by Amaury Pi Gonzalez

mlbshop.com photo: The Major League Baseball store in New York is sold out of the 25 card Topps Chicago Cubs commemorative set the store couldn’t keep enough of these on the shelf

OAKLAND–Very few people today were around in 1908 when the Chicago Cubs won their last World Series, previous to this last month. In the world there are an estimated 116 people left that were born before 1908 and in the U.S. Adele Dunlap was born in 1902 is still alive. TheWorld Series victory over the Cleveland Indians, and the stores that are selling souvenirs of the Cubs 2016 World Series are running out and re-ordering at a very fast pace. From personal experience, as I bought some of those Cubs World Series souvenirs, even the Official MLB shop had to re-order many items, because they just cannot sell them fast enough. I was told by somebody that knows this business “there are selling like no other”.

Baseball is a very regional sport, here in the Bay Area you will see all kinds of souvenirs of both our teams, and basically that is what happens in most other areas of the country, but with the Chicago Cubs it is much more than just in Chicago, for years their fans showed up all over the country. to support them on the road, and their 108 year drought made them like the National Baseball Team. A store right across Wrigley Field in Chicago has this in an awning: “being a Cubs fans is a lifelong commitment”. Even non-baseball fans jumped on the Cubs bandwagon, when they learned they have not won the big one for over a century.  In Spring Training this past season the Spring Training home of the Cubs, Sloan Park(opened in 2014) in Mesa, Arizona, it was the busiest park during Spring Training attracting more fans than any other team; selling out everyday, every game. We can only image what to expect next February and March when they go back, but this time with a World Series championship to brag about. If anybody here in the Bay Area is planning to go to Spring Training in 2017, it would be extremely difficult to find tickets available for the Cubs at Sloan Park .Also hotel rooms are already very scarce for this upcoming Spring Training in the Valley of the Sun.

Baseball cards have been very popular for many years, by generations of sports aficionados. Recently a 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle card sold at auction for more than $1.13 million. I know some of you that told me: “I had that card when I was a kid”, well “do you have it now?”  Sets of Cubs cards for this 2016 team are almost impossible to find in the regular collectibles and souvenir sports stores. Right now if you can find a Kris Bryant or Anthony Rizzo card you will pay just a few bucks. If you can keep them and pass them to your siblings, they (this 2016 Cubs edition)could bring you a dividend much larger than some stocks you might have in the Stock Market. I am not an investment expert, but common sense would tell you that 20-30 years from now a 2016 set of cards of the 2016 MLB World Champion Cubs would be something very nice to own. Even if the Cubs ran a string of consecutive World Series championships beginning next season, the 2016 team is something special and super marketable, for historical reasons.

Days after their World Series championship title, authorities in Chicago estimated about five and a half million people during the Victory Parade….I mean that is a parade! The Chicago White Sox won a World Series in 2005, but it was nothing compared to this year’s victory by the Cubs.  We should not be surprised, the Cubs have always been Chicago’s team.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez is the vice president of the Major League Baseball Hispanic Heritage Museum and does News and Commentary each week at http://www.sportsradioservice.com