CURSE OF BILLY GOAT — Wikipedia

Biscuits sold in Chicago in October 2016 refer to the “cuddle of the goat”.

The Billy Goat curse (Curse of the goat) was a superstition associated with the Cubs of Chicago, an American team from the major baseball league.

This alleged curse was supposed to explain the reason why the franchise did not win as a world series, the ultimate title of the Major Baseball League, for 108 years, between 1908 and 2016.

The “curse” was thrown during the world series 1945, lost by the Cubs. The club must then wait 71 years before reaching the final again. The Cubs will finally win their first world series in 108 years when they win the 7 ^{It is} 2016 World Series match against the Cleveland the Indians November 2, 2016 .

The curse would have shot the cubs on the October 6, 1945 When a Chicago trader named Billy Sianis, owner of a taverns chain named Billy Goat Tavern , introduced himself to the Wrigley Field to attend a world series match with a goat ( billy goat in English) domesticated. The smell of the animal annoying the other spectators, Sianis were asked to leave the stadium with the beast. Furious, the man cursed the team by declaring ” Them Cubs, they aren’t gonna win no more “(” These cubs, they will never win again “) ^{[ first ] , [ 2 ] , [ 3 ] , [ 4 ]} .

The Cubs actually lost the 1945 final series against the Tigers de Detroit and have never reached the world series since the last time in the fall of 1908. The 2008 baseball season therefore marked the 100 ^{It is} A consecutive year when the franchise did not win the major league championship.

In 2003, during the championship series of the National Baseball League between Chicago and Florida, an incident involving a young spectator of the Wrigley Field, Steve Bartman, deprived the cubs of the victory which would have allowed them to finally access the Final series. Although superstition was already well known to Chicagolese baseball fans before that time, the media spoke of the “Billy Goat curse” several times during this series.

Sam Sianis, nephew of the man who threw the bad luck on the cubs, tried on many occasions to overthrow the curse. He attended the opening matches in 1984 and 1989 at Wrigley Field, each time entering the field, accompanied by a goat. These two seasons, the Cubs won the east division championship, but were unable to reach the world series. He repeated the experience in 1994, this time accompanied by the legendary player of the Cubs Ernie Banks, while the team crossed a series of 12 home losses; Then in 1998 during the suicide match won by Cubs to access the playoffs (to lose three consecutive games and be eliminated the following week by the Braves of Atlanta in the Division Series) ^{[ 5 ]} .

Sam Sianis has already said that the curse could only be broken if the organization of Chicago Cubs developed a sincere and disinterested love for goats and goats, letting them enter the stage simply because that is their desire and not To orchestrate a media blow ^{[Ref. necessary]} .

The September 22, 2003 , Three supporters of the Cubs, Jim Comiskey, David Townsend and Bill Miller, went to Texas, and tried to enter the minute Maid Park, the Stade des Astros de Houston, with a goat named “Virgil Homer”. When these supporters were refused access to the stadium with the animal, they told a text proclaiming that they “overthrow” the curse ^{[ 6 ]} . The Cubs won the central division championship that year, and approached only five withdrawals to access the world series, when a bizarre incident led their defeat against the Florida Marlins.

The October 3, 2007 , a few days before the start of the playoffs, the Chicago Sun-Times reported ^{[ 7 ]} That we had found a dead goat hung on the statue of Harry Caray, located in front of the Wrigley Field. Qualified for the playoffs as champions of the central division, the Cubs were swept away in three consecutive parts by the Diamondbacks of Arizona from the initial round. The following year, the story was repeated, the team falling this time from the national league division series in the hands of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The April 13, 2009 , at the very beginning of the baseball season, an incident similar to that of 2007 occurred, while a goat was found hanging from the same statue in front of the Cubs home ^{[ 8 ]} .

• In the movie Taking Care of Business (1990), the main character, interpreted by Jim Belushi, escapes from prison to go see the cubs playing in the world series. He refers to many times throughout the film, bringing many toasts to the team.
• The American musician Sufjan Stevens published in 2005 an album entitled Illinois , the American state where the city of Chicago is located. The album’s cover is decorated with a goat, in reference to legend.
• In the # 250 of Light blazer , a story of Brian Azzarello and Rafael Grampá entitled What I Goat for Christmas features the detective John Constantine, committed to breaking the curse of Billy Goat.
• In the movie Back to the future II (1989), it is announced that Cubs won the 2015 World Baseball Series in front of a fictitious team, Miami’s Gators.
• Finally, many works dealing with the history of baseball refer to the failures of the Chicago Cubs and the supposed curse of Billy Goat.

The November 2, 2016 In Cleveland, the Chicago Cubs (in Blue) celebrate their 2016 world series victory, which ends the “curse” weighing on them.

The curse ends the November 2, 2016 At the Progressive Field of Cleveland when the Chicago Cubs won 8 to 7, after 10 game sleeves, the 7 ^{It is} And the last match of the 2016 World Series, which allows them to win the final series 4 victories at 3 on the Cleveland team of Indians.

This world series was the first in which the Cubs participated since 1945, ending 71 seasons without title of the National League. Victory allows them to end a sequence of 108 years without title, the longest in North American professional sport ^{[ 9 ]} . This success crowns the long -term work undertaken a few years earlier by the team, whose workforce is rebuilt in particular by the president of the club Theo Epstein, whose efforts had in 2004 allowed the Red Sox of Boston, of which he was the director General, to put an end to the curse of the Bambino and 86 years without world series victory. Cubs’ victory in 2016 continues for a 69 ^{It is} year ^{[ ten ]} The misfortunes of Cleveland baseball supporters, whose club has not enjoyed the title since the 1948 world series, now the longest sequence of the genre in the major leagues ^{[ 11 ]} .

A goat’s head silhouette is engraved inside the commemorative ring received by players and members of the Cubs organization for their 2016 world series victory ^{[ twelfth ] , [ 13 ]} .

• Notice in a generalist dictionary or encyclopedia :
• (in) ‘ The Billy Goat curse » , on The site of the Billy Goat Tavern from Chicago (consulted the November 24, 2019 )