So, I was looking into something that totally caught my eye recently, and I just had to share my little adventure with you all. I’ve always been a bit of a baseball history buff, you know? And the Chicago Cubs, well, they’ve got a history as long as my arm. I was digging into their past, specifically about the Most Valuable Player (MVP) winners from the Cubs. I wanted to see who these legends were and how many times they have won it.
I started by hitting up the usual spots on the internet. I mean, where else do you go when you need a quick info fix? I found out some basic info like the Cubs also used to be called the Chicago Orphans and Chicago Colts. I found some lists of award winners and league leaders. It’s a lot to take in, honestly. But it’s all so fascinating. Like, did you know the team’s been around since the 1870s? That’s way before my grandparents were even a twinkle in someone’s eye!
First, I had to actually figure out what players won the MVP award while playing for the Cubs. I found a few different lists and started to pull all the names together, with the years they won.
Here are some real standouts:
- Frank Schulte in 1911. Now that’s a name from way back when.
- Rogers Hornsby in 1929. A classic baseball name, right?
- Gabby Hartnett in 1935. Another old-timer.
- Phil Cavarretta in 1945. Right in the middle of the war years.
- Hank Sauer in 1952.
- Ernie Banks in both 1958 and 1959! Back-to-back, can you believe it?
And then I realized something even cooler. The Cubs have had players who were not just great, but they were the best in the league in certain years. These guys were the top dogs in things like batting averages and home runs, a list of the National League or other league leaders. I decided to jot down some of those names too, just for kicks:
- Ross Barnes in 1876. I mean, that’s ancient history!
- George Gore in 1880.
- King Kelly in both 1884 and 1886. Sounds like a baseball legend.
After gathering all these names and dates, I put them all into a simple list. It’s not fancy, but it does the trick. Now I have a neat little record of all these amazing players and when they were at the top of their game with the Cubs. And they’ve got a ton of team awards, too, like National League pennants dating all the way back to 1876. The Cubs aren’t just a team, they’re a huge part of baseball history, and it’s all really fun to follow.
This whole thing started as a simple search, but it turned into a fun dive into baseball’s past. I was just going to share the list of names and ended up sharing my whole process. That’s the fun of these little research projects, right? You never know where they’ll take you. Hope you enjoyed this little trip down memory lane with me!
