Posts Tagged Miller Park

September 29th, 2008

Man Loses Musician Gig at Miller Park for Playing ‘Go, Cubs, Go’

By Will Brinson

When you perform in Miller Park for a living, you would think it would take a lot to get fired. You would actually be right. Unfortunately, “a lot” can include: playing a Chicago Cubs song. Which is what Ted Wulfers did. And naturally, lost his job as a result.

“It was not taken kindly by the Brewers fans,” said a spokeswoman for TGI Friday’s. “Friday’s and the Brewers made the decision not to have this band back this year.”

Wulfers, who sang the national anthem in May at Miller Park, said he had no idea Brewers fans would be upset with “just one chorus” from “Go Cubs Go.”

“Basically I had compared this to playing ‘Free Bird’—the crowd just kept asking for it,” he said, while conceding the crowd was mostly Cubs fans.

Now, losing your job at the Miller Park T.G.I. Fridays? Well, life could be worse. After all, it’s easy to grin when  your ship’s come in and you’ve got the stock market beat. But the man worthwhile is the man who can smile when the Brewers toss him out on his seat. Or something like that.

In reality, he played along with a crowd that consisted of primarily Cubs fans, and then tried to play it off like it was “Free Bird,” which it is not.

September 17th, 2008

Miller Park Causes The Cubs To Rethink Their Surroundings

By Eamonn Brennan

Miller Park is nice. I know a few fellow Cubs fans who have visited it — who have walked the spacious concourse and sat in a comfortable seat and enjoyed some superior food — who prefer it to Wrigley. Blasphemy, but true.

After visiting earlier this week, the Cubs are blaspheming, too:

After his no-hitter Sunday, Carlos Zambrano went as far as to say: “This is a beautiful ballpark. Gosh, I wish we could have a new ballpark.” Is Zambrano crazy, or should the Cubs abandon Wrigley Field and build a modern facility like Miller Park?

“Miller Park is beautiful,” center fielder Jim Edmonds said Tuesday before the Cubs’ game with the Brewers. “I have a much greater appreciation for that field now that we saw the other side. I don’t [know] what they should do with [Wrigley] because this is a great place, a place people have been coming to for almost 100 years. [...] “That’s what we have in front of us, and what we deal with,” Edmonds said. “I mean, I enjoy it, and I enjoy the history. Of course it’s always nice to have a new place. The weight room in Milwaukee is as big as our clubhouse, and they have whirlpool and weight rooms and batting cages, but it is what it is.”

I’ve long imagined that the Cubs players — more so than fans, owners, or community leaders in Chicago — would be unopposed to building a new field. That might seem like an outrage to those of us that pay $50 for a 400-level ticket, but think of it this way:

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September 14th, 2008

Carlos Zambrano Throws First Cubs No-Hitter Since 1972

By Will Brinson

Well, Chicago Cubs fans. Well. I would would say that if you need a sign that there’s a World Series title waiting for you at the end of the rainbow that is October, this is pretty good one.

See, Carlos Zambrano just tossed the first Chicago Cubs no-hitter since Milt Pappas slung one in 1972. Which means that for roughly 50 percent (I made that up) of Cubbie fans, this is the no-hitter they’ve ever seen.

Zambrano was standardly emotional and standardly brilliant, although a lot of Cubs fans didn’t get to see it. See, because of the super-awesome blackout rules that often apply to baseball games, only the White Sox were on television for Sunday Night Baseball. (Though, it obviously wasn’t blacked out in Chicago.)

The thing is, too, that it makes almost zero sense why ESPN wasn’t showing this game. Yes, you could in fact argue that it was a rescheduled game (more on that in a sec) and therefor just not a plausible option for Sunday night. But it was the Cubs and baseball’s hottest team, the Astros, and they were playing in Milwaukee. Just reroute Joe Morgan, John Miller and a few HD cameras.

Need a storyline? Well, how about not looking any further than why they were in Milwaukee in the first place? The Astros, displaced because of Hurricane Ike, were “lucky” enough to have MLB send them to Milwaukee, a much closer location than almost, well, none of the other places they could have played.

So, in return they get a whole nine innings of nothing, courtesy of Big Z — who, I might add, is a perfect pitcher because of stamina and strikeouts to throw a no-no, and who also deserves much praise for such a feat. But yeah, Houston thanks you Bud Selig. Been a fun 48 for that team.

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