Good, glad to see we're all on the same page. For those who don't feel like stopping by Google and looking up how long it's been since that occurred, let me give you a refresher course.
The last time our 'lovable losers' hoisted baseball gold was 1908, or 106-plus years and counting.
That's not a dry spell, that's four generations of misery. Since that time, the Cubs' dreadful stretch without a championship has been blamed on black cats, billy goats, Leon Durham, Steve Bartman, and so many ridiculous things that it crossed passed absurd into Twilight Zone territory long before even I was born way back in 1976.
We live in an era where our every thought is public knowledge. Social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc., put our things out there for all to see. Pick your poison. Everyone, myself included, is an armchair critic.
Which is why I find the debacle of the Chicago Cubs so tantalizingly fascinating. Each time I log on to a site and give anyone the tiniest hint I'm being critical of the Cubs, I'll inevitably get an angry comment back, a snarky reply, or just good old-fashioned anger in return.
Which is fine. It comes with the territory. If you are a writer and have a sports-related opinion, you better have thick skin. But you also better be prepared to back up your points.
I don't like making sweeping generalizations, but sometimes I wonder: Why do so many Cubs fans seem so angry?
Is it because they know the crosstown Chicago White Sox had possibly the best offseason of any major league team, signing on-base guy Melky Cabrera, former Yankees closer David Robertson, lefty veteran slugger Adam LaRoche, and another reliever who averaged over a strikeout an inning in 2014?
Or perhaps the anger stems from things like Cubs fans seeing their former players, like Jeff Samardzija, land elsewhere and succeed. He's in a Sox uniform now, in case any of you shut your TV set off for the last month.
When your foundation includes names like Adam Eaton and Jose Abreu, youngsters who were both .300 hitters in 2014 --- and perennial Cy-Young candidate Chris Sale --- well, that's not just a good offseason. It's a full-fledged revival on the South Side.
Full disclosure, I'm a lifelong White Sox fan. But I'm not one of those Sox fans who gets my rocks off seeing the Chicago Cubs lose. I'm just not. The trouble is, if you grew up in Chicago, you've been trained, A.K.A. brainwashed, by one or more of your family members to root for one team over the other.
Maybe I don't get angry like so many Sox and Cubs fans do when debating things like which team had the better offseason because my beloved Pale Hose actually hoisted a World Series trophy in 2005, so as a fan, I know what that feels like. I understand the rush (and relief) as I sat there in shock and disbelief the same way so many of you sat there certain Mark Prior and Kerry Wood were about to become lifelong Chicago icons back in 2003.
That ill-fated Cubs game against the Marlins happened over a decade ago, now. And I bring it up not to pick at that scabby, lifelong wound, folks. I bring it up because I want to see the Friendly Confines host a World Series game in my lifetime the same way all of you do, north/south side allegiances be damned.
But I'm also a realist, and I'm here to tell you that while the Cubs are headed in the right direction, they also have a ways to go. Listening to Chicago talk radio, you'd think they'd already won the 2015 Central Division Crown.
But lets take it one step at a time.
The 2014 Chicago Cubs, when we last left them, didn't have a single .300 hitter on their roster. They didn't have a hitter with more than 78 RBI. They also only had one pitcher with 10 or more wins.
So forgive me, my pinstriped friends, for telling things the way they really are, but those are all facts.
Sure, they, too, had a solid offseason, signing all-star caliber catcher Miguel Montero, and landed a whale ace starter in Jon Lester. Those two should be a great starting point for a team that's lacked direction and leadership for far too long. A tip of the cap, there.
The signing of former Tampa Bay manager Joe Maddon was a refreshing wakeup call to Cubs fans everywhere that this organization finally means business, as well.
But this remains a team that won 73 games in 2014. All I'm saying is let's be cautiously optimistic, given this team's history, rather than expecting anything.
If there's one thing I learned in 2005 being a Sox fan, it's that great things happen when you least expect them. Just ask the Kansas City Royals, who almost did the unthinkable in October.
The Cubs and their fans have every right to be excited about youngsters like Starlin Castro, Anthony Rizzo, Javier Baez and Jorge Soler. I also think Soler, Rizzo and soon-to-be starring in primetime third baseman Kris Bryant are legit, though I'm not sold on Baez's ability to make consistent contact with the baseball. The trouble is --- and remains --- these are players who, for the most part, haven't proven a thing yet on a major league diamond when it comes to winning consistently.
Winning teams also do a lot of little things right, and my lone fear is this organization has put too much emphasis on people who can hit the ball out of the park, rather than plucking youngsters who would rather get an opposite field base hit with two strikes.
Maybe someday soon these guys will all blossom into stars. And maybe in nine months, Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer will be proven to be geniuses who orchestrated this entire thing from the ground up.
But until I see it with my own eyes, in person, I'm going to keep reverting back to the history book that shows pictures of Moises Alou leaping into the stands and throwing a temper tantrum. Or the 1969 Mets crawling out of last place to shock the world. Or the team that lost in the World Series, ahem, back near the end of World War II.
Talk is fun, but it's also cheap. It doesn't win baseball games. It doesn't put talent on the field. But the fact we are even talking about these things in a positive way, in Chicago, on both sides of town, is a good thing. A great thing.
Hell, let's all root for our Chicago teams to do well, together.
Just don't get mad at me if year 106 becomes year 107 on the North Side. Or year 108.
Life's too short for that kind of anger. Channel that angry energy toward your team, on the field.
It's the exact same unhealthy anger and energy that should've been given --- in a POSITIVE WAY --- to Mark Prior that night after Alou missed the foul ball in 2003, rather than some guy named Steve Bartman, when things didn't go the Cubs' way.
Soon, on a warm April or May evening later this year, you'll all see signs of your Cubbies starting to bloom like the flowers that grow outside. And bloom, they shall.
But a word of advice:
Water them wisely, Cubs fans. So that someday, just maybe ... they'll grow into a garden, alongside the magnificent ivy that rests on the outfield walls, for us all to behold and admire.
Even us hated Sox fans.
