Well, Cub fans.  You finally got what you wished for.  Gone are the stuffed shirts of the Tribune Company and enter the Ricketts family. Now it's Cub fans who are running the team, a family of gazillionaires poised to take the Cubs to the promised land, or so it seems.

They say there is never a better day than your first day of a new job.  I can tell you from my own experience that's true.  You meet a whole bunch of new people who share the same goal you do---success.  This lasts a couple of days until you find out that everyone has a different agenda.  Then people come, people go and eventually it spirals into what the Trib ownership did.

Being old enough to remember such solid Chicago baseball owners as John Allyn and P.K. Wrigley, I honestly thought that the Trib did not do Cub fans a disservice.  They always had the resources available, signed the sexiest free agents and  hottest managers.  It was so much more optimistic than the White Sox, who were forced to scan the waiver wires and hire players other teams had cast aside in the hopes of re-training them and making them fit.  And then the corporate mantra of "pitchers don't win championships."  And the love affairs with players past their prime like Albert Belle and Junior Griffey as a gimmick to sell tickets.  So really, Cub fans, I don't know why you've been bitching, except that your team seems to choke everytime you get in the playoffs.  Don't blame the Trib for that or for Bartman or for Dusty Baker or for a million other things you people point your fingers at when you can't win the big one.

If the Trib was guilty of anything it was too much patience.  How long were guys like Andy McPhail and Ed Lynch empowered to control the Cubs fortunes before they finally were shown the door.  In a family or privately owned business, probably much earlier.

Enter the Ricketts family on day one, saying all the right things.  "No. 1 is we're going to win the World Series," Tom Ricketts proclaimed, to the surprise of absolutely no one.  What is he supposed to say "Our goal is to be the best mediocre team in baseball"  Of course not.

Then he went on: "I'll be honest. I think we have a team that can do it next year. I'm not going to promise anything. There's enough talent on this team coming back next season to go all the way to the finish line." Which to Cub fans means the new boss is optimistic and to the rest of us means "We're not going to sign any big names in the off season because I don't think we need them."

And of course on the subject of the goat, Ricketts pounded his fist and stomped his feet and proclaimed "There is no curse. There is no curse. If anybody on our team thinks he's cursed, we'll move him to a less accursed team. From this day forward, let's just get that behind us."

So, one day one, Cub fans are oooing and ahhing and salivating that a man who once hung out in their bleachers is running the show and that he will lead them to where they haven't been in 101 years.  Ah yes, Cub fans, but be careful what you wish for.

The Sox ownership under Jerry and Eddie starting out on a positive note, despite the Bill Veeck bashing.  In 1983, it looked like the Sox would be a player for many years to come.  Then came Hawk Harrelson as GM.  Then came the stadium issue.  Then came several lean years before the Sox could home grow some decent young players.  Then came The Chairman leading the lockout in a year his team might have been able to win it all.  Then the white flag trade, Albert Bell, Terry Bevington, Jerry Manuel et. al until finally, by sheer luck, the White Sox got hot at the end of the year and cut a swath through the playoffs and won the big prize.

If we learned anything in 2005, it's not about who has the best team, it's about who can win 11 games first.

So, congrats on the new owners, a group of rich people who are just fans.  Here's hopeing for your sake that your new owner turns out more like Mark Attanasio than Peter Angelos. Here's wishing he's more John Henry than Jeffery Lurie.  And with any luck, he'll be far more Bill DeWitt than Tom Hicks. And, for your sake, I hope that they do not turn into the Wilpon Family. Otherwise, as Aerosmith used to sing, it'll be "the same old story, same old song and dance, my friend."  And by now, that type of music has worn thin with Cub fans.