It was Wrigley,
not some goat, who cursed Cubs

Web-posted: Friday, March 21, 1997

t's about time that we stopped blaming the failings of the Cubs on a poor, dumb creature that is a billy goat.

This has been going on for years, and it has reached the point where some people actually believe it.

Now a beer company, the Cubs and Sam Sianis, who owns Billy Goat's Tavern and the accused goat, have banded together to lift the alleged curse that was supposedly placed on the Cubs in 1945 -- the last time they were in the World Series.

As the story goes, the late Bill Sianis, founder of the old tavern, tried to bring his pet goat into Wrigley Field and was turned away because the goat smelled.

That's when the curse was placed on the Cubs, and they haven't been in a World Series since.

It's an entertaining story, but is only partly true.

Yes, blame for many of the Cubs' failings since 1945 can be placed on a dumb creature. Not a poor, dumb creature but a rich one.

I'm talking about P.K. Wrigley, head of the chewing gum company and the owner of the Cubs until he died in 1977.

In many ways, Wrigley was a nice man -- shy, modest and very good at selling chewing gum. He was a lucky man, inheriting the thriving gum company and a fine baseball team from his more aggressive father.

In baseball, what P.K. Wrigley was best known for was preserving day baseball long after all other franchises were playing most of their games at night.

A myth grew that Wrigley believed baseball was meant to be played in sunshine and, as a matter of principle, kept lights out of his park.

The truth was that he planned on lights very early. But when World War II began, materials needed for lights were needed in the war effort. So he shelved plans for the lights, and when the war ended, he didn't bother.

The only other baseball feat he was known for was running the worst franchise in baseball.

And a big part of that can be blamed on racism. If not Wrigley's, then that of the stiffs he hired to run his baseball operation.

After World War II ended, the best players available were being discharged from the military and returning to the teams they had starred for a few years earlier.

But Wrigley had a unique manpower problem. His best players had remained home during the war because they were 4F for one physical defect or another or too old to have served.

So as other teams quickly got better, all the Cubs' 4F team did was get older and more enfeebled.

Because he had a second-rate minor-league system, there were few good young prospects moving up.

But all of that could have been overcome in 1947 -- two years after the Cubs' last World Series and the end of the war.

That was when Branch Rickey of the Brooklyn Dodgers knocked down the racial wall in baseball by signing ex-Army officer Jackie Robinson.

Although he went on to a fabulous career, Robinson was not nearly the best available black ballplayer at the time. Rickey chose him because Robinson had the education and character to endure the racial abuse heaped on him by fans, press, some of his own teammates and opposing players.

The old Negro League was loaded with outstanding players. When they played off-season exhibition games against white all-star teams, the blacks won as often as they lost.

By 1947, the year Robinson broke in, the Cubs were already pathetic doormats.

Had Wrigley followed Rickey's lead, he could instantly have had a competitive team. And depending on how many black players he could have tolerated, maybe a great team.

He didn't. His players had made their feelings clear, voting not to play if the other teams boycotted Robinson. And his team's front office wouldn't listen to those who urged them to sign black players.

It wasn't a momentary hesitation. It was not until September 1953 -- nearly seven full seasons after Robinson arrived -- that Wrigley signed two black players.

By then, the Dodgers, with Robinson, Roy Campanella, Junior Gilliam, Don Newcombe and Joe Black, and the New York Giants, with the amazing Willie Mays and clutch-hitting Monte Irvin, had become dominant teams.

Who did Wrigley ignore? Besides some of the names above, there was Larry Doby, who became an American League home run leader; slugger Luke Easter; Minnie Minoso; the great Satchel Paige; and Hank Aaron, who broke Babe Ruth's lifetime home run record. During the years Wrigley snubbed black players, the black players who were in their late 20s or early 30s when Robinson broke in had aged past their primes.

By the time Cubs management got over their racial fears, the black league was getting ready to fold. Fewer players were available and better teams competed for them. Other sports, college and pro, began going after black athletes.

So what might have been wasn't. It had nothing to do with a goat's curse. Not unless the goat wore a gabardine suit and sat behind a desk in an executive suite.

Yes, I know, so don't grab your phone: The corporation that owns this paper has owned the Cubs since 1981. So why, you ask, haven't they made it to the World Series?

Because they haven't been good enough. But I do know that if they thought a three-legged green creature from another planet could hit home runs or throw a 95-m.p.h. fastball, they'd sign it. And we'd cheer.

© 1997 Chicago Tribune