The non-alcoholic champagne was on ice Wednesday night, and the Kane County Cougars were eager to celebrate their Midwest League championship until they learned about a territorial disadvantage.
This is Chicagoland, and our national pastime is waiting.
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Alas, the Cougars were whipped by the Lansing Lugnuts 6-0, this best-of-five series is tied 2-2, and so it will all come down to Thursday night’s decisive game at Philip B. Elfstrom Stadium in Geneva. The Cougars can only hope they don’t play down to local standards.
Everything is relative, of course. The Cubs haven’t won a World Series since 1908; the White Sox haven’t won a World Series since 1917. Combined, both teams have lost their last nine Fall Classics, a horrid streak neither outfit has had a chance to break since 1959.
Thus, a baseball trophy, any kind of baseball trophy, even a baseball trophy gleaned by a Class-A farm club, would represent some sort of benign intervention to Chicago’s 80-year slump. Besides, even if Florida’s Marlins provide the players, this region supplies the love.
“Don’t let this crowd fool you,” shortstop Joe Aversa said of Tuesday night’s sparse gathering of 1,827. “Summer’s over, school’s in. The treatment we get here is unreal.”
Indeed, in this, their seventh year, the Cougars attracted 436,505 fans for 66 regular season dates–an average of 6,614 that ranked 14th among all minor league operations. Buffalo and Indianapolis, for example, drew better with their Triple-A franchises, one step removed from the big show.
But the Cougars outdid many teams in larger markets, like Las Vegas, Phoenix, Orlando and Nashville. The Kane County success story is no accident. Prices are affordable, $7 for box and $4 for lawn seating, same for the playoffs. A 22-ounce beer is $3.25. The hot tub in right field rents for $100 a night, but it holds eight and is, well, a hot item.
“From Day One, we’ve aimed to be customer-friendly,” said Jeff Sedivy, the Cougars’ general manager. That is, unlike the sport’s uppity upper crust, the Cougars learned to say hello to fans before fans started saying goodbye.
It’s not baseball that is in trouble, but major league baseball, and deservedly so. Minor leagues are doing fine.
Rare is the home game when Cougar players don’t go out of their way to meet fans at the rail and sign autographs. It’s different on weekends, when traffic is reversed. Before games, fans leave the stands to mingle with the players. Try that some time at Wrigley Field or Comiskey Park.
“We like all our prospects to come through Kane County,” said John Boles, the Marlins’ vice president of player development and an esteemed baseball figure who once worked for the Sox. “And so do the prospects. When we assign young players to come here in the spring, they’re delighted.”
The Cougars have the best of it. They are 35 miles from Chicago, yet in an intimate setting. Most of them earn a monthly salary of $975, a modest sum more easily stretched with the Adopt-A-Cougar Program. All but Larry Glozier, an infielder from Chicago, live with local boosters.
“My wife and our 1-year-old son are with a family in Batavia,” Aversa said. “I’m from California. And I’ve got a ring from 1995, with (Triple-A) Louisville. But Chicago, this is the best city I’ve ever been around.”
Aversa, 29, has been beating the bushes for eight years, without a major league at-bat.
“I still love it,” he said. “I’m not bitter, I’m not envious of guys who made it. You’ll see more heart, more hustle out here than you will in the big leagues.”
And Thursday night, maybe you’ll see the Cougars break a local rule.