You know, I still think about that 2017 season. It was… well, it was different, wasn’t it? After the absolute craziness of 2016, with the Cubs finally winning it all, 2017 felt like the morning after a huge party. Everyone was still happy, sure, but also kinda blinking in the sunlight, wondering what to do next.
That Whole “Defending Champs” Year
So, for me, 2017 became this personal quest. I had this idea in my head. I thought, “Alright, they’re the World Series Champions. I need something, like, from this year, this specific ‘defending champs’ year.” It couldn’t just be more 2016 celebration gear. I wanted something that said, “Yeah, this was the year after.”
I started looking around. First, the usual online spots. You know, auction sites, fan shops, the whole deal. But everything felt a bit… I dunno, either ridiculously expensive for game-used stuff or just more generic champion merchandise. I was hunting for something specific, though I wasn’t even sure what. Maybe:
- A particular player’s 2017 edition jersey?
- A ball with a special 2017 stamp?
- Just some unique keepsake that wasn’t everywhere.
It was tougher than I thought. Or maybe I was just being too picky. So, I figured, “Okay, I gotta go to Wrigley. Soak it in. See what they’ve got at the park itself.”
Getting tickets wasn’t the absolute nightmare it had been in late 2016, but it still took some doing. I finally snagged a couple for a game mid-summer. I remember walking up to the ballpark, and the air just felt… different. Still buzzing, definitely, because it’s Wrigley and it’s the Cubs. But that almost frantic, desperate energy from the year before? That was gone. It was more of a settled pride, if that makes sense. It was good, but it was an adjustment.
Inside, I made a beeline for the gift shops. Man, they were loaded. Tons of “Reigning Champions” this and “World Series Title Holders” that. And I looked, I really did. I picked things up, put them down. I saw some cool stuff, but nothing really clicked for that “2017 specific” vibe I was after. It all felt a bit like they were just pumping out merch for the sake of it, you know?
Then I saw this one kid. He couldn’t have been more than eight or nine. His dad had just bought him a simple, standard Rawlings baseball. The kind with the 2017 MLB logo on it. Nothing fancy. But this kid was absolutely beaming. He was turning it over and over in his hands like it was the most precious thing in the world. Just a regular ball from that season.
And it kinda hit me. What was I really looking for? Some super-exclusive, rare thing to prove I was there, or that I remembered? That kid, he just wanted a baseball from the year his team were champs. He got it. He understood it.
So, I didn’t end up buying some crazy expensive collectible. I actually walked out of there with a small, simple lapel pin. It just said “Cubs 2017.” That was it. Sounds pretty anticlimactic, right? But here’s the thing: I still have that pin. And when I look at it, I don’t think about some rare artifact. I think about that calmer day at Wrigley, the feeling of a city still proud but moving on. And I think about that kid and his baseball.
Yeah, 2017 wasn’t 2016. But it was its own thing. It was about figuring out what comes after the biggest win ever. And sometimes, the simplest souvenirs are the ones that mean the most, I guess. Just had to live it to get that, you know?