Baseball fans, and fans for both the cities of Chicago and Cleveland, will be sitting or standing tonight watching, hoping and praying that either the Cubs or Indians will swing the bats, get hits, score runs and make the plays in the field to support their pitchers and bring home a game seven victory and the World Series Championship to their city.
Make no mistake about it, the Chicago Cubs set up the winner take all game 7 grudge match tonight. In the face of elimination on Tuesday the Cubs beat the Indians 9-3. Addison Russell was the game MVP because he smashed a grand slam and tied a World Series record with six runs batted in. Other Cubs hitters Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo contributed with four hits each, and 13 total team hits by the Cubs forced the Indians to use six pitchers.
The quest for the 2016 World Series title remains alive for both teams and tonight, game seven pitchers are Corey Kluber for the Indians, winner of two series games, and Kyle Hendricks for the Cubs, the National League ERA leader. With two great pitchers on the mound, sometime around midnight there’s going to be one city of fans celebrating and the other wondering what in the heck happened.
I’m sure that it will be an exciting game 7 with the World Series Drought ending for one. I’m crossing my fingers and hoping the drought ends for my beloved Cubs. GO CUBS GO!!!
By Fred J. Cromartie, Ed.D.
Dr. Fred J. Cromartie is the Director of Doctoral Studies at the United States Sports Academy, and can be reached at cromarti@ussa.edu.