ALL OF FAME: IN SPORTS, CHICAGO HAS EVERYTHING
Unexpected ride in Cooperstown helps me see that our city is blessed with a past and a present few can match
COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. — The shuttle bus from the Baseball Hall of Fame media center to the media parking lot was nowhere to be seen, so I started walking.
No big deal. I had spent hours in the hot sun Sunday listening to speeches, video tributes and introductions. Then I had sat on my butt for several more hours writing about Harold Baines’ wonderful induction speech. Actual movement might be good for me, I decided. I might even finish the 1½-mile walk before the bus made it to the
parking lot.
I had gotten about a quarter-mile down the road, successfully avoiding traffic by sticking to a thin ribbon of a shoulder, when a pickup truck slowed next to me.
“Where are you going?’’ said the woman who was driving. “Do you need a ride?’’ Exercise? Who needs exercise?
“I guess you don’t look like a serial killer,’’ she said as I hopped in.
No, but I have been called an enemy of the people. I thanked her and told her how much I appreciated her kindness. She said she lived in Cooperstown and hoped I had a good impression of the place. I did. The village of about 1,700 people is known almost solely for the Hall, but it’s set amid rolling hills, thick forests, charming farms and a scenic lake. It’s gorgeous.
She asked where I was from. Chicago, I said. “What does Chicago have?’’ she said. By that she meant, what is Chicago’s equivalent of the Hall, its calling card? Someone says “Cooperstown,’’ and you think of nothing else but the Hall of Fame. It’s the cradle of baseball civilization. Everything here revolves around the museum, which is stuffed with the game’s artifacts. If the Smithsonian Institution is the nation’s attic, then the Hall is the country’s sports closet.
So what does Chicago have that defines us? Well, we used to have an alligator. Then we had a celebrity alligator catcher. Now we don’t know what to do with ourselves.
What do we have? What defines us? Let’s do as we’re told and stick to sports. If someone says “Chicago,’’ what comes to mind? That used to be an easy answer: Michael Jordan. He was the best basketball player on the planet, and by some really loose game of association we played, so were we. But we’re more than 20 years removed from the last of the Bulls’ six titles, and MJ is much more a memory than a presence in the city.
The Cubs’ futility was a huge part of the city’s persona for 108 years, until the team won the World Series in 2016. White Sox fans certainly weren’t defined by any of it during that long span, though they had spent a lot of time, energy and enthusiasm explaining to outsiders that they couldn’t be bothered with the team from the North Side. Nope, couldn’t be bothered at all.
Does the Cubs-Sox dynamic best explain us?
Is Wrigley Field our Hall, or has it turned too much into a theme park?
If I had told the nice lady that the 1985 Bears defined us, I might have broken down in tears at the pitifulness of our condition.
What could I tell her? For about three
seconds, we believed we had the 2016 Olympics, and then we got slimed politically by IOC voters, which was embarrassing because the city is the Hall of Fame for political slimers. So there are no “Chicago, Olympic City’’ signs around town.
Finally, I blurted out a one-word answer that seemed somewhere between weak and blustery at the same time. What does Chicago have? “Everything,’’ I said.
Arrogant but, the more I thought about it afterward, true. What defines us is a breadth and a history that few cities can match. We have two baseball teams that each have been around for well over a century. If you took the Cubs and the Sox out of the Baseball Hall of Fame, the place would look like a family home after three kids have left for college. Babe Ruth’s called-shot home run happened at Wrigley. The 1919 Black Sox changed forever the way people looked at the game.
Without Bears founder George Halas, there might not be an NFL as we know it.
What does Chicago have? We have the Bears and the ongoing discussion of whether quarterback Mitch Trubisky is good enough to get them a Super Bowl title 34 years after their last one. This takes up about 95 percent of our waking conversations and about 50 percent of our sleep-talking.
We have the Blackhawks, not so far removed from three Stanley Cups in six seasons, and we have the Bulls. We have Northwestern football. Once in a while, a story like Loyola’s run to the Final Four drops in our laps, and we embrace it until it can’t breathe anymore. We have all the elements: Fire, Sky and Red Stars.
I’m sure I’m forgetting something, and maybe that’s the point.
There’s so much, that we too often take the bounty for granted. The city is a living, breathing, talking ode to American sports.
We have everything. Lucky, is what we are.
The ride to the media parking lot lasted a few minutes, tops. It’s funny how much can come out of a brief exchange. I thanked her for her hospitality. I should have thanked her for opening my eyes.
She told me she had a soft spot in her heart for Chicago. When her husband, a policeman, was injured on the job, police at O’Hare took good care of her worried daughter, who was rushing home from overseas.
I’d like to think that’s Chicago, too — just as Cooperstown is an unexpected ride on a hot day.