When Kris Bryant won the 2016 NL MVP, he was quickly welcomed to the club by Ryne Sandberg in an Instagram photo that could only be captioned “Two Cub legends pose for a Wes Anderson film.” And after Bryant completed his follow-up season, it turned out that the two of them had a lot more […]
Tag: Ryne Sandberg
Ryne Sandberg and the Summer of ’89
To almost every Cub fan, Ryne Sandberg is most indelibly associated with the 1984 season–and for good reason. He won the MVP in a year where the Cubs advanced to the postseason for the first time since 1945. Statistically, it was his magnum opus as he accumulated a career-high 7.6 WARP. And there was that […]
Kris Bryant: National League All-Star, Baseball Stoic
On Monday, June 27, Kris Bryant had a day for the ages against the Cincinnati Reds, going 5-for-5 with three home runs and two doubles. As this had never happened before in baseball history, tributes to his achievement poured in from all over the baseball landscape. (Except for one Boston hack who sniffed that Bryant […]
Cubbie Encores: How Top Cubs Followed Up Their Rookie Seasons
Last April 17th, BP Wrigleyville, then in its infancy, commemorated Kris Bryant Day by looking back at the debuts of some of the franchise’s most iconic players. Despite our initial wariness about celebrating yet another holiday manufactured by the greeting card companies, we came together to celebrate and put the heralded prospect’s arrival in historical context. Following […]
Rethinking “The Sandberg Game”
At some point during every day of his life, Ryne Sandberg is asked by fans or the media about June 23, 1984. And invariably, the conversation goes something like this: RADIO GUY: Hey Ryno, remember that game where you hit the two homers off Bruce Sutter? SANDBERG: Yes. (Uncomfortably long awkward pause) RADIO GUY: That […]
Cubbie Debuts: How Other Top Cubs Fared on Their First Day in Cubbie Blue
Happy Kris Bryant Day! If you live a jaded, cloaked-in-irony existence like myself, you are sick of holidays manufactured by the chocolate, greeting card, and chocolate greeting card companies. Kris Bryant Day, though, represents something else—it is pure, joyful, and created organically by the MLB Player Union’s poor negotiating. We here at BP-Wrigleyville thought it […]