2011年6月15日 星期三

Big League Stew - MLB - Yahoo! Sports: Cubs players rally together, spring for funny goat T-shirts

Big League Stew - MLB - Yahoo! Sports
Latest Big League Stew - MLB from Yahoo! Sports
Cubs players rally together, spring for funny goat T-shirts
Jun 15th 2011, 15:13

Everybody knows why the Chicago Cubs haven't been to the World Series since 1945.

It's not because of mostly rotten teams, or the rotten luck they've had with an occasional good team. It's because a local Greek restauranteur, one day, brought his pet goat Murphy to Wrigley Field and was denied admission to the '45 Series because — well, he brought a billy goat to a baseball game — and so he therefore placed a curse on the franchise that lasts to this moment.

Duh.

Depending on its mood, the Cubs organization sometimes has been hostile to this theory (or fact). At other times, it has played along.

With the team 10 games out of first place in the NL Central and apparently not heading for what would be its first championship in 103 years, the players are embracing the goat.

Well, they're doing something with the goat, as Paul Sullivan of the Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday night. Several players wore T-shirts that said "(Bleep) the goat!!!" on the back and showed a cartoon goat with the international "no" symbol on the front.

As seen above, Sullivan captured Carlos Zambrano buying in with a shirt of his own, which resembles other semi-licensed goat-related items that fans can buy from vendors outside Wrigley.

Will some take it the wrong way, with the Cubs bringing up the curse during a losing season?

"Why?" Koyie Hill said, "I think it's just kind of a loose, fun saying that came up, and it was funny as hell, and now we have T-shirts. Basically, that's all it was. It was an awesome joke. Everyone laughed. And now I have an extra large on."

Not only that, but the shirts obviously work as a curse-buster!

Wearing the goat shirts, the Cubs rallied for a 5-4 victory in 10 innings against the Milwaukee Brewers.

Right-hander Randy Wells appreciated the effect the shirts had. So did Mike Quade, the team's manager.

"Whatever it takes to get guys going," Wells said. "I personally love it. It has been a trial and error process for us, but it just takes a couple of good efforts and we'll turn the corner."

Wells wouldn't say who gave the "good" speech while the T-shirts were distributed.

"It's private," he said.

Quade also applauded the T-shirt ploy because he said the team needed to loosen up.

"Anything that draws them together, keeps them together, I'm all in," he said, before adding: "Well, not anything. But damn near anything."

Good. That means the team probably will stop short of taking the message on the shirt too literally.

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