English 102
Research Paper

What is a curse? A curse could be defined as anything negative wished upon a person or place. So is it possible that an entire franchise be cursed? Well this is the case for one Major League baseball club, the Chicago Cubs. It has been over 100 years, 1908, since the Cubs have won the World Series. With many many great teams since then and no World Championships, is it too much to think that maybe, just maybe this franchise, is cursed? Well from the Billy goat in 1945 to the black cat in 1969 and Steve Bartman in 2003, many unfortunate events have occurred that have led many to believe that in fact the Chicago Cubs franchise is cursed. Cub pride was at its height in 1945. The war was over, the boys were
From August 14 through the end of the season, the Mets had an amazing 39-11 record, while the Cubs record was 21-29 for the same period, slumping to 8-17 in September 1984 saw more heartbreak as the Cubs won the National League East but fell to the San Diego Padres in the National League Championship Series. The Cubs won the first two games, but the Padres roared back, taking three straight from Chicago. Game 4 ended when the Padres Steve Garvey hit a walk-off homer. Game 5 was irretrievably damaged when Cubs first baseman Leon Durham committed a bad error that Cubs fans don't need to hear about again. Almost twenty years passed before anything really weird, or really heartbreaking happened to the Cubs. Then, the 2003 playoffs came around.
Fast forward to 2003. The Cubs had three of the best young pitchers in baseball with Kerry Wood, Mark Prior and Carlos Zambrano. Their offense was led by Moises Alou and Sammy Sosa, the latter of whom had averaged .302, with 57 home runs and 135 RBI from 1998 through 2003. Looking tough all the way, the Cubs won the National League Central, beat the Atlanta Braves in the National League Divisional Series and then took 3 games to 2 lead over the young and inexperienced Florida Marlins.
The 2003 season brought a great deal of national attention to the Cubs franchise, both positive and negative. On one hand, their surprising regular season run to 1st place