The Year of the Cubs

A few days ago, Wayne Buckner of The Wrigley Blog, posted a picture of one of the buildings across the street from Wrigley...saying something was missing.

The building know as the Lakeview Baseball Club on Sheffield is the building with the "Eamus Catuli!" sign on it.  Wayne did state that the owners of the building went bankrupt and it now has new owners.  The Eamus Catuli sign and the accompanying sign with "AC" and the number of years since a World Series title, National League pennant and a division championship were both missing from the building.

Buckner never recalled seeing the signs removed during the off-season in the past, but I do seem to remember them missing once or twice during the off-season some years ago.

Regardless, speculation started as to whether or not the signs would return.  The Tribune reported today that  the new owners did indeed take the signs down so some work on the building could be done.  Those new owners also stated that they do intend to put the "Eamus Catuli!" sign back up.  No such statement was made about the "AC" sign saying no decision had been made about it, hinting that Cubs officials may have requested that the sign be taken away since it is a constant reminder of the clubs futility over the years.

Personally, I think the sign should go away.  A while back, some people made a big stink about the Cubs doing away with the "L" flag after a loss because of the negativeness it portrayed.  The flag only flies after a game.  The "AC" sign is in the face of everyone all the time with it's glaring "103" (or 104 this coming season) at the end of it reminding everyone that none of us probably knows a single person who was alive the last time the Cubs won the World Series.

I'm actually surprised the Ricketts family did not request the sign to be taken down 2 years ago when they started the "Year One" campaign.  Sure, this has become almost as big of a part of the tradition of Wrigley Field as the scoreboard and the ivy, but this sign needs to go.  I won't miss it.  It's a bad tradition, like many of them that the Cubs cling onto.

This is the only way I ever want to see this sign again.
(Thanks to the Wrigley Blog guys for use of the original photo.)

And, as you all probably know, "AC" stands for "Anno Catuli"....or in a non-dead language, "The Year of the Cubs."