The First Chicago Cubs Collapse

It wasn’t in 1969

By William S. Bike

Chicago Cubs fans painfully remember all of the epic Cub collapses — except for one.

There was the Cubs’ collapse of 1970, a year in which they were five games ahead, only to finish five games behind. There were the collapses of 1973 and 1977; in both years, the Cubs were 8–1/2 games ahead, but instead failed to finish even in the top three in the National League East. There were the collapses of 1984 and 2003, in which the Cubs needed only one more playoff win to grab the pennant, but instead lost three in a row at the end of each playoff series. There was the collapse of 2008, in which the Cubs finished with the best record in the National League, but failed to win even one playoff game.

And of course, there was the 800-lb. gorilla of Cub collapses, 1969, in which the team was 9–1/2 games ahead and led for 155 days, only to blow the championship to the New York Mets.

Cub fans remember all of those, but nobody remembers the First Cub Collapse — because nobody is alive now who witnessed it. The First Cub Collapse happened in 1891.

Called the Chicago Colts in 1891 (the team would be renamed the Chicago Cubs in 1902), the team was unexpectedly able to acquire some good new players after a third major league, the Players League, folded after the 1890 season.

In what was supposed to be a rebuilding year, the Chicago team started hot and stayed hot, entering…