Cubs EndThe Longest Curse

On November fourth, twenty sixteen, the city of Chicago celebrated something that hadn't happened in over one hundred years, the Chicago Cubs winning the World Series after what was arguably one of the greatest and baseball games of all time, in the greatest Game seven in the World Series and allowing their fans to celebrate for the first time in a lifetime, and they pulled out all the stops going into extra innings, a rain delay, tension, everyone at the edge of their seat glued to their TV screens the entire time. We're going to dive into this game and how it all broke down on Daily Sports History. Welcome to Daily Sports History. I'm Ethan Rees, your guide as you daily learn more about sports history, increasing your sports knowledge. And today's trivia question to list now for is where does the Cub's World Series Parade rank in size for the largest gathering of human people ever so coming into the season, starting in the two beginning of the two thousands, all these curses started to be broken in baseball. The White Sox had broken the Black Sox curse, the Red Sox had broken the curse of the Bambino, and there was two other teams that still had quote curses on them. The Curse of the Billy Goat was still hanging over the Cubs and hadn't won in over one hundred and eight years, and the Cleveland Indians hadn't won almost seventy years. Both these teams had come into the season with hopes, as every team did, that they would break this curse, and they each had great seasons. The Cubs led the league in wins with one hundred and five and their entire starting infield made the All Star Team, and the Cleveland Indians had a great season as well, winning their division, and each team made their way through the playoffs to battle each other in the World Series, knowing that no matter what, one fan base was getting the first championship in a lifetime, and it started out with the Indians dominating in Game one, and then the Cubs came back and dominated Game two to tie it up. Game three the World Series, the Indians were able to dig out a one run win, and they followed that with a five run win in Game four, giving them a three to one lead in the World Series, giving them a ninety one percent chance to win the World Series. But the Cubs did not give up. They eked out Game five win and then they dominated Game six nine to three, leading to Game seven in Cleveland in front of thirty eight thousand fans and millions more watching at home as they were either gonna see history be made or a great plunder be made. Now, what's unique about a Game seven or a final game in any professional sport is you pull out all the stops, and especially unique in baseball, where you have a starting pitcher and then you usually have relievers and closers in the pitching game, well, usually your best pitchers are your starters or your closer, and in a final game you can throw all your starters in to try to see if you can eke out this win. And that's exactly what the Cubs were trying to do. Put out their best starters for their best chance to win and coming into the game, and Kyle Hendrick started for the Cubs the but Joe Madden, the Cubs manager, had already told everyone that they were planning on bringing John Lester in, bringing in their ace John Lester midway through the game to try to finish out pulling out all the stops. And the game started off great for the Cubs as Dexter Fowler hit a lead off home run over the centerfield wall, giving the Cubs a one zero lead and marking the first time a player hit a lead off home run in a Game seven of a World Series. But it only took a couple innings for the Cleveland Indians Carlos Santana to hit an RBI single to tie the game up one to one. Then in the fourth inning, the Cubs would go on to score two more runs, and in the following inning, Javier Baiz home over the right field wall to increase their lead four to one, but they weren't over. After a wild pitch, the Rudders would advance and be driven in by a single by Ben Zuebertz, making their lead even larger five to one. But the sixth inning, the Indians were starting to make a comeback. John Lester had come in for Hendricks, then struggled to settle in and allowed two runs, making the score five to three. But john Lester would settle down and make it all the way to the eighth inning, and with the score with the score six to three and only four outs remaining, in Erawdess Chapman, their closer, who hadn't given up a home run all year, and despite his heavy workload the previous game and the whole postseason, they just needed four more outs, but unfortunately, with the runner on, Roger Davis connected with one of his fastballs with a line drive over the wall, giving them a two round of shots, tying the game six to six. Chapman would settle things down, get out of the inning, take it into the ninth. They would shut each other down, and being tied six to six, they went into extra innings. Now briefly after the ninth inning, there was a ray delay, extending the game even more, but it allowed the chance for the teams to prepare to how they were going to attack this time, and Jason Hayward of the Cubs actually gave an empowering speech to the Cubs while in the locker room, helping motivate the team, as he was one of the highest paid players on the team but had one of the worst seasons of his career and wasn't being much help on the field. But if you could motivate the team, maybe that would be all they needed. So after about a twenty minute rain delay, they would resume play with everyone on the edge of their seat. Kyle Schwarber would lead off with a single and be pinched front by Albert Almora Junior, who would advance the second on a flyout, and Ben Zubitt would hit a double down the left field line, allowing Almora to score, getting them the lead seven to six, and then Miguel Montero would hit a single to score another run, giving them the lead eight to six, putting all the pressure on the Indians. If they did not score two runs or more in the bottom of the tenth, the Cubs would win the World Series. But the Indians didn't give up. With the runner on base, Davis singled again, allowing them to score again, bringing the score within one and with a tying run on base, Cubs pitcher Mike Montgomery came in to try to finish out the game. With Michael Martinez at the plate, he was able to get him to hit a grounder to third, where Chris Bryant was able to feel the ball and throw a clean throat at first, giving the Cubs their first World Series since nineteen o eight, and after this the Cubs celebrated like crazy. It was the longest streak for a team to win a World Series. They pulled out all the stops, They spent millions of dollars. They brought in people from the Red Sox that broke their curse to beat this Billy Goat curse. They did everything they could and the city of Chicago celebrated as when they held their parade back in Chicago after winning the World Series, over five million people showed up, which was enough to be seventh all time for the largest gathering of humans in history, just showing how much that Chicago and Cubs fans have been waiting and we're ready to celebrate with the team. And today's episode was the most requestion episode by far we have ever had. And here's a list of everyone that request of this episode. And thank you for your request. And if you want to request an episode, please leave us a review wherever you're listening and tell us a topic in the review you would like us to cover so we can get that done just for you. So I want to think from Twitter, Larry Lambert, Kurt langele At, Josh n one oh one at Racin, MG, Greg McManus, Alex Frank, Joseph Malecki, Corey Sun Black, Mike Bell, Pat and I want to thank you all for suggesting the topic and feel free to reach out to us on our socials to also suggest a topic as we continue to grow and we want you to be a part of our community. See you tomorrow. See tomorrow on Daily Sports History. And did you catch the answer to today's trivia question where does the Cubs World Series Parade rank in size of the largest gatherings of human people in history? And the answer is it ranks seventh all time, where they had over five million people in attendance,