April 23, 2010
By Skip Myslenski
NUSports.com Special Contributor
'Cat coach Pat Fitzgerald is standing in short center when he turns and points toward the rooftop of an apartment building just the other side of Wrigley Fields' right field wall. "That's where I was a security guard after the Rose Bowl (in the summer of '96). A couple of my teammates and I came down here and had some fun," he then says.
And what did he do?
"I made sure everyone had the right ticket and no one threw anything off the roof," he says with a chuckle. "A summer gig. I think I had 25 games. We broke them up (among teammates). It was a lot of fun. A lot of hot dogs. A lot of chicken sandwiches."
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It was that kind of memory-filled morning this Friday at Wrigley, where the 'Cats officially announced that they will host Illinois there at 11 a.m. on November 20. There was Cub brass on hand along with Fitzgerald and Director of Athletics and Recreation Jim Phillips and former Board of Trustees chair Pat Ryan, and there too was former Bear Ronnie Bull and Bear principal owner Virginia McCaskey. She recalled seeing her first football game at the place back in September of 1925, recalled too seeing her dad, George Halas, win his last championship as a coach there in December of 1963. They defeated the Giants that afternoon and, she said, "It was very special to him because some people were saying, 'Oh, he's 68-years old. The game has passed him by. He should retire.' Instead of retiring, he was a winner. That's always my favorite memory.
"So I'm delighted to be here to participate in this announcement of the new era of football in Wrigley Field. I hope all the Bears' fans who still talk about coming to games here will be just as excited (with) Illinois meeting Northwestern on November 20th."
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The Bears last played at Wrigley on Dec. 13, 1970 and that afternoon the field (basically) ran uphill from the left field wall into the visitor's dugout. In fact, recalled Bull, the back of that end zone was "about two feet into the dugout. They had wood coverage and you could see. They painted a white line into it."
The field in November will be different. It will run (basically) from the right field wall to just short of the Cubs' dugout. "We'll fit it in. We won't have that issue," Cub president Crane Kenney says when informed of Bulls' memory.
The length of the field, he also assures, will be a full 100 yards. In the old days, legend has it, that was not necessarily the case. "I can't confirm or deny. But I heard it was a couple inches short. That's all I'll say," even Fitzgerald says with a chuckle.
"Yeah. Yeah. There was always the rumor, but it fits," insists Kenney. "We actually came out with engineers with their tripods and lasers. Lasers are supposed to be accurate, but then, to prove to ourselves, we came out literally with yard markers and plotted the whole field out."
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Other nuts and bolts? "We're treating this like a Northwestern home game. They'll have essentially control of the ticket manifest," says Kenney. Those tickets will not be part of the season package and only season ticket holders will have a chance to purchase them. Parking will be handled as it is for a normal Cub game, but the lots at Ryan Field will be open and free for those who wish to dump their cars there and hop the "L" to Wrigley. Gates will open at 9 a.m. and, yes, the concessions served will be the same as those offered during a baseball game. In other words, beer will be available.
And if the event is a smash, could there be more like it at Wrigley?
"We like to stretch our skin a little bit," says Kenney. "The concerts in '05 were the first time we tried it. Hockey was next. But there's been a lot of different events here."
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On June 26, 1920, something called the "Inter-state Championship" was settled at Wrigley in a game matching Lane Tech and New York City's Commerce High. Commerce rallied to a comeback win on the strength of a grand slam hit by their 17-year old star, a kid named Lou Gehrig.
In 1934 Ed "Strangler" Lewis wrestled there and in 1946 Jake LaMotta, later memorialized by Robert DeNiro in "Raging Bull," got a knockout victory there. Rodeos were held there in the '40s and the '50s and, under portable lights on Aug. 21, 1954, a crowd of over 14,000 watched the Harlem Globetrotters beat George Mikan's U.S. All Stars there. Then were those consecutive weekends in January of 1943 when the Norge Ski Jump Club held its annual mid-winter championships at Wrigley, where the competitors took off down a ramp that started by the press box and landed somewhere out by second base.
"The question I get asked a lot is, 'Why?' The question should be, 'Why not? Why not bring football back to this historic stadium?'" says Phillips, with an implicit glance back at that past. "It's an opportunity to showcase Northwestern and Northwestern football and Northwestern athletics, but more importantly to showcase a world-class institution ... To create a buzz within Chicago ... To try and increase season tickets, absolutely, and to try and leverage season tickets. I think it's going to be great on both sides of it because we're going to drive a bunch of fans here to Wrigley Field, but there'll be five other games at Ryan Field that will absolutely be impacted in a positive way."
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Quarterback Dan Persa and defensive tackle Corbin Bryant, who were also at Wrigley on Friday, knew little (if any) of that history. Neither, in fact, has ever been to a Cubs' game and both were seeing the place up-close-and-personal for the first time in their young lives.
"It's going to be nuts. Can't wait. It's going to be awesome," Persa said when looking ahead to November's festivities.
"I'm anxious to see how it's going to be set up," said Bryant, who was standing in short left. "But I'm looking at the old school scoreboard, thinking of all the history that's behind Wrigley Field and I just love the idea of being able to play here where some of the greats have played."
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"We're looking into some things on how we'll bring the team down," Fitzgerald, still in short center, is saying. "We'll probably take the 'L' down from Evanston and have (fans) walk with us as we get off the 'L.' There's a lot of fun things that are going to go around the game and we're in the preliminary stages of a lot of the logistics. We're going to have a great time. For me, being a Chicagoan and having the chance to lead our team onto Wrigley Field, it's something I'll never forget. But at the end of the day, when we show up here and kick it off, we're here to win."
Growing up on the South Side, was he a Sox fan or Cub fan?
"I think I'm a Chicago fan," he says.
That's an easy out, he is told.
"No. There's no question I'm proud of where I'm from and I'm proud of the way I was raised and I was raised a Sox fan. There's no question in my mind that, if the Cubs and the Sox play in the World Series, I'm rooting for the Sox."
Finally, with all the histrionics sure to surround the occasion, how can he get his team focused on the game?
"That's what we do. That's how we approach each day, each game," he concludes forcefully. "It's another opportunity. If you focus on what's important, you'll do the right things. If you focus on the sights and sounds and smells ... well, we'll probably have to settle them down early, similar to the way you go into a bowl game. You've got to make sure you keep them settled down. The difference in the bowl game, though, is you have a month to prepare. For this game, we'll play Iowa the week prior and then we'll have to get ready for this and have Wisconsin on the heels of it.
"It'll be a challenge. But it'll be fun."