This is a memoir of a diehard--a diehard fan who drove himself and his family half crazy to get to Cubs games that were 700 miles away from their home. Along the way Sullivan recounts the history of Cubs baseball, including events from the 1908 season, as well as reminiscences from other fans and stories of his own experience following a team that has gone more than a century without attaining that final win that would make them world champions.

The New York Times Bestseller With inside access and reporting, Sports Illustrated senior baseball writer and FOX Sports analyst Tom Verducci reveals how Theo Epstein and Joe Maddon built, led, and inspired the Chicago Cubs team that broke the longest championship drought in sports, chronicling their epic journey to become World Series champions. It took 108 years, but it really happened. The Chicago Cubs are once again World Series champions. How did a team composed of unknown, young players and supposedly washed-up veterans come together to break the Curse of the Billy Goat? Tom Verducci, twice named National Sportswriter of the Year and co-writer of The Yankee Years with Joe Torre, will have full access to team president Theo Epstein, manager Joe Maddon, and the players to tell the story of the Cubs' transformation from perennial underachievers to the best team in baseball. Beginning with Epstein's first year with the team in 2011, Verducci will show how Epstein went beyond "Moneyball" thinking to turn around the franchise. Leading the organization with a manual called "The Cubs Way," he focused on the mental side of the game as much as the physical, emphasizing chemistry as well as statistics. To accomplish his goal, Epstein needed manager Joe Maddon, an eccentric innovator, as his counterweight on the Cubs' bench. A man who encourages themed road trips and late-arrival game days to loosen up his team, Maddon mixed New Age thinking with Old School leadership to help his players find their edge. The Cubs Way takes readers behind the scenes, chronicling how key players like Rizzo, Russell, Lester, and Arrieta were deftly brought into the organization by Epstein and coached by Maddon to outperform expectations. Together, Epstein and Maddon proved that clubhouse culture is as important as on-base-percentage, and that intangible components like personality, vibe, and positive energy are necessary for a team to perform to their fullest potential. Verducci chronicles the playoff run that culminated in an instant classic Game Seven. He takes a broader look at the history of baseball in Chicago and the almost supernatural element to the team's repeated loses that kept fans suffering, but also served to strengthen their loyalty. The Cubs Way is a celebration of an iconic team and its journey to a World Championship that fans and readers will cherish for years to come.

World Champion Chicago Cubs 2016 World Series Commemorative Book

From Ernie Banks, the legendary "Mr. Cub," to Sammy Sosa, today's record-setting sensation, "Cubs Nation" traces the history of a team that often had everything going for it and yet was so hampered by losses that it came to define the term "lovable losers."

Celebrate the 2016 World Series champions with the only official publication licensed by Major League Baseball! When the Cubs clinched the final out of the 2016 World Series, the city collectively exhaled; the wait was finally over. Chicago's National League franchise ended its 108-year title drought this season, winning a Major League-best 103 games and leading the NL Central wire to wire. All five of the Cubs' starting pitchers posted double-digits in wins, while Kyle Hendricks led the Majors in ERA and WHIP with Jon Lester not far behind. And a young core bolstered by Kris Bryant, Addison Russell, Javier Baez and countless other stars who had led the club to the playoffs in back-to-back seasons brought the world title to Wrigleyville for the first time since 1908, ushering in a new era of prosperity. 2016 World Series Champions takes fans out to the ball game and right down to the field-level action. Published in partnership with MLB and researched and written by their own in-house team of committed and knowledgeable baseball experts, this commemorative keepsake offers fans not only a detailed game-by-game recap of the World Series Champion's run through the annual Fall Classic, but also a history of the World Series. With more than 200 incredible photographs, descriptive game analysis, profiles of every member of the team, statistics and box scores, this official MLB publication celebrates the most memorable and magical highlights from the entire 2016 MLB season. It's all here -- the biggest hits, the unbelievable throws, the most talked-about trades, great plays, amazing comebacks, and a season of unforgettable moments.

Holly Swyers turns to the bleachers of Chicago's iconic Wrigley Field in this unique exploration of the ways people craft a feeling of community under almost any conditions. Wrigley Regulars examines various components of community through the lens of "the regulars," a group of diehard Chicago Cubs fans who loyally populate the bleachers at Wrigley Field. In a time when many communities are perceived as either short-lived or disintegrating, the Wrigley regulars have formed their own thriving set of pregame rituals, ballpark traditions, and social hierarchies. Swyers examines the conditions, practices, and behaviors that help create and sustain the experience of community. At Wrigley Field, these practices can include the simple acts of scorecard-keeping and gathering at the same location before each game or insisting on elaborate rules of ticket distribution and seating arrangements, as well as more symbolic behaviors and superstitions that link the regulars to each other. A bleacher regular herself, Swyers uses a qualitative approach to define community as the ways in which people arrive at an awareness of themselves as a group with a particular relationship to the larger world. The case of the regulars offers a challenge to the claim that community is eroding in an increasingly fragmented and technologically driven culture, suggesting instead that our notions of where we find community and how we express it are changing.

After his first Cubs game when Rich Cohen was eight, his father asked him to make a promise. "Promise me you will never be a Cubs fan. The Cubs do not win," he explained, "and because of that, a Cubs fan will have a diminished life determined by low expectations. That team will screw up your life." Here he captures the story of the team, its players and crazy days-- not just what happened, but what it felt like and what it meant. He searches for the cause of the famous curse, and came to see the curse as a burden but also as a blessing.