Billy Goat Bosses Say Curse Over, Now Up To Cubs

CHICAGO, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News -29th oct,2016) - At the Billy Goat Tavern, the owners and managers say the "curse" has been lifted from the Chicago Cubs, but now it's on them to win their first World Series since 1908.

Trying to end America's longest sports title drought, the Cubs trail the Cleveland Indians 2-1 in Major League Baseball's best-of-seven championship final after a 1-0 loss Friday in the first Series game at Chicago's 102-year-old Wrigley Field in 71 years.

Back in 1945, Billy Goat owner Bill Sianis brought his goat Murphy to the game but both were ejected after fans complained the animal stunk. Sianis imposed the "Curse of the Billy Goat" and until this year they had not reached the World Series since then.

"In our minds, the curse is done," said Tom Sianis, a manager at the bar. "Now it's up for the Cubs. We're here for everybody who wants to see it finally happen. "We're kind of Ground Zero of the curse.

Winning the Series is how we want the goat to be remembered and not for 71 years of a curse." Sam Sianis, the Billy Goat's proprietor and nephew of curse-placer Bill, brought a goat into Wrigley Field in 1984 and 1994 and says that banished the hoodoo.

"Oh yeah, the curse is gone," he said. "I went with a goat all around inside there and broke the curse." And he says the Cubs will win the crown this year. "For the city of Chicago, it will be a big celebration.

We will have a lot of people coming in here because of the curse." The bar is located below the section of Michigan Avenue known as "The Magnificent Mile" with fancy hotels, retired NBA star Michael Jordan's steak house and the Water Tower Place shopping mall.

Straw scarecrows clad in Cub uniforms are there, a stone's throw from Lake Michigan. A small sign leads people down from the sidewalk onto a lower street level but truly into a bygone era.

The sign on the door says "Butt In Any Time" but the one as you walk through warns "Enter At Your Own Risk." Along the walls are black and white photographs of reporters who frequented the bar, located between the Tribune and Sun-Times newspaper buildings, and copies of some of their stories.

A -30-, which oldtime newsmen used to indicated the end of a typewritten story, notes those who are deceased. - 'It would be insane' - ======================== The Billy Goat hosted a "Reverse the Curse" party on October 6, the anniversary day of the goat's ballpark ejection.

It featured a real goat and the bell behind the bar that Murphy wore back in 1945, a spiritual exorcism of any lingering curse on the Cubs. "It has gotten us to the World Series and with a little luck we will bring home the title," Tom Sianis said.

If the Cubs did win, the Chicago party, "it would be insane," he said. "The city would be up for grabs." The Billy Goat's grill was made famous on a Saturday Night Live sketch, with Chicago actors Bill Murray and Dan Akroyd grilling up "Cheezborgers" with "No fries, chips" and "No Coke, Pepsi," although that was reversed when the bar switched soda brands.

On Saturday morning, there were a few people at the L-shaped bar watching Manchester United play Burnley on television. Once the English Premier League goal-less draw ended, one man applauded and the match was back to background noise for conversations about the Cubs, as usual.

Come the night and the place will be jammed again with six televisions showing the Cubs' latest game. "It was crazy in here last night, busy all day and long into the evening," Tom Sianis said. "It has been non-stop. People come in here from all over the country to see what we're all about."