The Chicago Fire destroyed the club's ballpark, uniforms and records. The club completed its schedule, finishing second in the NA that year, but was forced to drop out of the league for two seasons as a result.
"Tinker and Evers and Chance"
Joe Tinker (SS), Johnny Evers (2B) and Frank Chance (1B) were 3 legendary Cubs infielders, who played together from 1903-1910, and sporadically over the following two years. They, along with third baseman Harry Steinfeldt, formed the nucleus of one of the dominant baseball teams of all time. After Chance took over as manager for the ailing Frank Selee in 1905, the Cubs won four pennants and two World Series titles over a five-year span. Their record of 116 victories in 1906 (in a 154-game season) has not been broken, though it was tied by the Seattle Mariners in 2001.
The Cubs relied on dominant pitching during this period, featuring hurlers such as [Mordecai "Three-Finger" Brown]?, Jack Taylor, Ed Reulbach, Jack Pfiester and Orval Overall, who posted a record for lowest staff earned-run average that still stands today.
However, the infield attained fame after turning a critical double play against the New York Giants in a July 1910 game. The trio was immortalised in [Franklin Adams]?' poem "Baseball's Sad Lexicon", which first appeared in the July 18, 1910 edition of the New York Evening Mail:
(The fourth line is sometimes misquoted as also reading "Tinker to Evers to Chance").
Tinker and Evers reportedly could not stand each other, and rarely spoke off the field. Evers, a high-strung, argumentative man, suffered a nervous breakdown in 1911 and rarely played that year. Chance suffered a near-fatal beaning the same year. The trio rarely played together after that. In 1913, Chance went to manage the New York Yankees and Tinker went to Cincinnati to manage the Reds, and that was the end of one of the most notable infields in baseball. They were inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame together in 1946.
Success in the 20s and 30s
"Smalley to Miksis to Addison Street"
"Let's play two!"
Day games only until 1988, because the stadium owner donated the lights to the war effort in the 1940s, and it then became tradition. The first night game was scheduled to be played August 8, 1988, vs. Philadelphia, but after 3 1/2 innings, it was rained out, and so the first official night game occurred the next night, August 9, 1988. The Cubs defeated the New York Mets, 6-4.