Chicago Cubs: Curse of the Billy Goat

The Chicago Cubs is a Major league baseball team in Chicago, Illinois.  The Cubs play their home games at Wrigley Field which is their home stadium. An interesting fact about the Chicago Cubs is that they have not won a World Series since 1908. The Cubs have not been to the world Series since 1945. The reason for this is because they have a famous curse that people say that is placed upon them called the curse of the Billy Goat.  It is called the curse of the Billy Goat because a person brought a goat into the Cubs stadium and was told to leave because he could not bring a goat into the stadium and the goat was causing problems for the people in the stadium. The owner was very mad about this and said that the Cubs would not win another game. After this happened the Cubs still have not won a World Series since 1908 and it has been 101 years now since they have not won. But the Cubs may soon win the World Series because they are doing better than they have before and last year they made it into the playoffs but lost to the Los Angeles Angels in all three games of the first round of the playoffs. But since then the Cubs are doing better and they may soon be World Series champions after 101 or more after winning the World Series. Their may still be hope because over the years two other baseball teams have ended their curses by winning the World Series. These two teams were the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago White Sox. The Red Sox ended their curse which is the Curse of the Bambino in 2004. This was their curse because in 1918 they traded Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees and they did not win a World Series since then. The White Sox ended their curse in 2005 after not winning the World Series since 1917. their curse was called the Black Sox scandal after some of the players were payed to lose the 1919 World Series and were banned from baseball. This is why I still have hope that the Chicago Cubs may sooner or later win a World Series very soon and end their curse.

The Chicago Cubs were originally known as the Chicago White Stockings from 1876 to 1889. While under this team name they won 6 pennants and were in the playoffs 2 times. After that they were later named the Chicago Colts from 1890 to 1897. They did not make the playoffs or the World Series as the Chicago Colts. In 1898 their name was later changed to the Chicago Orphans and this name lasted until 1902. As the Orphans they did not win a World Series or a playoff game like they did when they were the Chicago Colts. It wasnt til 1903 when they got their official name as it is today. Today their name is the Chicago Cubs. As the Chicago Cubs they won 2 World Series, 10 pennants and they made the playoffs a total of 16 times. The last time they won the World Series was 1908 and they have not won a championship ever since.

During the 1908 season, the Cubs won their last World Series and thus this was the start of the Curse of the Billy Goat. The players with the highest batting average during the 1908 season was Bill Mack and Carl Spongberg. Both players batted a .667 batting average.  The players who had the most home runs during the 1908 season were Bill Tinker and Johnny Kling. Kling hit four home runs during the 1908 season and Tinker hit six home runs during the 1908 season. The pitchers with the most strikeouts during the 1908 season were Orval Overall, Jack Pfiester, Ed Reulbach and Mordecai Brown. Brown had 123 strikeout during the 1908 season, Reulbach had 133 strikeouts during the 1908 season, Pfiester had 117 strikeouts during the 1908 season and Overall had 167 strikeouts during the 1908 season. Seven of the Chicago Cubs pitchers had a perfect win-loss percentage during the 1908 season. The players who had the good records are Mordecai Brown with a .763 percentage, Ed Reulbach with a .774 percentage, Jack Pfiester with a .545 percentage, Orval Overall with a .577 percentage, Chick Fraser with a .550 percentage, Carl Lundgren with a .400 percentage and Andy Coakley with a 1.000 percentage. The players who were fielders during the 1908 season had a very good year and their averages are very good. Their averages range from 1.000 to .667. So from the way its seems the Cubs fielders had a very good year during the 1908 season. Hopefully the Cubs fielders today can reapeat that and by winning the the World Series very soon.

Pulling the Starters out in the 3rd quarter. A good idea?

When the Indianapolis Colts lost against the New York Jets on December 27th many Colts fans were not very happy with their coach Jim Caldwell. The reason for this is because Caldwell pulled his starting QB Peyton Manning and other starters out of the game during the third quarter. But Caldwell defended his decision on doing that but many people including the NFL are not to happy about that. When they lost last Sunday against the Bills, the  started looking into teams that were pulling their starters out of the game. It is not quit a good idea to do that because your starters are the one’s who win games and are the ones who can possibly bring their team all the way to the Super Bowl. But now the Colts have lost their record as a undefated team. The second undefeated that also lost their record was the New Orleans Saints. They started their season off undefeated but they lost that record to the Dallas Cowboys on December 19th. This may also be a result of pulling their starters but no one exactly knows what may have happened. Their should be a rule made about pulling starters. The coach should ask their player if they need a break instead of the coach just plain out taking the player out of the game. That way they would be making a lot of people happy including the teams fans. Also after both the Colts and Saints lost their undefeated season they both lost a number of games in a row. The Colts lost 2 games in a row and the Saints lost 3 games in a row. This is why pulling a starter out of a game is not a very good idea because it will make a lot of people unhappy and it will also end of perfect season that a lot of fans and players were hoping to have happened.

Jim Thorpe

Jim Thorpe is considered to be one of the greatest athletes in the whole wide world. He has won many awards and has set many sports records during his time as an Olympic athlete, a baseball player and a football player. People today still consider him to be a great athlete and he his remembered today as one of the top athletes of the 20th century and as the one of the greatest athletes of the first half of the 20th century. Here are some facts about Jim Thorpe’s sports career and about his life.

Jim Thorpe was born James Francis Thorpe on May 28th, 1887 in a one room cabin near Prague, Oklahoma. There is still some confusion to where he was actually born but according to the estate that was where he was born. His parents were Hiram Thorpe, a farmer and Mary James, a Pottawatomie Indian. Thorpe was actually born a twin but his brother died at the age of nine. His indian name is Wa-Tho-Huk which means bright path and there defiantly was a bright path ahead of him. 

Thorpe began his athletic career in 19o4 at his school called Carlisle Industrial Indian School located in Pennsylvania. While at his school he played both football and he ran track too. In 1908  he was selected as a third- team All American and he made the first team in 1909 and in 1910. He was coached by football legend Glenn “Pop” Warner and he was able to see that Thorpe would evolve into a sports phenomenon.

At the age of 24 Thorpe was selected to play in the 1912 Olympic Games which was being hosted in Antwerp, Belgium. While at the games he blew the competition away in both the pentathlon and the decathlon and he set records that would stand for decades. King Gustav V presented Thorpe with his gold medals and before Thorpe could walk away, King Gustav told Thorpe that he was the greatest athlete in the world. But the wins were jeopardized in 1913 when it came out that Thorpe played two semi-professional seasons of baseball. The Olympic Committee had strict rules about athletes receiving monetary compensation for participating in professional athletics. Thorpe said he played it for the love of the game and did not play for money but the committee decided that his baseball experience adversely affected his amateur status in the track and field events and he was removed from the record books and his gold medals were taken away. It would not be until 1982 long after Jim Thorpe died that he was given back the gold medals and got his name placed back in the record books.

After the controversy, Thorpe moved on and he signed on to play baseball for the New York Giants.  He played for the Giants from 1913 to 1915. Later he left the Giants and played for the Cincinnati Reds during the 1917 season. He then went back to the Giants from 1917 to 1919 and ended his career playing for the Boston Braves. He played outfield for both teams and had a batting average of .252 with seven home runs, 82 runs batted in with 176 hits.

During much of his baseball career Thorpe also immersed in professional football. From 1915 to 1920 he played for the Canton Bulldogs and the Cleveland Indians in 1921. In the years following his football career Thorpe also organized, coached, and played for the Oorang Indians a professional football team comprised completely of American Indians and played for them from 1922 to 1923. Also Thorpe was responsible for forming the American Professional Football Association and would later become the president of the group. This association would later be called the National Football League or NFL which is still around to this very day. During his football career Thorpe played on six different football teams and ended his football career with the Chicago Cardinals in 1929.

After his sports career ended, Thorpe made a living being an extra in movies, serving as a superintendent of recreation in the Chicago Park System and was also quite vocal with matters of Indian affairs. He also made a living of being a public speaker/ lecturer and created a dance troupe called “The Jim Thorpe Show”. The Merchant Marines even had the honor of Thorpe’s presence, as he served with beginning at age 58. In 1950 Thorpe was bestowed two monumental honors. These two honors were ” the greatest American football player” and “the greatest overall male athlete” by the Associated Press.

Even though he died on March 28th, 1953, Thorpe is still remembered today and he has influenced many sports players today. He will be forever known as the greatest athlete in the world. Thorpe influenced players in football and baseball and he influenced people who competed in the Olympics. His legacy shall be remembered forever and he shall be remembered for year to come.

Throughout his career Thorpe has recieved many achivements during his sporting career before and after his death. In 1951 he was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame. He was voted All-America in 1911 and in 1912. He was elected to the Charter Enshrinee in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963. He was also elected to the Track and Field Hall of Fame but the date in unknown on when he was elected. In 2001 he was ABC’s Wide World of Sports Athlete of the Century.  From 1996-2001 he was continuously awarded ABC’s Wide World of Sports Athlete of the Century award.

Super Bowl Champions

Here are the football teams that have won a Super Bowl. The first Super Bowl was in 1967 and the Green Bay Packers won it that year. It also lists the names of where the 2010-2012 super bowls are going to be held. ( 2012 is not the end of the world. No one knows when the world is going to end. It ends when it ends).

Baseball World Series Winners

Here are the teams who have won the MLB World Series. It has who won the World Series in what year and the teams who played each other. It also has the MVP’s who were chosen.

My blog photos

I have been getting a lot of praise for all the photos i have been putting on my blog. I appriciate this praise very much and i am gald that you like all these photos. I plan on putting more photos on my blog every day. So don’t worry u will be seeing new photos a lot on my blog.

Sports and culture Friday the 13th

Today we created our own blog in sports and culture today. We also added sports websites to out blog so we could put blogs on their websites too. Some of the websites that I added to my blog are espn.com and yahoo sports. It was also very interesting on learning how to create a blog for I thought it was not a very easy thing to do when it it actualy bery easy but sometimes a little dificult to do.

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