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Cubs wash away 'Friendly Chalkboard,' but hope new tradition is born

Mark Townsend
·Yahoo Sports Contributor

For decades Cubs fans uttered the phrase “there’s always next year” hoping next year would finally bring an end to their World Series drought. Now that that’s happened, the phrase takes on a much more positive feeling, as fans are hoping next year brings about new traditions centered around success.

Traditions such as the message-covered walls outside the Wrigley Field’s “Friendly Confines,” which was aptly named the “Friendly Chalkboard.”

A look at the chalk-covered walls outside Wrigley Field before they were washed away. (AP)
A look at the chalk-covered walls outside Wrigley Field before they were washed away. (AP)

As the Cubs chances of winning the World Series seemed to fade after falling behind the Indians three games to one, fans spontaneously began writing messages in chalk on the brick wall along Sheffield Avenue.

The messages started before Game 5 of the World Series and ranged from inspirational words, like “we believe,” to motivational terms, such as “this is the year.” Some were even personal messages as fans honoring loved ones or noted how far they’d traveled just to be there.

With each Cubs victory that followed, eventually culminating in a World Series victory, the wall of messages expanded in size and and grew in meaning. It was a place fans gathered and shared first hope, then joy, but above all what the Cubs mean to them.

It was truly a sight to behold. An added attraction even. But like all good things, it wasn’t meant to last. This week, Cubs’ employees washed down those walls, making each message a memory.

Everyone knew this was an inevitable. If the Cubs didn’t remove them, Mother Nature would have done so eventually.

With construction work needing to be done though, it perhaps happened sooner than most hoped it would. But the meaning of it all wasn’t lost on Cubs president of business operations Crane Kenney. Earlier this week, he released a statement explaining why the messages would be removed, while expressing hope a new tradition was born.

Due to the start of offseason construction, we will need to fence in these beautiful postseason memorials and remove the artwork from all areas of the ballpark. … While we hate to remove these cherished messages, chalk is a fleeting medium. To preserve these images, we will continue to photograph the outfield bleacher walls so we may share these postseason wall messages publicly in the future.

We are humbled by the beautiful memorials you created as testimonials to your faith, perseverance and generational connection to our beloved ballpark and team. … You have developed what we hope will become a Wrigley Field postseason tradition. … We also are very appreciative of the use of chalk, which produces a creative and colorful display that does not damage our historic brick walls, which include bricks dating back to the 1920s.

It was a wonderful sidebar that added another layer of meaning to Cubs fans and understanding for others who perhaps didn’t grasp what this meant in Chicago. We have no doubt Cubs fans will embrace that and make it yet another tradition that separates the Cubs from everyone else.

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Mark Townsend is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at bigleaguestew@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!