There are now only two.
That was my first thought when the Boston Red Sox won their first World Series in 86 years. Now there are only two teams that have not won a World Series in a pathetically long time. And they're both from Chicago.
The Chicago Cubs haven't won a World Series since 1908 and the Chicago White Sox haven't won since 1917. Both teams own the longest droughts of not even being in their, with the Cubs last going in 1945 and the Sox in 1959.
The Cubs' woes have been so well documented that I swear if see another documentary about it I'm going to punch a wall.
The White Sox don't have the losing mystique the Cubs had or the Red Sox did. The White Sox were not agonizingly close like the Red Sox consistently were. They're not consistently at the bottom of their division like the Cubs. The White Sox are consistently in the middle, always around .500, competitive early and fading late.
Even when the White Sox make the playoffs or get close, they don't lose in spectacular fashion. Their first baseman has never let a crucial groundball go through his legs, their fans haven't reached out to grab a crucial foul ball, they haven't given up crucial home runs in the game, nor or have they had a late season collapse (though they tried their best to do it this year).
The White Sox never have had the big name stars of Ted Williams, Ernie Banks, Carl Yastrzemski or Sammy Sosa (well, not in his prime). They don't play in a classic stadium like Fenway Park or Wrigley Field. The White Sox first played in a so-so ballpark known as Comiskey Park and then built New Comiskey Park, a.k.a. U.S. Cellular Field, which is not as bad people made it out to be and has drastically improved, thanks to innovations.
People fawn over the Cubs and their "loyal" fan base. The truth is that there are two types of Cubs fans. There are the true die-hards who follow the team and truly care for it. The other group consists of people who jump on and off the bandwagon and go to games to play hooky from work and to get drunk at the biggest bar in the world - Wrigley Field. Trust me on this subject. I've gone to enough Cubs and grew up in a city with these people.
It is not like the White Sox deserve the same publicity as the two other teams have. The fan base is schizophrenic in loyalty thanks to its horrible treatment after 1994 strike. (Note: This is the closest thing White Sox fans have to Bartman or Buckner. The White Sox were in first place in the AL Central had Frank Thomas in his prime and four stud pitchers before the strike ruined their chances to win their first World Series since Woodrow Wilson was president.)
The team does not play in the best part of Chicago and has not been a true World Series contender in a decade or so.
Now the White Sox are up 2-0 on the Red Sox, coming back from a 4-0 deficit against the former White Sox pitcher David Wells (who stunk for the entire period he was with the team). This White Sox team is the most talented team of my lifetime and has a chance to end 88 years of misery. The Red Sox did the unthinkable last year. Will the White Sox pull off the same incredible feat? The impossible already happened last year, so who says it won't happen again. I only hope the White Sox can do it before the Cubs.
