Classic Royko: A pitch for the Cubs, as columnist recalled his first time seeing them play

Editor’s note: The Cubs’ home opener is Monday. Which we mark with this classic Mike Royko column, originally published April 5, 1979, from the Sun-Times’ archives.

It’s always one of the best events of the year, the real beginning of Chicago’s spring, and I remember the first time I took part.

The old man had hit on the daily double, and to celebrate we were going to opening day at Wrigley Field and sit in the grandstand. There were four of us in the group — the old man, Dutch Louie, Shakey Tony and me.

Sun-Times file

It was a cold, blustery day, so everyone dressed accordingly — long underwear, wool pants, heavy jackets and a pint of Jim Beam. Except me. I didn’t get to wear Jim Beam because it was 1939 and I was 6. The old man wasn’t permissive.

That was not only my first opening day, but it was the first Cubs game I ever saw and the first time I saw Wrigley Field.

Today it is considered tiny, the smallest ballpark in Major League Baseball. But when we got off the streetcar and there it stood, I couldn’t imagine anything could be that big and magnificent. To this day, I still have a trace of that awe whenever I see it. Of course, the awe dissipates when I see the players.

As we walked toward the ticket gate that afternoon, a cop pointed at me and sternly said: “Shouldn’t that kid be in school?”

Dutch Louie said: “He stayed home sick.”

“What’s wrong with him?” the cop asked.

“Pneumonia,” said Louie.

The Cub leadoff man — the first Cub I ever saw bat — was Stan Hack. And on the first pitch, he ripped a screaming, hissing rocket down the foul line toward right field. It bounced once and banged into the wall. Hack’s feet barely touched the ground as he raced around the bases, ending up at third base with a theatrical slide.

I was hooked. From that moment on I was a Cub fan. I felt great. I was too young to realize it was a curse.

The next inning Phil Cavaretta came up. Shakey Tony went crazy, He was on his feet waving his arms, whistling between his teeth, yelling, “Hey, Phil, Phil, it’s me. Tony”

He sat down and explained that he and Cavaretta had both gone to Lane Tech, both were Italian, and he had once met Cavaretta’s uncle in a tavern. So Cavaretta was his friend and hero.

When Cavaretta flied out, a man in the next box shouted an insult. Shakey Tony stood up and snarled at the man: “Hey, you want to die? Huh? You want to die?” The man didn’t say anything for the rest of the ball game. Even when he ordered peanuts, he used hand motions.

I don’t remember much about the rest of the game, except that the Cubs easily won. That was expected then. They were the defending National League champions.

Ten years passed before I went to another opener. By then I had been to countless games and knew every statistic in Cub history. I flunked algebra, but I knew Hack Wilson’s lifetime batting average.

But in April 1949, the Cubs were no longer defending champs. They could barely defend themselves against ground balls. This may have been the most pitiful era in Cub history, and I think I know why.

In 1945, with World War II still raging, the Cubs won a pennant with a team made up of some 4-Fs.

When the war ended, P.K. Wrigley, the Cub owner, apparently reasoned that the way to win a championship was with 4-Fs. So while other teams began putting healthy athletes on the field, Wrigley continued hiring players who walked funny and had strange physical infirmities.

I remember two things about that 1949 opening game. The Cub pitcher, Dutch Leonard, a sly old man, threw the knuckleball, and he had the Pittsburgh hitters so confused and helpless that they looked almost like the Cubs.

In nine innings, they had just two or three dinky hits. But in the ninth inning, one of them hit an easy grounder to Roy Smalley, the Cub shortstop. He was the only shortstop in baseball who had a deformed hand. I guess Wrigley figured that if another war ever broke out, he’d be set at that position.

Smalley pawed at it, slapped it, finally picked it up and stared at it. Someone hit a pop-up and the Cub catcher and the third baseman collided at their foreheads and fell down. The run scored and we lost one-nothing. I was learning that some Cub fans carried Jim Beam for more than the cold.

I didn’t make another opener until 1960, and by then Wrigley had abandoned his 4-F program. He had decided to stock his team with people who had big biceps, like George Altman and Frank Thomas and Ernie Banks and Moose Moryn. They could really hit home runs. The trouble was, most of them had big biceps in their arches, too, and the old ladies behind the concession counter could run faster.

But it was a good opener. Altman hit a long homer, Thomas hit an even longer one, Moryn knocked some mortar out of the right field wall, the Cubs scored eight runs, and the Giants scored only 10.

I stayed away from any more openers until 1969. And that may have been the greatest of them all. There were almost 41,000 of us there.

Ernie hit a homer in the first. Then he hit a homer in the third, and we all jumped up and down and screamed and acted like crazy people. Then the other team tied it, and the suspense mounted until a fine hulk named Willie Smith pinch-hit a homer in the 11th inning. Jack Brickhouse screamed himself into a hernia, some fans didn’t fall out of the nearby saloons until closing time, and the city was gripped with season-long pennant fever.

Bob Langer / Sun-Times

We all remember what happened that season. It was the best Cub team in 30 years. No 4-Fs. No strange mutants. For the first time in three decades, the players were better athletes than the grounds crews.

It didn’t help. When the crunch came, the Cubs swallowed their tongues, and New York, in its greed, had another championship. Since that season I have made a point of seeing the movie “Fail Safe” every time it is on TV because the movie ends with New York being nuked.

I haven’t been to an opener since, partly because I’m mad at the Cub management for trading Jose Cardenal, the only player I saw who could sleep between innings. In fact, Jose could sleep between pitches. With his potential, I had hoped he would remain in Chicago and someday become a distinguished alderman.

But when the day arrives, it’s hard to resist. So if I can scrounge a ticket, I might be there.

Just look for a guy wearing long underwear and Jim Beam. My old man has become permissive.