Sec 511 Die-hard

Cubs season ticket holder here. I can honestly say that my assessment of the people who attend Cubs games at Wrigley is: Mid May through the summer night games: Many drunk idiots - some who are die hards, many are recent college grads and young professionals who live in the city who are looking for a chance to get out after hibernating for the previous 6 months. Crownd can be obnoxious. Weekend games: June - August. Many many tourists and die hard Cubs fans. The tourists seem to get into the game and not get as drunk and they can almost be mistaken as unmarked Cubs fans. They get caught up in the aura of Wrigley and the fever of the die-hards. Best time to go to a Cubs game if you are a true Cubs fan: Night games in late Aug. - the end of the season. The tourists are gone, the yuppies have had enough and if the Cubs are still in contention - your'e talking a ballpark full of die-hards who come throughout the Chicagoland area. I sat in the bleachers on May 18th and could not believe the amount of 19-22 year old drunken idiots yelling the dumbest, non-thought-out garbage at the top of their lungs.

I have a right to cuss out the mentally handicaped kid at the grocery store for not bagging my groceries quick enough. But my right, doesn't make me less of an a-hole. I never said it didn't. People have a right to be a-holes, too. Are you suggesting we start handing out fines for people booing too early in the season? Fines? Are you kidding? I'm suggesting we don't boo because booing isn't warranted in this situation. I want Jacque Jones to succeed, and I think the best way for him to succeed is for him to not get treated like complete sh-t for making an out.

Jones needs our support, not our boos. If you are a Cubs fan, and want him to help this team, then you should NOT boo him and add extra pressure.

I think Jimmy is rightfully upset about the lack of hot water. I mean, all the golden showers that he takes has made it hard for him to get used to anything not warm.

I have a right to cuss out the mentally handicaped kid at the grocery store for not bagging my groceries quick enough. But my right, doesn't make me less of an a-hole. I did not like the signing, but I am not gonna take it out on Jones. I want him to have a career year and help the Cubs win the world series. I think the best way to do that is make him feel at home, letting him know we are behind him. Cubs players have enough pressure playing for this city with the media attention, for Cubs fans to boo J Jones after 13 AB is completely short-sighted.

The Cubs' lineup is potentially bad, and potentially solid. There are WAY to many unknowns to forecast with this lineup.

I can't believe the criticism that some people give Dusty for the things he says to the media. What the hell do you expect him to say, anyway? People got mad a few years ago because Dusty wouldn't call out his players for bone-headed plays (Alou running the bases, Wood/Zambrano throwing a temper tantrum) Why do you think player's love him? Because he is honest with them, and cover's up for them in the media. If you want to judge Dusty on anything, judge him on how his team performs. I've been a Cubs fan since before many of you were born and I can tell you that never in my lifetime has the Cubs had a coach that was so successful that he changed the expectations overnight. Before Dusty came, the Cubs had not had back-to-back winning seasons in 35 years!!!!!!!!!!!! I don't know what you Cubs fans expect of the guy but his style is what it is. And you know what - he's the winningest skipper the National League has seen besides Bobby Cox in the last 20 years.

What do you people expect the truth? That would be something like this...... Q: So, Dusty - why is there competition at 2nd base right now. A: Because Todd Walker's knee is soo messed up right now that we don't think it is going to make it through the season. But you know what, I really didn't want to tell you and make it obvious because we are trying to trade him and we would like to keep the knee-thing on the down-low. You know, like selling a used car that you just know is gonna break down a few weeks after you sell it. God knows Todd is 10X the hitter Jerry is. Sure, Jerry is faster but the truth is that Todd's defense is not bad. He was given that label and we are kinda running with it to make it seem that I have a good reason to start a .250 hitting right handed hitter (Jerry Hairston) in a predominantly right handed lineup. God knows we desperately need a left-handed hitter like Todd. But, for what I am supposed to say, well we are committed to defense. I mean, what do you think we're gonna do next? Start Jose Macias over ARAM? Bring back Cory Patterson? Bench Barrett and give the job to any catcher? Hell, I started Sammy, Moises, and Aram everyday and how good were they on defense? I mean defense is important, but you gotta be able to hit too. So when I telll you that Jerry is getting a look because of defense, remember - Walker's knee's messed up and the holy water ain't workin.

100 Million? Where are you people getting your numbers? The Cubs payroll is a couple million higher than the White Sox, while over the last decade the Cubs have doubled the Sox's attendance. If you think the Tribune is committed to winning you are a fool. The Cubs are in the top half in revenue year in and year out and some of you people think that they are committed to winning because they spend more money than teams like the Pirates, Reds, Brewers, etc. With the amount of money the Tribune brings in, their payroll should be upwards of $140 million a year PERIOD!!!!

Standing alone, this isn't a crisis. But if you are paying attention, then you should know that the Cubs are SLooooowly bringing in advertising into the ballpark. Consider the changes the last few years (one change per year): *Put up southwest airlines logo on the front ledge of the bleachers. * Put Sears logo throughout the Cubs and visitor's dugout. *Put up 2 LED signs in the upper deck that flashed Sears advertisements. *Put up a new LED sign under the historic manual scoreboard - said it would be for statistics, etc. A year later, all you see on it between innings is McDonalds. *Named the bleachers the "Bud Light Bleachers". *Now the city council is talking about getting rid of street venors??? People come to Wrigley for many different reasons. But many love going because it takes them back to their grandparent's generation. Street vendors are a part of old-time baseball and American history. Much like Maxwell street, Coney Island, and the soda fountain. Getting rid of the street vendors is a HUGE mistake. Separately, these changes appear to be no big deal. But like gaining weight, you don't usually go from a supermodel to a fat lard overnight. These changes are a trend that I do not like. They do not enhance Wrigley. They simply take away from Wrigley and Wrigleyville's old time charm.

Is it me or does that dress make his Barriness look fat? My Gosh, Barry certainly didn't do anything to change people's opinion of him using steroids.

My brother and I share Cubs season tickets and I'm looking to sell 6 Tuesday night games this year...one game a month. Anyone interested? They are real good upper deck reserved seats around third base. Sec. 511 Row 5 to be exact. I'm selling 2 tickets to 6 different games and thought I would check with the fellow NSBB members first. Here are the games: *April 25th vs. Florida Marlins *May 16th vs. Nationals or May 30th vs. Reds *June 27th vs. Brewers *July 18th vs. Astros *Aug. 1 vs. D'backs or Aug. 22 vs. Phillies *Sept. 5 vs. Pirates or Sept. 26 vs. Brewers $216 and they are yours. PM' me if you are interested. First come, first served.

That said, why wouldn't some team use this option more often? Even if you sacrifice a little defense - it seems like a no brainer.

BEWARE, There's a trick that the Cubs pull every year... They hold back almost all of their good seats to most every game so that when someone clicks on "best available" they end up getting upper deck box or something like that. They even sell the lower level corners before the better seats in the infield. Why do they do this? So that people feel the urgency to get any tickets possible (Oh my gosh, they're going to sell out a Tuesday night May game). Then, once all the crappy seats are sold, they will send the good tickets out the back door to the brokers. My girlfriend was a Cubs ticket Rep. for 3 years and I could not believe the stories that she told me. Likewise, the Cubs will "hold back" many tickets to see if they will sell out the back door. If the team is playing poorly, or the weather is bad, they will suddently have tickets available on Cubs.com. Take my advice, go for the good games - you can ALWAYS get tickets during the week for under face value. If we as fans don't act like a bunch of crack addicts and gobble up the unattractive games/seats - we will all benefit.

I have been looking forward to the "bleacher expansion" since they announced it years ago. I thought that the addition of beloved seats would make the supply go up, and hopefully bring the price down (on the street that is). What I am extremely dissapointed in, is the Cubs way of handling it. If you notice, the Cubs have slowly been transforming Wrigley into a different ballpark. The changes are one at a time, one year at a time. It started when they decided to put the SEARS logo all over the dugout, followed by the Southwest Airlines logo on the facade of the bleachers. The season after that, the Cubs put up a new message board under the center-field scoreboard with McDonald's logo flashing at us all game. Then, they put up message boards in the upperdeck on the facades, as well as hanging from the underside of the roof facing the playing field. Oh, must I forget the addition of the dugout boxes, followed by the bullpen boxes. Now don't get me wrong - I'm not saying that there are no benefits to these additions, but it is obvious to me that the Cubs know that introducing all of them at the same time would have led to public outcry! Now, the Cubs are "expanding the bleachers", but are so ashamed of the project that they won't answer any questions to reporters, and won't release any statements. THEY TORE DOWN THE BLEACHERS AND ARE REBUILDING THEM!!! The Cubs brass new damn well that the fans never would have gone for this if they had just come out and say it. So what do they do - they LIE ABOUT THE WHOLE THING!!! As far as I'm concerned, idiot fans can spend $45 (after ticketmaster fee) to sit in the bleachers with a bunch of 20 something yuppies who don't know sh-t about baseball. The bleacher craze has gone way too far and what made the seats special was day baseball with the common fan. Now it is weekday night baseball with yuppies who are at the game looking to get drunk and get lucky.