Waitkus 'til Next Year...

(Chicago Cubs' marketing director Jay) Blunk said the Cubs will hold their first retro game in the coming season. Players will wear replica 1948 uniforms as part of the 60th anniversary of WGN-TV.

"We've never done one at Wrigley," he said. "It seems like a perfect fit. Every day is turn back the clock day at Wrigley."

Coincidentally, the Cubs' '48 opening day line-up featured Eddie Waitkus in his final season with the North Siders.

A bit of trivia: The former Rookie-of-the-Year's subsequent trade to the Phillies the following year triggered (pun intended) a psychological breakdown in the mind of Chicago resident (and Cubs' fan) Ruth Steinhagen.

On the evening of June 14, 1949, Steinhagen paid a bellhop at the Edgewater Hotel to give a note signed "Ruth Ann Burns" to Waitkus' Philadelphia teammate, Russ "Monk" Meyer (who had pitched a 9-2 victory at Wrigley earlier that day).

Monk knew Waitkus was dating a "Ruth Ann", who was from his hometown of Melrose, Mass. (and that her parents were wealthy), and relayed to Eddie he was to meet her at room 1297. When Waitkus arrived Steinhagen told him she was a friend of Ruth Ann's and subsequently proceeded to shoot the NL's leading first baseman in the all-star balloting with a .22 caliber rifle.

Waitkus' subsequent rehab and return to the majors was one of the inspirations for the Roy Hobb's character in Bernard Malamud's novel, "The Natural".