It started with a no-good St. Louis Cardinals fan being a troublemaker. That no-good Cardinals fan was Drew Silva, who began things innocently enough, noting that, despite their dominance this season, any team can theoretically beat the Chicago Cubs in a short series because that’s just how baseball goes:
You know who can beat this Cubs team in a five-game series?
— Drew Silva (@drewsilv) August 25, 2016
Anybody.
Cubs fans started giving him guff for that, so Drew gave some back:
Know what else is fun? Human flight -- first accomplished in 1903, just five years before the Cubs last won the World Series.
— Drew Silva (@drewsilv) August 25, 2016
And with that it was on like Donkey Kong (a super old video game which was not invented for another 73 years after the Cubs last won the World Series). I tweeted this:
I know Cubs fans get super pissed, but it's still fun to play the "things that happened in the world since the Cubs won the WS" game.
— Craig Calcaterra (@craigcalcaterra) August 25, 2016
And with that, my followers went crazy. Here’s a sampling of some of the best ones:
There were 46 states last time the Cubs won it all.
— Chris Jaffe (@jaffechris) August 25, 2016
The last Cubs championship is closer in time to the Burr-Hamilton Duel or to Lewis&Clark than it is to the present
— Chris Jaffe (@jaffechris) August 25, 2016
if they don't win this year, their last WS title will be closer to George Washington being alive than to the present date.
— wick e. pedia (@wickterrell) August 25, 2016
And, for that matter . . .
@craigcalcaterra the Ottoman empire (founded in 1299) was still 15 years from ending when the Cubs last won the world series
— Andrew Howell (@awhowell) August 25, 2016
Four U.S. presidents were born, lived their entire lives and died. LBJ misses by six weeks.
— Joe Sheehan (@joe_sheehan) August 25, 2016
George Burns wasn't a teenager yet the last time the Cubs won the World Series.
— Will (@Sharkfinhat) August 25, 2016
Halley's comet passed . . . twice
— The butterflies are drinking the caiman’s tears (@MadnessDavid38) August 25, 2016
we had Civil War reunions, not reenactments
— MAGA Extra Value Meal (@sas_stimpy) August 25, 2016
harambe was born, lived, and shot in cold blood since the Cubs last won a World Series
— Red O’Reilly (@Real_Big_Red) August 25, 2016
Too soon. Unlike the last Cubs World Series title.
Like I said, this was just a sampling. I’ve retweeted a ton more on my timeline and those I didn’t retweet can be seen in the replies here. My favorite one may have been “literally the invention of sliced bread,” which debuted in 1912, but I can’t find that tweet.
Please, Cubs fans, have a sense of humor about this. You have a wonderful ballpark that is not named after a third tier mortgage company, a grand history that is fantastic even if it hasn’t featured any championships and a future that is as bright or brighter than any other team out there. Maybe even come up with some of your own in the comments! History is fun! As is self-deprecation! What I’m saying is don’t be salty about this sort of thing. Salty is a bad look.
In other news, the Morton Salt Company was incorporated in 1910, two years after the Cubs last World Series victory.