A decade of Chicago sports

Chicago sports had an all or nothing nature to this decade. Your team either won big or lost in the most frustrating way possible.

It was a good time to be a Blackhawks and Cubs fan. The same can’t be said about being a fan of any other team.

But it didn’t have to be this way. And after 10 years and four titles, including one that seemed impossible due to a decades-old curse, one can’t help but wonder what could’ve been if Derrick Rose hadn’t blown out his knees and the Bull ascended to their first title since Michael Jordan? And man, what if Jay Cutler had the leadership skills to go with his talent? Oh, and what if the White Sox found 25 Mark Buehrles and Paul Konerkos, and Elena Delle Donne never requested a trade from the Sky?

It could’ve been the greatest decade of all time.

However, what Chicago was left with was a very successful decade — at least for two teams.

The Hawks were by far the most dominant team, but the Cubs’ earth-shattering World Series win overshadowed every other accomplishment.

Because it finally happened, it really did. And the world didn’t end (at least not yet).

It took 10 innings, a blown three-run lead, a brief rain delay that allowed Jason Heyward to give his teammates the best pep talk of all time — but after nearly 4½ hours on Nov. 2, 2016, the Cubs beat the Indians in Game 7 of the World Series to end the longest championship drought in baseball history.

Not to minimize the Hawks’ dynasty, but the Cubs’ championship win was one for the ages. In fact, it was the biggest story in American sports from this decade.

Fans from all over the world, young and old, celebrated. In that moment, all those years of unfulfilled promises and heartache were washed away. The Cubs were lovable losers no more.

But after the taste of sweet victory dissolved, people wanted more.

Perhaps Cubs fans were spoiled. Manager Joe Maddon took a last-place team to three consecutive National League Championship Series — unparalleled success for a team that had been saying “maybe next year” for 108 years. But with heightened expectations, anything short of a World Series berth was a disappointment.

The Cubs haven’t made it back to the World Series. And after a season of so-called “reckoning,” the Cubs fired Maddon, arguably the best manager in franchise history, and replaced him with fan-favorite catcher from the World Series team, David Ross, who has no previous coaching or managerial experience.

After the Cubs, the next best thing in Chicago sports this decade was the Hawks and the three Stanley Cups they raised over six season.

After years of Hawks players handing out codes for free tickets at subway stations and outside the United Center, Chicago identified itself as a hockeytown.

Led by future Hall of Famers Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane and coach Joel Quenneville, the Hawks were the hottest and most exciting team in town. And they just kept winning, and winning, and winning. And they did so under some of the most insane circumstances, too.

Remember Kane’s 2010 Stanley Cup-winning goal in overtime? Or the Hawks’ two goals in 17 seconds to win their second title in three years? And who could forget Andrew Shaw’s triple-overtime goal off his shin in Game 1 of the 2013 Stanley Cup Final?

General manager Stan Bowman showered his core with long and lucrative contracts that perpetually put the Hawks in salary-cap hell. And as the core got older, winning games became more difficult. Over the last few years, the Hawks fell down the totem pole of Chicago sports. They ultimately fired Quenneville 15 games into the 2018-19 season, replacing him with young gun Jeremy Colliton, who has yet to turn the Hawks around.

Another major storyline from this decade is the decline of Rose, a Simeon grad whom the Bulls picked first overall in the 2008 draft.

Rose started the decade on a high note becoming the NBA’s youngest player to be named league MVP in 2011. During that season, Rose helped his hometown team finish with the best record in the NBA. The Bulls made it to the Eastern Conference Finals, where they were ultimately eliminated by the Heat. In the following seasons, Rose underwent three knee surgeries and was never the same.

The Bulls ultimately traded Rose, who still gets a warm welcome to the United Center every time he returns.

Other highlights from this decade, include:

• The Bears made it to the playoffs twice, winning only one of their three games. Cody Parkey’s infamous double-doink kick scarred some Bears fans for life.
• The whole city rallied behind Loyola and its basketball chaplain, Sister Jean Dolores Schmidt, during its improbable run to the Final Four in 2018.
• Oh, and Northwestern went dancing, too, in what was the Wildcats program’s first NCAA Tournament appearance.
• The White Sox haven’t made the playoffs since 2008 and have posted a losing record in eight of their last nine seasons. But after a dismal decade, the Sox’ arrow seems to be pointing up with exciting young players, including Tim Anderson, Yoan Moncada, Eloy Jimenez and Lucas Giolito, showing flashes of All-Star potential.
• The Bulls have had a rollercoaster decade and have been on a downward spiral over the last few seasons. The three key players of the team’s rebuild — Zach LaVine, Kris Dunn and Lauri Markkanen — have come up short.
• Led by Delle Donne, the Sky earned their first WNBA Finals appearance in 2014. After the two down seasons following Delle Donne’s trade, the Sky made it back into the playoffs in 2019.
• The Red Stars made five consecutive semi-final appearances, including a second-place finish in 2019, to close out the decade.
• The Fire have remained more or less the same over the last decade even with German soccer legend Bastian Schweinsteiger. They’ll starting next decade with a clean slate, including a venue change as they’ll play 2020 season at Soldier Field.

It’s impossible to know what’s in store for Chicago sports in the next 10 years, but there’s some promise.

Will the next decade upstage the 2010s?

There won’t be any breaking of a century-old title drought. But maybe the success will be a little more evenly distributed.