarities in our first names -- Ryne and Ryan. Due to this personal revelation of sorts, Ryne Sandberg instantaneously became my childhood hero -- along with several characters from Sesame Street, of course. From that time on, I loyally followed the Chicago Cubs and the career of Sandberg in particular, extensively and thoroughly.

For over a decade, Ryne Sandberg was the face of the Cubs franchise. Number 23 provided a legion of dedicated followers a glimmer of hope that one day soon, their years of futility and suffering would end. His time on the North Side failed to provide a much-coveted World Series title -- or even a National League pennant -- to the Cubs' faithful. However, due in large part to the emergence of "Ryno" during the 1984 season, the Cubs participated in their first post-season series in 39 years.

Ryne Dee Sandberg was born in Spokane, Washington, on September 18, 1959, to a father who was, of all things, a baseball fan with a sense of humor. He named his sons after his favorite players -- Ryne after Ryne Duren, a hard-throwing relief pitcher (and maybe it's a good thing Sandberg's father only knew the short version of Duren's name; his given name was "Rinold"), and Ryne's older brother was named Del, after 1950's era Phillies slugger Del Ennis.

Sandberg was a three-sport star in high school -- basketball, football and baseball -- and had been a highly recruited HS quarterback prospect. He had committed, in fact, to attend Washington State University when the Phillies drafted him in the twentieth round of the 1978 June amateur draft.

As Cubs fans, we can only be forever thankful that Ryne Sandberg passed up what likely, due to his great athletic talent, could have been a successful career as a NFL quarterback, to sign with the Phillies and start riding the minor-league buses in the Pioneer League, for their affiliate in Helena, Montana.

His minor league statistics are far from notable, though he did lead each of his minor leagues in OBA, and showed some speed; he hit twelve triples and stole 32 bases for the Double-A Reading Phillies in 1980.

Just before he turned 22 in September 1981, Sandberg was called up to the Phillies, with Dallas Green being his field manager. That team, the defending world champions, didn't have much space for a skinny shortstop, so his month in their red pinstripes consisted primarily of pinch-running and being a defensive replacement. But on September 27, 1981, ironically enough at Wrigley Field, Sandberg was sent in to play the last five innings of the second game of a doubleheader, a game the Cubs (a horrid team that year) were inexplicably winning 13-0 after five innings. In the eighth inning, with two out and a runner on first, Sandberg hit a little flare into short right field off Mike Krukow, his first major league hit and the only one he hit in a Phillies uniform.

Speaking of which, here's a rare photo of our hero in said uniform:

After the season, Green was hired as Cubs GM, and knew of Sandberg's potential and talent, so he set out to acquire him, without letting on how badly he desired him. Green also wanted Larry Bowa's veteran leadership for a young Cubs team, so he arranged a swap of shortstops, Bowa for Ivan DeJesus, a younger, faster man. But Green insisted on Sandberg as a "throw-in", and wouldn't do the deal without him. Eventually the Phillies agreed.

It was one of the best deals in Cubs history. Bowa gave the Cubs three decent years, and was the starting SS for the 1984 division champs. DeJesus fizzled out, and you all know about Sandberg.

Green had also acquired Bump Wills to play second base, so with 2B and SS covered, Sandberg was installed at third base to begin the 1982 season. He promptly went 1-for-32; other managers would have given up on "the kid", but to Lee Elia's credit, he stuck with him -- in the next nine games he would go 14-for-41 (.341), with his first two major league homers. His 1982 season finished capably, with a .271/.312/.372 line and 32 stolen bases.

In the ensuing offseason the Cubs signed veteran Ron Cey to play third base, and with Wills departing to play in Japan, Sandberg relocated to second base. As a full-time starting second baseman for the Cubs in 1983, Ryno was awarded the first of his nine consecutive Gold Gloves. While his defensive prowess earned him national recognition, Ryno's offensive skills failed to flourish as quickly. From his Major League debut in late 1981 through the 1983 season, Ryne only managed a .265 batting average with an on base percentage (OBP) of 312. The Cubs finished their 1983 season with a 71-91 record--fifth in the National League Eastern Division.

Although that bittersweet season of 1984 occurred merely 2 years after my birth, any Cub fan can tell you that this was the season that the baseball world discovered Ryne Sandberg. In large part that was due to the patient coaching of new manager Jim Frey, who had been a batting coach for many years. He worked with Sandberg in spring training, convincing him that he could hit for more power without sacrificing batting average.

And on June 23, 1984, Ryno's status changed from rising Cubs superstar to baseball legend.

Heading into the bottom half of the ninth inning, the Cubs trailed divisional rival St. Louis by a score of 9-8. Baseball's most dominant closing pitcher at that time, future Hall of Famer Bruce Sutter, was on the mound. Sutter was in the midst of arguably his greatest season. In 1984, Sutter finished the year with a 1.54 ERA and a career best 45 saves. According to broadcaster Bob Costas, the game had ended. As Sandberg approached the plate, Costas prematurely named St. Louis' Willie McGee Player of the Game. Immediately following Costas' praise of the Cardinals' outfielder, Ryno proceeded to extend the game with a solo home run to left field. In heroic fashion, Sandberg extended the game further in the tenth inning with a two-run shot, after Bob Dernier had extended the Cubs' chances with a walk drawn on a 3-2 pitch that might very well have been a strike, once again off Sutter -- finishing the day 5 for 6 with 2 home runs and 7 RBI. From that day forward, June 23, 1984 will forever be remembered by Cubs fans as "The Sandberg Game". A great trivia question, incidentally, is "Who got the game-winning hit in the "Sandberg Game?" It was reserve infielder Dave Owen, who singled with the bases loaded in the bottom of the eleventh. After the game, Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog paid Sandberg the ultimate compliment, terming him "Baby Ruth" and calling him  "the greatest player I've ever seen".

Ryno finished the 1984 season posting a line of .314/.367/.520 with 19 home runs, 19 triples. 36 doubles, 84 RBI, 32 stolen bases and 200 hits -- winning the National League's Most Valuable Player award. Although the Cubs lost to the San Diego Padres in the National League Championship Series, Sandberg's season is forever immortalized in Chicago as one of the greatest seasons ever by a Cub.

In 1985, Sandberg's speed and power numbers increased greatly upon the previous years totals. Although the team regressed--finishing in 4th place in the NL East with a 77-84 record--Ryno stole a career best 54 bases (the first Cub to steal fifty or more bases in a season since Frank Chance stole 57 in 1906) and hit 26 home runs. From 1985 through 1988, the Cubs failed to win more than 77 games -- despite the addition of Andre Dawson via free agency from the Montreal Expos. During this stretch, the Cubs changed managers five times. Jim Frey, John Vukovich, Gene Michael, Frank Lucchesi and Don Zimmer all spent time -- albeit brief -- managing on the North Side in the late 1980's.

The 1989 Chicago Cubs team rebounded from a terrible three year stretch, winning the NL East with a record of 93-69. Ryno continued to flourish offensively posting a line of .290/.356/.497 with his first 30 home run season as the Cubs reached the NLCS for the second time in five years, and he finished fourth in MVP voting. Despite an incredible offensive effort by Sandberg in the NLCS--hitting .400/.458/.800 with a home run, 4 RBI and 6 runs scored--the Cubs suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of Will Clark and the San Francisco Giants. This post-season series would be Ryno's final chance to win a World Series.

Sandberg continued to hit well in 1990 -- he had his only forty-homer season (leading the league) and drove in 100 runs (something he would repeat in 1991) and again finished fourth in the MVP balloting, despite the Cubs having yet another losing season.

During spring training in 1993, Sandberg was hit in the hand by a pitch from the Giants' Mike Jackson; the resulting broken bone caused him to miss the first month of the season, and robbed him of much of his power. Though he hit .309, he hit only nine home runs, his lowest total in ten seasons, and he shut it down in mid-September, playing in only 117 games, his fewest in a non-strike season. He was never really the same after this injury.

Sandberg remained the Cubs' second baseman into the 1994 season; off to a poor start (.238/.312/.390), he decided to retire from baseball, a decision that surprised almost everyone. He held a bizarre press conference at which his wife Cindy appeared wearing what was immortalized forever as the "corncob dress":

At the press conference, he was asked why he was retiring at the relatively young age of 34:

From his first season with the Cubs in 1982 through the first 57 games into the 1994 season, Ryno played 1866 games (7378 at bats), hitting .289/.349 with 2132 hits, 245 home runs (including the aforementioned National League best 40 in 1990), 905 RBI, 1179 runs, 325 stolen bases and 349 doubles.

Although Sandberg put forth the notion that his retirement was simply due to his fading desire to play the game and to spend more time with his children, it is hardly a secret that some personal problems factored into his decision. According to many sources, Cindy, his high school sweetheart and wife of fifteen years, was unfaithful. Rumors circulated for years that Cindy's promiscuous behavior played a large role in the decision by management to trade both Dave Martinez and Rafael Palmeiro (Palmeiro's trade was more likely due in large part to his lack of power at the time and the fact that management envisioned Mark Grace as their future first baseman) -- just a couple of the players with whom Cindy Sandberg reportedly maintained an intimate affair. Only ten days after the retirement announcement, Cindy filed for divorce.

In the midst of his retirement, Sandberg met his second -- and current -- wife, Margaret Koehnemann. She and her family were Ryne's neighbors in the Phoenix area, and they married and blended their families, five children in all. Late in the 1995 season, Ryne and Margaret were attending a game at Wrigley Field as guests of the Cubs. Margaret would later report that Ryne had "that look in his eyes" and asked him if he wanted to play again. Knowing that his new bride would approve of his return to the Cubs, on October 31, 1995 Ryne Sandberg had another press conference, announcing that he would return to the Cubs for the 1996 season.

Despite hitting 25 home runs and 92 RBI, Sandberg was clearly past his prime. In 1996, Ryno only posted a .244 batting average -- his lowest average for in a full season. After struggling offensively again in 1997, he decided to retire for good. On September 20, 1997, Ryne Sandberg officially played in his final game at Wrigley Field, another dismal loss in a dismal season. Coincidentally, his long time friend in broadcaster Harry Caray performed his last rendition of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" that day -- Caray passed away in February 1998.

Broadcaster Joe Morgan has often criticized Sandberg on the air, but in my opinion, Ryne Sandberg is the greatest second baseman to grace the diamond. He won nine consecutive Gold Gloves, appeared in 10 consecutive All-Star Games -- winning the 1990 All Star Game's Home Run Derby at Wrigley Field. He won eight Silver Slugger Awards and still possesses the third-highest career fielding percentage for second basemen (.989). In 2164 games, Ryno accumulated 2,386 hits (8385 at bats) with 403 doubles, 76 triples, 282 home runs, 344 stolen bases, 1318 runs and 1061 RBI. The 344 SB are the most for any Cub in the "modern" era (post-deadball), and fourth on the all-time team list. His other Cub rankings include: third in runs, fourth in hits, fourth in doubles, and fifth in total bases and home runs.

In 2004, his third year of voting eligibility, Sandberg earned proper recognition for his career achievements, as he was inducted as the 17th second baseman in Baseball's Hall of Fame -- receiving 393 votes out of 516 ballots (76.2%).

Ryno's critically acclaimed induction speech provided a revitalizing message for every baseball fan, reminding us why the game we love remains one of our national treasures. In an age consumed with astronomical power numbers, many times we fail to realize the fundamental aspects of the game. Sandberg's speech reminded us that laying a perfect sacrifice bunt or turning a simple double play are equally as important as the home run. In a veiled swipe at the players accused of bulking up with steroids, Sandberg said in his induction speech:

This speech reminds every single one of us that while at times fans are lost in the "glitz and glamour" of the modern era's power surge, we should never forget the way the game was supposed to be played -- the way Ryne Sandberg played it.

This past offseason has perhaps opened a new chapter in Sandberg's relationship with the Cubs. After several years in retirement in Arizona, Sandberg threw his hat in the ring to become the Cubs' new manager. GM Jim Hendry preferred the experienced Lou Piniella, but offered Sandberg a managerial slot in the Cubs' farm system, telling him that after some experience, he could work his way up toward a major league coaching or managing job. Sandberg accepted and in 2007, at age 47, will be the manager of the low-A Peoria Chiefs this summer, once again riding the buses in the minor leagues. Given his quiet determination, it would not at all be a surprise to see Ryne Sandberg in a Cubs uniform again, someday managing the club at Wrigley Field.

Ryne Sandberg's career stats at baseball-reference.com

About five years ago, I was sitting in a gate area at LaGuardia Airport in New York, waiting for a flight home to Chicago.

I looked up and saw sitting, not fifteen feet from me, Billy Williams. I'd have recognized him anywhere, despite the fact that he was then about 63 years old. He had his Hall of Fame ring on his finger, and was sitting by himself.

I was frozen. I could have had a nice conversation with him, perhaps gotten a photo with my camera phone, or had him sign an autograph. But I couldn't say a word.

That's what you get when, as an adult, you find yourself suddenly in the presence of one of your childhood heroes. While other friends of mine, Cub fans of my generation, idolized Ernie Banks for his production and sunny personality, or Ron Santo for his passion for the game and great play at third base, Billy Williams was my favorite player.

I loved the way he approached the game -- quietly, consistently producing year in and year out, literally never missing a game for years, playing in 1117 consecutive games from 1963 through 1970 (a then-NL record I wish were still his, rather than held by the current recordholder). He played in 150 or more games for twelve straight seasons, 1962-1973, and, along with Santo, is the co-club record holder for games in a season, 164 (all the decisions plus two tie games in 1965; only one man, Maury Wills, has ever played in more regular-season games in a year, and it took a three-game playoff against the Giants in 1962 to do that). I loved the "sweet swing" that got him his nickname; I used to imitate it when my friends and I played "fastpitch". I can still see Billy, the big blue number twenty-six on his back, in that left-hand batter's box at Wrigley Field, bat standing almost straight up and down, then whipping with amazing bat speed to send another rope of a line drive down the right-field line, or into the bleachers.

Billy Leo Williams was born on June 15, 1938 in Whistler, Alabama. These are facts known to every Cub fan of my generation, because Jack Brickhouse used to remind us of them constantly. He was signed in 1956 out of high school, and began playing in the Cubs' minor league system. In 1959, playing at the Double-A level in San Antonio, Williams got homesick, jumped the team, and went home to Alabama.

Buck O'Neil, then a scout for the Cubs, went to visit Billy. Although O'Neil hadn't been the one personally responsible for signing Williams, he knew of Billy's talent and thought he could become a major league star. In his wonderful and highly recommended book "I Was Right On Time", O'Neil describes how he got Williams to return to play in Texas:

So credit Buck O'Neil with a "save" -- saving the professional baseball career of a kid who wasn't sure of himself, but had the talent to be a superstar, and over the next seventeen years, proved it over and over again.

Having gotten some coaching help at San Antonio from Hall of Famer Rogers Hornsby, Williams made it to Chicago in the late summer of 1959. He made his major league debut on August 6, in an otherwise unremarkable 4-2 Cub win over the Phillies. He hit only .152 that year, and a little better -- .277/.346/.489 -- in 47 at-bats in 1960, including his first major league home run, off another Williams, Stan of the Dodgers, on October 1, 1960 at the Los Angeles Coliseum.

In 1961, at the age of 23, Billy was installed as the Cubs' regular left fielder. The team was terrible -- they finished 64-90 and would have finished last if not for the even more awful Phillies -- but Billy blossomed. He hit .278/.338/.484 with 25 HR and 86 RBI, and was named National League Rookie of the Year, the first of two straight Cub ROY's (the late Kenny Hubbs being the next, in 1962).

The following year Billy began a remarkable streak -- no, not his consecutive game streak, but a series of twelve straight years in which he would drive in no fewer than 84 runs, and in ten of those years (all except 1967 and 1973) he had ninety or more. He was primarily a left fielder, although in 1965 and 1966, he played mostly in right field. He didn't really have the arm or the range to cover RF -- he played there mostly because the other options, guys like Doug Clemens, Don Landrum and Byron Browne were even worse -- and so in '67 he moved back to left field, to stay there until an ill-advised attempt to make him a first baseman in 1974.

On September 21, 1963, Billy sat out an otherwise ordinary 4-0 loss to the Braves -- Warren Spahn was pitching, and perhaps Bob Kennedy sat him against "a tough lefty". It would be the last game he would miss for nearly seven years. The next day, Billy began a consecutive-game playing streak that lasted until September 3, 1970, when Billy told manager Leo Durocher he wanted to end the streak -- it had gotten too big for him, he thought, and he didn't want the added pressure as he approached what was then the second-longest streak in history, Everett Scott's 1307 games (and after the streak had been kept going the previous year in mid-June with three token pinch-hitting appearances after he had suffered a minor injury in Cincinnati). Billy's record, which we all thought would last forever, was broken by Steve Garvey on April 16, 1983. Interesting note: had Williams not skipped that September 1963 game, his streak would have been 166 games longer (1283), as he had played in all 155 previous games that year, and the final 11 games of 1962. Along with Ron Santo, he holds the club record for games played in a season, 164 in 1965 -- the entire schedule plus two ties.

One of Billy's biggest disappoinments was never winning a MVP award, even in his two biggest years, 1970 and 1972. In 1970, a hitters' year, he hit .322/.391/.586, with 42 HR and 129 RBI. He led the National League in runs, hits (tied with Pete Rose) and total bases, but lost the MVP to Johnny Bench, who had a spectacular year for the eventual pennant-winners, the Reds. Two years later, it was the same story -- Billy won the batting title (the first Cub to do so since Phil Cavarretta in 1945) with a .333 average; the rest of his line included a .398 OBA, a .606 SLG, and finishing second in RBI (by two) and third in HR (by three) -- to Bench, who again won the MVP. That's about as close as anyone has come to winning the Triple Crown in the last forty years. Billy also led the league in 1972 in total bases, slugging percentage, OPS and extra-base hits. During one 12-game stretch in mid-July 1972, Billy went 28-for-53 (.528) with 6 HR and 17 RBI.

In a rare display of displeasure, Billy expressed his disappointment at losing out on this award, finishing a fairly distant second, twice:

The Cubs and Cubs fans had given their own recognition to Billy three years earlier; on June 29, 1969, the Cubs held "Billy Williams Day" at Wrigley Field, the day that Billy broke Stan Musial's NL record for consecutive games (895). With the Cubs flying high in the NL East at the time, it is possible that more people were either in Wrigley Field or attempted to get in, than on any other day in history. The announced attendance was 41,060, but contemporary estimates said that perhaps as many as 50,000 people were turned away at the gate. My friend Dave says that's the only day ever that he wanted to get into Wrigley Field and couldn't.

I wasn't there, unfortunately -- I didn't attend that many games as a 12-year-old -- but those who were not only saw a special man get a special honor and gifts from the Cubs, but also a doubleheader sweep of the Cardinals, 3-1 and 12-1, and Billy had a big on-field day as well, going 5-for-9 in the DH, with a double, two triples, four runs scored, and three RBI.

At the end of the 1973 season, the Cubs "backed up the truck" and dealt away so many of the stars we thought were going to win it all for the club. Billy was one of those who survived the initial purge, but was unhappy because the new manager, Jim Marshall, tried to play him at first base, a position he had played only briefly before 1974. The Cubs sunk to a 96-loss depth and Billy was traded to the Oakland A's shortly after the 1974 season ended, for Darold Knowles, Bob Locker, and Manny Trillo.

At Oakland, Billy was one of the first veteran stars to be used as a fulltime DH. Though he hit only .244 in 1975, he hit 23 HR and drove in 81 runs, including his 400th career HR on June 12, 1975 in Milwaukee, a game which featured a HR from a 400-HR man (Williams) and a 700-HR man (Henry Aaron) -- and it was also the first home run Aaron hit in Milwaukee as a Brewer. The A's won the AL West that year, and Billy Williams became the only position player among the famed 1969 crew (Kenny Holtzman was the only pitcher) to play in the postseason. Unfortunately, he didn't do very well -- going 0-for-7 -- and he retired as a player after the following year.

Seven years post-retirement, Billy was invited to play in a pre All-Star Game event, an AL vs. NL Old-Timer's game, at the old Comiskey Park, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the first All-Star game in 1933. In those days, baseball didn't do the big whoopty-do that surrounds the ASG now, and that Old-Timer's game was one of the very first such events, which I had the good fortune to be able to attend.

At age 44, still in playing-shape trim, he was one of the youngest players in that game. And early in that three-inning affair, he came up to bat against Hoyt Wilhelm, and promptly hit a monstrous home run into the right field upper deck.

Now, consider the sort of game this was, and that the man who was pitching was nearly 61 years old. But that home run was the talk of many national sportswriters covering the event, and got people remembering how good a hitter Billy was, and I believe it became a factor in his eventual Hall of Fame election, something that some of the writers who subsequently voted for him confirmed. His HoF vote total, 23% in 1982 and 40% in 1983, steadily climbed after that, and he was elected to the Hall in 1987 (after missing by only four votes in 1986). On August 13, 1987 the Cubs retired his uniform number 26.

Billy coached for the Cubs in varying capacities (mainly as first base and bench coach) for fifteen seasons after his retirement as a player, also spending three years in Oakland as an A's coach in the mid-1980's. The thirty-one seasons in which he wore the Cub uniform are more than any other single individual; I estimate Billy participated in over 5,000 Cubs games as a player or coach. And in each and every one of them, he conducted himself with class, dignity and grace.

Billy Williams has resided in the Chicago area since he retired from baseball; I happened to see him one other time in recent years, while I was in Arizona for spring training. I was at a restaurant and he was at a nearby table dining with his wife and some other family members -- yet another time I didn't feel I could approach him, because I think it's respectful of public figures to give them this sort of time with their families without interrupting them. But Billy, if by some chance you ever read this profile -- know this: one child of the sixties grew up idolizing you, and you lived and played the game the right way. You'll always be one of my biggest heroes.

Billy Williams' career stats at baseball-reference.com

Chicago Daily News negatives collection, SDN-066127. Courtesy of the Chicago Historical Society. Taken in 1926.

Profile by BCB cartoonist Mike

Occasionally someone sponsors a fan vote on the greatest moment in a team's history. The Chicago Tribune promoted such a vote in 1976, the centennial year of the Chicago Cubs. The greatest Cub was voted to be Ernie Banks, the greatest moment, his 500th home run. In the sentimental perspective of a local poll, this result was to be expected, but in the broader perspective of baseball history as seen from outside, the moment doesn't make the grade.

There are only three moments in the long history of the Cubs that every sports historian has at his fingertips (though the Bartman business is threatening to make it a quartet). They are: the Merkle incident and its aftermath, Babe Ruth's "Called Shot", and Gabby Hartnett's "Homer in the Gloamin'". Returning to the local perspective, Gabby's home run easily takes the prize among this trio.

But why the general interest? It was a walkoff home run that gave the Cubs a half-game lead during the last week of a tight pennant race. It clinched nothing. There are dozens of similar moments scattered throughout the lore of the game. This one had charisma, and trying to explain why it has shone so brightly in history is an impossible task. It acquired its reputation the instant it happened. No hindsight need apply.

Gabby Hartnett was the greatest 20th century Cubs star until Ernie Banks. He was the consensus greatest catcher in NL history until Johnny Bench arrived to provide an argument. At his retirement, Hartnett held most of the major power records for the Cubs in particular, and for major league catchers in general. He still ranks in the Cubs top ten in nearly every major batting category. As recently as the seventh edition of Total Baseball (2001), Hartnett was ranked the greatest catcher in history by Palmer and Thorn's Linear Weights methodology.

Charles Leo Hartnett (Leo to family and teammates), was born in Woonsocket, Rhode Island, December 20, 1900, son of a streetcar conductor who had been a semipro catcher. Leo was the eldest of fourteen children (the first seven, boys; the second seven, girls). The family moved to Millville, Massachusetts, when Leo was an infant, and there he and his siblings were raised. The family was close-knit in the Irish tradition, and by all accounts baseball-mad. Gabby was the only one to make the big show, but three brothers, and three sisters, would play pro or semipro ball eventually. Hartnett came of age at a time when team scouting networks were finally in place in a manner we would recognize. A young man with talent could dream of the majors, provided he had a team.

Hartnett finished grade school, and then began to earn a living. He caught for the factory team, for semipro nines, for a junior college squad; anything that might get him noticed.

In 1921, aged 20, Hartnett was offered a contract by Worcester of the Eastern League, and immediately became their regular catcher, appearing in 100 games and batting .264. During that season, he was scouted by two major league teams. John McGraw of the Giants sent Jesse Burkett, a great 19th century outfielder and future Hall of Famer. Burkett famously sent back word that Hartnett's hands were too small for a major league catcher. The Cubs' Jack Doyle (an old Giant himself), saw the bigger picture, and Gabby was purchased by the Cubs for $2500 at the end of 1921.

Bob O'Farrell, one of the finest catchers of his time, and a local product, was the Cubs regular. Hartnett reported to his first spring training strictly as a backup. Advised by his mother to "keep your mouth shut", Leo acquired the nickname "Gabby" as ironic comment. Once he got comfortable with his situation, his loquacious nature reasserted itself, and only those who had been present at Catalina in `22 knew the truth behind the origin of his moniker.

Hartnett was assigned to catch Grover Alexander that spring, and Alexander insisted Gabby become his personal catcher. Thus Hartnett caught the season opener in 1922 for his major league debut.  He was backup in `22 and `23, catching 27 and 39 games, respectively. He played 31 games at first base in 1923, an attempt to get his bat in the lineup more often, but he was a sometimes amusing failure at the bag, and remained firmly behind the plate thereafter.

Then Hartnett literally got a break. O'Farrell: "In 1924 a foul tip came back, crashed through my mask, and fractured my skull ... Gabby Hartnett had come up to the Cubs in `22, and he was sort of crowding me. But the catcher's job was mine until I got my skull fractured." Hartnett began a steady period of growth, as a batter and a fielder. The team seemed to folllow suit, also-rans in the early `20s, they became perennial contenders by the end of the decade. The appointment of Joe McCarthy as manager in 1926 heralded the team's first great era since the championship years at the turn of the century.

Hartnett caught 111 games in 1924, the first of a then-NL-record twelve 100-game seasons. He batted .289 with 24 homers, then a season record for the position. He led the league in putouts and assists. In 1928 Hartnett hit .300 for the first time, and by then was widely recognized as the best catcher in the league. Hartnett, along with AL catchers Mickey Cochrane and Bill Dickey, were seen as the "big three", a class by themselves.

Though a big man (6'1", 210 lbs), Hartnett's hands were indeed small, as Burkett noted, but they were attached to what McCarthy called "the Perfect Catcher". He possessed the "Hartnett arm", as his Massachusetts family friends called it, deadly to potential base-stealers. His handling of the mundane plays was near flawless, one admirer claimed Hartnett dropped only three pop fouls during his career. Gabby never broke a finger, and many posed photos exist in which he proudly displays his unmarred throwing hand. The only weakness in his game was speed, Hartnett was notoriously slow afoot.

And then, in 1929, it almost ended. Accounts vary as to the cause, but Hartnett injured his throwing arm in spring training, and `29 would be, for him, a lost season. He caught only one game, and appeared primarily as a pinch-hitter. He struck out in his three pinch-hit appearances in the `29 World Series. Family lore says that Hartnett's mother predicted Gabby's arm would return to health following the birth of his first child, due the following winter. A son was born December 4, 1929, and by the end of the year, mother Hartnett's prediction had come true.

Hartnett had a lot to prove in 1930, and he proved it. It was his finest season, even if the offensive totals were slightly inflated, as were all totals in 1930. He batted .339, and had career highs in games (141), home runs (37), RBI (127), hits (172), and runs (84). He led NL catchers in fielding, and began a then-record streak of eight consecutive seasons of 100 or more games caught.

It was about this time that Gabby got into trouble with the Commissioner of Baseball, his one such reprimand, and it could only have happened in Chicago. Al Capone, by the early `30s, felt secure enough in his "position" to try to acquire some respectability. One reasonable way to do this was to appear in public at popular sporting events, like any legitimate celebrity; and he and his considerable entourage became regulars at Wrigley Field. Even after Al's imprisonment, the north side gang continued to attend. Bill Veeck Jr: "Whenever I saw a $100 bill (in the box office till) I knew Ralph Capone and his boys were at the game."

Al Capone would arrive in company with several bodyguards, and occasionally a young teen identified, then and later, as his son Albert Francis ("Sonny"). Capone never appeared in public with with his immediate family, the boy was Sam Pontarelli, one of an extended surrogate family Capone cultivated. (Albert Francis, as of this writing, is very much alive). Hartnett once obligingly signed a ball for Pontarelli at Capone's request, the moment immortalized by a newspaper photographer. When the photo circulated, an edict came down from Commissioner Landis' office forbidding fraternization between players and fans. Hartnett's reply to Landis' admonishments became legendary: "If you don't want anybody to talk to the Big Guy, Judge, you tell him."

Hartnett was the NL All-Star catcher for the first five such contests, 1933-37. He was behind the plate for two of the most famous early All-Star moments. In 1934, after Carl Hubbell got into trouble in the first inning, Hartnett advised: "Just throw them what you throw to get me out." Hubbell then struck out Ruth, Gehrig, Foxx, Simmons, and Cronin in succession. In 1937, his final All-Star game, Hartnett was behind the plate when Dizzy Dean was nailed by a line drive, effectively ending his career as a great pitcher.

1932 was Hartnett's first World Series behind the plate, and about all that remains of it are his accounts of the "Called Shot": "I don't want to take anything away from the Babe, but he didn't call the shot. He held up the index finger of his left hand, looked at our dugout, not at center field, and said, `It only takes one to hit it.'"  For what it's worth, existing film seems to back Gabby's account. (See the top 100 Charlie Root profile for more).

Gabby batted .344 in the pennant-winning season of 1935, the first of three consecutive .300 seasons, including his career best .354 in 1937.  In 1935 he became the first Cub to be voted Most Valuable Player under the current format. In the `35 World Series, comparisons between himself and Detroit catcher Cochrane were inevitable. The Tigers took the Series in six games, but the catchers battled to a draw, each hitting .292.

The Cubs finished second in `36 and `37, and started 1938 with a sluggish 45-36 mark, in third place, 6.5 games behind. On July 20, manger Charlie Grimm was replaced by Hartnett, now 37 years old and a 17-season major league veteran. The appointment was a surprise, Hartnett had not been considered managerial material. But he impressed, taking the team 44-27 the rest of the way, an 89-63 record overall. The Pirates had taken a seemingly secure lead by midsummer, and were still apparently in command on September 1 with a seven-game advantage.

But the Cubs closed the gap with an amazing September run of 19-3-1. The margin was 1.5 games when the Cubs and Pirates met at Wrigley for a decisive three-game series, September 27-29. The Cubs won the first game, 2-1, behind Dizzy Dean. The margin was now one-half game.

Septmber 28 was a gray, gloomy afternoon, 34,465 fans assembled for the crucial game. Game time, in those days, was 3 p.m., thus it was well past 5 p.m when the ninth inning began, the score tied, 5-5.

By all accounts, plate umpire George Barr announced, after the conclusion of the eighth inning, that play would halt after the ninth, if the score remained even. This was not uncommon. The game would have ended a tie, and necessitated a doubleheader the following day. Both teams were duly informed, and Cubs pitcher Charlie Root set the Pirates down in order in the top of the ninth. Pittsburgh reliever Mace Brown retired the first two Cubs, Cavarretta and Reynolds, bringing Hartnett to the plate.

Brown threw a curve for a swinging strike, Hartnett fouled another curve for strike two. Brown, an aggressive pitcher by nature, tried for the strikeout, a third curve intended for the outer half. But he hung it, center cut. It was 5:37 p.m. when Hartnett hit it, a drive into the (brand new) left-field bleachers, just to the right of the indentation in the wall. There was no doubt about it, from the moment of contact. The Cubs won the game and had the league lead.

And they also had a defining legend. Perhaps the most eloquent, and poignant, account comes from Paul Waner, the great Pirate outfielder, as told in the 1960s to Larry Ritter in The Glory of Their Times:

From Hartnett himself: "I don't think I saw third base. And I don't think I walked a step to the plate -- I was carried in. But when I got there I saw Ump Barr taking a good look. He was going to make sure I touched home plate."

Just how dark it was has probably been overstated. Chicago used Daylight Saving Time in 1938, one of the few jurisdictions that did. 5:37 p.m., on September 28, was thus exactly one hour before sunset. By announcing a cessation of play beyond nine innings, the umpire was merely following convention. A fan eyewitness to the game once told the author there was no difficulty viewing the climactic events of that afternoon.

And so the moment entered history. It was a national story, and soon an immortal one. The Cubs won the following day, 10-1, and clinched the pennant September 30. Mace Brown lived to be ninety-two, a baseball lifer, the last survivng principal. All his obituaries led with his inevitable claim to fame.

Gabby donated the bat, home run ball, and catching gear from that game to the Chicago Historical Society (now the Chicago History Museum). Today, the recently remodeled museum displays the bat and ball as part of its exhibit on Chicago sports.

Hartnett, and his team, had shot their bolts. The Yankees swept the Cubs in the World Series. Gabby had only one hit in eleven at-bats. It was his last World Series, his career postseason numbers were .241, with two home runs, over sixteen games.

Hartnett continued as player-manager another two seasons, now only a part-time catcher. The Cubs finished fourth in 1939, fifth in 1940, their first second-division finish since 1925. On November 13, 1940, the Cubs released Hartnett as player and manager.

Gabby signed with the Giants as player-coach, and 1941 was his twentieth and last major league season, 64 games, 34 behind the plate, with a .300 average.

Hartnett played 1990 games, batted .297, with 236 home runs and 1179 runs-batted-in. His 1793 games caught was the major league record until broken by Al Lopez in 1945. His record 236 home runs by a catcher were passed by Roy Campanella in 1953. Also that year, Campanella broke Hartnett's record for home runs by a catcher in a season (37 in 1930). Hartnett's six seasons leading the league in assists are still a major league record. His 163 career double plays are still the NL record. His Cubs record 231 home runs were surpassed by Banks in 1960.

Hartnett's current rankings, in major categories, on the all-time Cubs lists are:

Games: 1926 (8th)
Total bases: 3079 (8th)
Doubles: 391 (6th)
Home runs: 231 (6th)
Long hits: 686 (7th)
RBI: 1153 (6th)
Slugging average: .490 (7th)

Hartnett managed in the minors for three teams, 1942-46. By then, assuming no major league jobs would be offered, Gabby took up other pursuits. He opened a popular bowling alley in Lincolnwood, a suburb of Chicago, and was a fixture at local sporting events, banquets, and old-timers meetings. He interrupted his retirement to coach one season for Charlie Finley's Kansas City A's, in 1965.

Hartnett was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1955. Liver and kidney disease afflicted him in his last years; he died in Park Ridge, Illinois, on his 72nd birthday, December 20, 1972. Two baseball Hall of Famers have died on their birthdays, both Cubs; Hartnett and Joe Tinker. Gabby is a near-neighbor of Harry Caray in All Saints Cemetery, Des Plaines IL.

Gabby Hartnett's career stats at baseball-reference.com

Bleed Cubbie Blue.

That's the name of this site, as you all well know, and as you can see on the logo to the left every single day.

Ernie Banks may be "Mr. Cub", but perhaps no player in Cubs history epitomizes the phrase "bleed Cubbie blue" better than Ron Santo.

For fourteen seasons he was the ballclub's third baseman. You've no doubt read about the more than 100 other players who have started at least one game there since Santo was traded away at the end of the 1973 season; it has taken thirty-four years, but perhaps at last the Cubs have now found a suitable successor to Santo in Aramis Ramirez.

If you never saw Santo play, you can't get a real sense of his accomplishments and what he means to the Cub franchise just by looking at his statistical line -- and that line is, in fact, outstanding. It is even more remarkable when you consider the fact that he fought, and is still fighting to this day, juvenile diabetes. Santo was the first high-profile professional athlete to reveal that he played sports at the major league level with this disease, which can debilitate and kill. In retrospect, knowing this makes his considerable accomplishments even more impressive. Even without that, his passion for playing the game could be seen every time he set foot on a baseball field.

Ronald Edward Santo was born in Seattle on February 5, 1940, and signed by the Cubs after graduation from high school in 1958. In that era, after a long period of fallowness, the Cub franchise was beginning to produce solid and star-quality major league players (among them Billy Williams, Dick Ellsworth, Lou Brock, and George Altman), and Santo's talent rocketed him through the farm system. Not long after he turned twenty years old, on June 26, 1960, he made his major league debut, playing both ends of a doubleheader at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. The Cubs swept the eventual 1960 World Champions with Santo having a big day -- 3-for-7 with a double and five RBI. He started nearly every game for the rest of the 1960 season, and had fine numbers for a twenty-year-old: .251/.311/.409, with nine home runs. Santo's first major league home run (341 more were to come) was hit on July 3, 1960, at Wrigley Field off the Cincinnati Reds' Jim O'Toole.

Despite his diabetes -- which he concealed even from his teammates for many years -- Santo became one of the most durable players in baseball. He played in every game in 1961, 1962, 1963, 1965 (playing in a club-record 164 games in '65, tied with Billy Williams, including two tie games -- that's the second-most games played in a season in major league history. Only Maury Wills, in the Dodgers' playoff season of 1962, played in more), and 1968. By 1964 he had established himself as the best third baseman in the National League, had the first of his six All-Star selections, and finished eighth in MVP voting with a 30 HR, 114 RBI season and .312/.398/.564 with 86 walks. The patient Santo walked 86 or more times for seven consecutive seasons, from 1964 through 1970, leading the league four times in that period. For those of you who key on OPS as a Hall of Fame indicator, Santo was in the top six in NL OPS four consecutive seasons, from 1964 through 1967.

1964 was the first of four straight 30-homer seasons for Santo, and though he had "only" four 100-RBI seasons, he came oh-so-close to having eight straight; from 1963 through 1970 his RBI totals were 99, 114, 101, 94, 98, 98, 123 and 114, averaging 105 RBI over the eight seasons.

His best overall season, and also his most eventful season, was likely the 1966 season (though some might choose 1964 or 1969). He had career highs in BA, OBA and SLG (.312/.412/.538), leading the league in on-base percentage. He also set a club record (since broken) by hitting in 28 consecutive games.

Yet that performance got him only a twelfth-place finish in that year's MVP balloting, and part of the reason for that might have been an incident that occurred on June 26 when, in the first game of a doubleheader, Santo's cheek was broken by a pitch thrown by the Mets' Jack Fisher. That game featured a beanball war -- the Mets' Ron Swoboda and the Cubs' Adolfo Phillips had both been hit earlier in the day. Santo had to have surgery, breaking a consecutive-game streak at 390, but he was back in the lineup a week later.

The popular Santo -- he was so popular at one point that he began a suburban-based pizza operation, "Ron Santo's Pizza", and the pizza was for a couple of years sold at Wrigley Field -- and the Cubs broke through into pennant contention the following year, and despite a setback in 1968, were considered pennant favorites in 1969. Santo got off to a terrible start -- at the end of April, he was hitting only .205 -- but the Cubs won eleven of their first twelve, and it appeared they were well on their way to breaking a twenty-four year postseason drought.

Santo, never a man to shy away from showing his feelings, began clicking his heels as he would run off the field to the Cubs' clubhouse after home victories; at the time the clubhouse was located underneath the left-field stands (that door, still in the left-field corner, now leads to an area used by vendors), and so the players would all walk from the dugout across the field after the game, that year (at least till September) to the cheers of pennant-starved fans. Santo's heel-clicking became a popular sight, though some thought it a bit arrogant.

Meanwhile, the Cubs continued to win and Santo got hot. In June, July and August, he hit .320/.382/.529 with 18 HR and 75 RBI in 87 games. But dark shadows had begun to appear. On July 8 in New York, the Cubs took a 3-1 lead into the last of the ninth, but CF Don Young misplayed two fly balls (neither of which resulted in an error being charged), and the Mets scored three runs and won 4-3. Santo ripped Young in front of his teammates, and the incident made the papers (can you imagine what doing such a thing would cause now, with ESPN and blogs like BCB around?). He later apologized, but for the first time in his career was booed when the Cubs next played at Wrigley Field.

Without belaboring the 1969 collapse, it reached its crescendo when the Cubs returned to New York in September. The famous September 8 game in which Tommie Agee was called safe at a close play at the plate (and on which Randy Hundley jumped about ten feet in the air arguing, and to this day swears Agee was out) was also the game in which a black cat walked in front of Santo while he was in the Cub on-deck circle. Believe in superstition or not, as you choose, but it's no wonder that to this day in his broadcasting job, Santo hates taking road trips to Shea Stadium.

At age 30, and starting to feel the effects of a long career played with his disease, Santo's numbers began to decline in 1970. He had another 100-RBI season, but his average dropped to .267, and the following season his power also began to decline; he drove in only 88 runs, fewer than 94 for the first time in nine years.

It was in that year -- 1971, on August 28, as the Cubs were honoring him with Ron Santo Day at Wrigley Field -- that Santo at last revealed publicly his battle with juvenile diabetes. This began a lifelong association with JD foundations, including the local Chicago-area JDRF chapter, which has hosted the Ron Santo Walk to Cure Diabetes every year since 1974.

The rest of the 1970's weren't happy years, either in baseball or personally, for Santo. His production continued to decline, and in 1973, his mother and stepfather were killed in a car accident while driving to Arizona to see him play in spring training. At the end of that season, the team that shoulda, coulda, won it all for all of us was broken up, and Santo was among those to be traded away.

Before leaving the Cubs, though, he became the first player to invoke the ten-and-five rule under the collective bargaining agreement signed after the 1972 strike. The Cubs had agreed upon a deal to send Santo to the California Angels; the ballclub would have received in return two young pitchers: Andy Hassler, who went on to have a middling career as a reliever/spot starter, and Bruce Heinbechner, a very highly-regarded lefthanded pitching prospect. Santo didn't want to play on the West Coast and vetoed the deal. In a spooky coincidence, Heinbechner was killed in a car accident the following March, driving to Angels spring training in Palm Springs.

The Cubs still wanted to deal Santo, and since his preference was to stay in Chicago, they worked out a deal with the White Sox, acquiring catcher Steve Swisher, and three young pitchers: Jim Kremmel, Ken Frailing, and ... one of Santo's future co-broadcasters, Steve Stone.

Santo's stay on the South Side was miserable, and for him, mercifully brief. The White Sox already had a third baseman, Bill Melton, so Santo was relegated mostly to DH duty, which he hated. He wanted to play in the field, but Sox manager Chuck Tanner wouldn't bench Melton (who, to be fair, had had a couple of 30-HR seasons for them), so he tried Santo at second base, where, with no experience, he only embarrassed himself. Worn down by his disease, away from his familiar home at Wrigley Field, and finishing 1974 with a .221/.293/.299 mark, Santo retired from baseball at the age of 34.

And that's where this story might have ended. Santo spent fifteen years away from the game, though he continued to reside in the Chicago area. And year after year, he thought he might be elected to the Hall of Fame. And wasn't.

And so, in 1990, when Bob Brenly (see how all these people seem to come and go to the same places?) and DeWayne Staats both left WGN radio, Santo applied for the analyst position. He made no secret of the fact that one of his primary motivations for doing so was to get back into the game and perhaps get more "noticed" so he could get into the Hall.

WGN sent Santo and Thom Brennaman, who had applied for the play-by-play slot, to Florida to tape some sample games of the Senior Professional Baseball League, then a league for former players over 40, playing during the winter. Something about those broadcasts impressed WGN management, and they were hired.

My feelings about Brennaman as a broadcaster are well known, and Santo, with no previous on-air experience, was often baited into saying odd things by the also-then-inexperienced Brennaman (his hiring occurred after his father, Marty, turned the job down; at the time Thom's only broadcast experience was as a weekend TV sports anchor in Cincinnati). Only when Pat Hughes was hired to replace Brennaman in 1996 did Santo begin to really show off his likeable on-air personality. Hughes' gentle manner with Santo, who doesn't do real in-depth game analysis, makes for an entertaining partnership. Personally, I would prefer someone with more baseball analysis as my "color" guy on the radio. But I do know that Santo lives and dies with the Cubs and their fortunes, as do the rest of us, and that's in clear evidence in every single broadcast. Turn on the radio in the middle of the game not knowing the score, and within a few minutes Ron's demeanor will tell you whether the Cubs are winning or losing. His anguished scream, "Oh, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!", when Brant Brown dropped a catchable fly ball, costing the Cubs a key pennant-race game in Milwaukee on September 23, 1998, has become Cubs and broadcasting legend.

I believe absolutely, positively, that Ron Santo belongs in the Hall of Fame. When his number was retired by the Cubs on September 28, 2003, the day after the Cubs clinched the NL Central title, it was a cloudy, chilly day -- but the sun peeked through just long enough for Ron's speech, in which he thanked everyone and said, "THIS is my Hall of Fame." But, in my opinion, that should not be all -- Santo was the best third baseman of his generation, bar none, no, not even Brooks Robinson was better (Robinson's offensive numbers pale in comparison to Santo's, and though Robinson won 13 Gold Gloves to Santo's five, at least some of that can be attributed, again, to the diabetes that more or less ended Santo's career in his early 30's). He made nine All-Star teams, finished in the top eight on MVP ballots four times, and, arguably, there was a brief time in the mid-1960's when he could have been considered the best player in baseball. (Remember, I did say arguably!)

He has been denied Hall entry many times, most recently in 2005, and also two years earlier, when his son Jeff's documentary on Ron's life, "This Old Cub", was being filmed. In the film, the disappointment in Ron's eyes when he got Sharon Pannozzo's phone call saying he hadn't made it is heartbreakingly obvious. But "This Old Cub", which also details Ron's battle with diabetes, including the amputations of both his legs, shows him approaching that, and indeed all of life, with unfailing good humor. That truly shows the measure of him as a human being, a quality to admire in anyone.

There are presently at least two online petitions promoting Santo for the Hall, and the Cub Reporter recently posted a detailed three-part series on Santo's Hall merits, to which I commend all of you.

This year's Veterans Committee Hall voting is going on right now for possible inductions this summer. It would be wonderful to see Ron Santo on the dais with Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn, given his rightful place with baseball's immortals. I daresay it might draw the largest crowd in Hall induction history. Results will be announced on February 27.

Ron Santo's admission to the Hall of Fame would be a fitting climax to a life given to baseball, as a player for fifteen years (14 as a Cub), and now entering his seventeenth year as a baseball broadcaster. And part of the reason he's so beloved by Cub fans, whether you like his broadcasting style or not, is that he's one of us -- having transformed himself from a Cubs player into a Cubs fan, "bleeding Cubbie blue" every single day.

Ron Santo's career stats at baseball-reference.com

Photo taken during the 1907 World Series at West Side Grounds

Chicago Daily News negatives collection, SDN-053479 and SDN-060450. Courtesy of the Chicago Historical Society.

Profile by BCB reader JoshinLA

All Mordecai Brown ever wanted to do was pitch.

On the morning of October 8, 1908, the Cubs were about to meet the Giants in a one game playoff for the National League pennant (technically a replay of the "Merkle Boner" game). It was the biggest game in the history of baseball to that point, and Brown was angry. He was angry with the Giants, who had engaged in a bitter feud with the Cubs all season long and were starting rumors about Brown to try to throw him off his game. He was angry at the death threats that he had received from the Black Hand organized crime syndicate. But most of all, he was angry at his manager Frank Chance, who told him that Jack Pfiester would start the game instead of him.

To be fair, Chance had some good reasons to go with Pfiester rather than his ace Brown. First, Pfiester wasn't called "The Giant Killer" merely because of his name. But a bigger reason was that Brown had pitched as either a starter or reliever in 11 of the previous 14 Cub games. But for Brown, it must have felt like he was back in Indiana all over again, and someone was once again telling him he couldn't pitch. Not only that, but his biggest rival, Christy Mathewson was out there pitching for the Giants. He couldn't stand sitting on the sidelines.

Chance did tell Brown to warm up in secret behind the fans in right-center field. When Pfiester gave up two runs in the first inning. Chance signaled for his ace. To get to the mound, Brown had to push his way past the Giant fans standing behind the ropes in centerfield. "Coming through!" he shouted. "Get the hell out of my way!" The New York crowd booed and threw things at the Cub ace as he worked through the crowd. "Here's where you `Black Hand' guys get your chance", Brown shouted defiantly at those who threatened to kill him if he pitched.

Once on the mound, Brown struck out Art Devlin to get out of the first inning. He then proceeded to shut out the Giants for the final eight innings, and his Cub teammates scored four runs off of Mathewson to win the game, 4-2. Under a police escort against an angry mob looking for revenge for a pennant they considered stolen, the Cubs quickly fled the field as the National League champions. They would later beat the Detroit Tigers in five games for their final World Championship. Brown won games one and four of the Series.

Brown would later say that October 8, 1908 was his greatest day in baseball. It may have been the greatest day any Cub has ever had in baseball.

Mordecai Peter Centennial Brown was born on October 19, 1876 in Nyesville, Indiana, the son of a coal miner. On his uncle's farm at the age of seven, he stuck his hand into a corn shredder. The doctors had to amputate his index finger and his little finger became permanently paralyzed. Then, a few months later, young Mordecai, apparently having not learned his lesson from the corn shredder, fell chasing a rabbit and damaged his two good fingers, permanently mangling his middle finger.

By the time Brown was a teenager, he started working in the local coal mines. For recreation, Brown played third base for his mine's baseball team, although his mangled hand made it difficult for him to catch the ball. One day in 1898, his team's regular pitcher was out and Brown, eager to get off third base, volunteered to pitch that day. His pitches had an unusual movement to them that kept hitters off stride and his quickly became the team's regular pitcher after that. For the next three years, he would pitch in the coal miners' league to great results, but no professional team would sign him because of his hand. Finally in 1901, his popularity had become so great that 600 fans of the Terre Haute team in the Triple-I team threatened a boycott if the team didn't sign Brown. At the age of 24, Mordecai Brown got his first professional baseball contract.

Brown pitched so well in Terre Haute that his contract was purchased by Omaha in the Western League for 1902. It was in Omaha that the local sportswriters began to call him "Three Finger" Brown. It was a name that Mordecai neither liked nor hated. He never called himself that, and his friends and teammates called him "Miner" Brown after his coal mining days. But if someone called him "Three Finger," he never corrected them nor asked to be called something else. He accepted it, just like he accepted his hand. When he was asked if his mangled hand gave him an advantage as a pitcher, he would always just say, "I don't know. I've never tried to pitch without it."

Brown's big pitch was a curveball delivered with his crooked middle finger and the stump of his index finger. From the descriptions that we have from his contemporaries, it seems to have broken something like a modern forkball, a devastating pitch in the era before the forkball was invented. In 1903, the St. Louis Cardinals decided to give that devastating pitch a chance in the majors.

Brown pitched well for St. Louis in 1903, leading the Cardinals with a 2.60 ERA and tied for the team lead in wins with nine. But the Cardinals were a terrible team that year and in an era when most teams only looked at a pitcher's W-L record, Brown's 9-13 didn't look so good. But Cub first baseman Frank Chance thought the Brown looked good and lobbied the manager Frank Selee to trade for him. In one of the more lopsided trades of all time, the Cubs gave up twenty-game winner Jack Taylor for Brown.

Mordecai Brown quickly became one of the best pitchers in the league and was the ace for the Cubs pennant winning teams in 1906-1908 and 1910. His curveball got lots of easy groundballs to the Cubs great infielders. He won 20 games every year from 1906 to 1911. He was famous for his duels with Christy Mathewson of the Giants, the one-game playoff just being the most famous. It was a rivalry without a bad guy, either in the press accounts of the day or in reality. Mathewson was the good-looking aristocrat with a strong sense of honor and fair play and Brown was the common-looking man-of-the-people who embodied the traditional values of the heartland. Overall, Brown and Mathewson met 25 times in their careers. Brown won 13 of those games to Mathewson's 12.

Brown was not just one of the greatest starting pitchers of his era, he was also its greatest reliever. As in the one-game playoff, Frank Chance rarely hesitated to bring in Brown in relief if another Cub started got into trouble. Although usually it was when the Cubs were behind, Brown did retroactively lead the National League in saves for four straight years starting in 1908. Believe it or not (and Brown wouldn't have, since saves weren't invented until after he died), Mordecai Brown retired as baseball's all-time saves leader.

In 1912 at the age of 35, Brown began to develop arm troubles and missed most of the season. Sensing his years of effectiveness were over, the Cubs shipped him to Cincinnati that off-season. He rebounded nicely in 1913 with a good season for a bad team, but Brown decided to retire at the end of that season. However, when the St. Louis team in the new Federal League offered him the chance to manage, he decided to take one last shot at pitching. Brown pitched well enough, but the St. Louis team wasn't very good, so he lost his managerial job he returned to Chicago for the Federal League in 1915. After the Federal League folded, he returned to the Cubs as a part-time player in 1916. That final season, he mostly only pitched in blowouts and what could be more accurately termed in-season exhibitions than real games, especially a well-publicized final duel with Christy Mathewson on Labor Day.

Brown managed in the minors for a few years before retiring from baseball for good in 1920. He opened a filling station in Terre Haute, Indiana that he would run for the next twenty-five years. He bought his uncle's old corn shredder (the one he stuck his hand in) and put it on display there for everyone to see. Mordecai Brown's filling station became a big hangout for anyone wanting to talk baseball with the all-time great. It was considered a must for any old ballplayer traveling across the country to stop there and reminisce with old Miner Brown.

Brown died in Terre Haute in February of 1948, just shortly before he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. -- although he was told to expect induction shortly before he died, so he didn't exactly die not knowing he was heading to Cooperstown. He was survived by his wife, Sallie. They had no children.

Mordecai Brown was not only one of the greatest Cubs of all-time, he was one of the greatest baseball pitchers of all-time. If not for his late start in baseball, he would almost certainly have been well north of 300 wins in the majors. For Cub fans, he was the best player on our last World Series Champions. So if all you know about Mordecai Brown is that he had "three fingers," take this opportunity to get to know one of the greatest Cubs ever. And thank those fans in Indiana all those years ago that demanded that the young man with the funny hand be allowed to pitch.

On a final note, two descendants of Mordecai Brown's cousin, Cindy Thomson and Scott Brown, recently published the first full-length biography of Mordecai Brown. In addition, they maintain a nice companion website that contains an online "museum" and other information about this all-time great.

Mordecai Brown's career stats at baseball-reference.com