Editor’s note: Tom Morello is the former lead guitarist for Rage Against the Machine and a longtime Cubs fan. He shared read the following essay on Fox during the World Series.
My name is Tom Morello and long before I was a musician or an activist I was a Chicago Cubs fan. I grew up in Libertyville, Illinois, and attended my first game at Wrigley Field when I was 4 years old, in 1968.
As a Cubs fan, my two favorite moments have been winning the National League pennant and getting to sing the seventh-inning stretch with Mr. Cub, Ernie Banks, before he passed away. There I was up in the booth, swaying back and forth with one of my all-time heroes and singing “root root root for the Cubbies/ If they don’t win it’s a shame/ For it’s 1, 2, 3 strikes you’re out/ At the old ballgame!”
Well, through the years we Cubs fans have suffered a lot. And it raises the question: Does it matter? Peace in the Middle East matters. Curing disease matters. Stopping global warming matters. But does it really MATTER whether or not or this little woebegone Midwestern team dressed in blue wins a World Series in our lifetime? I think it might. And not merely out of some tribal affiliation to the place I grew up.
I truly believe that if this seemingly unredeemable team can make it to the promised land, if the worst of the worst can become the best of the best, then really, ANYTHING is possible. It makes one think. Can the unthinkable actually occur? Forging a just and humane planet? Ending homelessness, hunger and war? Impossible, right? Well, the Cubs winning the World Series has seemed impossible for over a century and yet here we are. And the kind of loyalty, dignity and ferocious after-parties we throw in Chicago just might be a roadmap for world peace and harmony.
But can a baseball team change the world? This team changed me. The Cubs were formative in forging my worldview. They are an important reason why I felt I always had to stand up for the underdog. Why I always valued those who were in last place in the standings. Why I stood up for myself no matter what others thought about me or the team I believed in.
This team made me feel less alone because I was an underdog too. Back then I was the only black kid in an all-white town. The only radical at a conservative high school. The only heavy metal guitar player at an Ivy League school. Back then, the Cubs were the only team without lights. The only team without advertising. The only team without a fancy blinking scoreboard. I felt like an outsider in the outside world but I felt like I belonged at Wrigley Field, home of the underdogs.
Now, every single team that wins a playoff series thanks their fans and tells their fans they are the greatest, that they are the most loyal. But a lot of baseball teams can’t even fill their stadiums during a pennant race. In some stadiums when their team is down by a few runs, fans will head for the exits in the seventh inning. In Chicago, we haven’t won a championship in 108 years and Wrigley Field is packed whether the team is in first place or last place, up by 10 runs or down by 10 runs, whether we are mathematically eliminated or whether playing in the World Series. The greatest fans? The most loyal fans? Look no further than Addison and Clark. Cubs fans are the real deal. Cubs fans love our team, now and forever, without compromise or apology.
My mom, Mary Morello, and my aunt Isabelle got me into the Cubs. My dear aunt Isabelle lived 82 years, lived her whole life in a small town in central Illinois called Marseilles and now she is buried in a little hilltop cemetery there having never seen her beloved Cubs win a World Series.
We’d go to Wrigley every summer as often as we could afford. Sitting in the bleachers, sitting in the grandstand. Getting there super early to watch batting practice. Staying super late to try to get autographs from my favorite Cubs after the game. We’d park in a Catholic seminary and some kindly nuns would guide us to our parking space, all of us offering up a prayer for a season that never came. Until now.
A total of 108 years have gone by without a title. Since our last near miss in 2003 we’ve had to endure our crosstown rival White Sox winning a title, our archnemesis St. Louis Cardinals winning two titles, and the formerly other “cursed team,” the Boston Red Sox, winning the World Series three freakin’ times. For 48 of my 52 years I have been cheering and hoping and crying.
I am not a superstitious person. But I sat 25 seats away from Steve Bartman. They actually showed me on the TV just before that happened; I was holding a sign. Check the tape. I felt it. It was eerie. It was bad. I felt cursed.
But something has happened in the last few years. We are in totally unprecedented territory. And we Cubs fans can thank Theo and Jed and Tom and Joe and this incredible squad of curse breakers for bringing Chicago to the brink of history. And personally I’d like to thank our fireball-throwing closer, Aroldis Chapman, for choosing Rage Against The Machine as his walk-on music, almost certainly a harbinger of glory.
Winning the World Series in Chicago is the Holy Grail of the entire history of organized sports. Our opponents are a great team too, though, and they have their own history of futility to contend with, so our team will need to be the most focused, committed and determined team IN THE HISTORY OF BASEBALL to get the job done. A city’s soul rests in your hands, guys.
So let’s get one thing straight. The Cubs have never been “lovable losers.” We’ve always been “hopeful underdogs.” The difference is crucial. “Wait until next year” is both a lament and a pledge. We Cubs fans will not bend, we Cubs fans will not break. We will hold up our end of the bargain, pouring every ounce of our love and support into our team. We are never gonna give up on ourselves and we are never gonna give up on the Cubs. And THIS Cubs team is the best Cubs team of our lifetime. This team and these fans will keep the faith and fight like hell without compromise or apology for our dream, and fight like hell for this World Series title.
And if it comes to pass that the Cubs do win the World Series, after I’m done crying and toasting and singing that “Go, Cubs, Go” song until I’ve lost my voice, my 93-year-old mom and I are going to drive straight to that little hilltop cemetery in Marseilles, Ill., drape one of those big blue “W” flags on my aunt Isabelle’s tombstone, sit down and tell her all about it.
So it’s root, root, root for the Cubbies/ If they don’t win it’s a shame/ For it’s 1, 2, 3 strikes you’re out/ At the old ballgame!
Because we love this team. Because we love Chicago. Because we deserve a World Series championship. Because it matters.
