“I know just from the experience of playing with those guys, and I’ve seen some of the mail that they get, obviously not a lot of us get that kind of mail,” Wood said on “The Waddle & Silvy Show” on ESPN 1000. “I didn’t, but there are people out there that got their beliefs.”

Wood said he saw some of the mail that was sent to former teammates LaTroy Hawkins, Jacque Jones and former manager Dusty Baker.

“It’s tough to sit there and read that,” Wood said, “and it’s tough to even understand what those players go through.”

Bradley accused fans of making racial taunts at Wrigley Field during the 2009 season, but he declined to give examples of specific incidents.

Now that Wood is saying it, all of a sudden people are starting to believe it just a little bit.  That in and of itself is a subtle (or not so subtle, depending on your point of view) form of racism.  What’s so unfortunate about this is that these players are not really hearing true, useful criticism.  Who sends ballplayers letters anyways?  If I were the one sending the letters, even if I was a racist, the fact that they were black would be the least of my concerns.  Dusty was a terrible manager, Hawkins blew way too many saves, Jones power went out after that first season and Bradley said all the wrong things at all the wrong times.  You know now that I think about it, I have some letters to send.  Does anyone have Kevin Gregg and Geovany Soto’s addresses?

The problem, fellow Cubs fans, is two-fold.  The first is that Bradley is hitting now.  I mean hitting pretty well.  His on-base percentage has been among the elite of the National League all season, and now his power numbers are finally coming along.  In the 18 games he has played since the Cubs were in 1st place on July 31, his numbers have been some of the best on the team: G: 18 / HR: 3 / RBI: 9 / BA: .303 / OBP: .410 / SLG: .500 / OPS: .910. The second is these quotes the Tribune and Sun-Times bring us.  Let’s be honest: Paul Sullivan, Gordon Wittenmyer and Phil Rogers are not exactly the greatest sportswriters.  They are grubbing for quotes and cornering a tired, beaten down Bradley for quotes that will make him look bad night after night.  Could you deal with it?  I would lash out for sure, and in all reality Bradley hasn’t even done that.  He’s just answered honestly.

So if you want to boo Bradley when he screws up a play in the field or strikes out in an important late-inning situation, then by all means indulge.  But if you hate Bradley personally based on either his play on the field or his personality, relax.  He’s just a regular guy going to work everyday and being attacked from all sides.  Instead of hating, why not just enjoy the hilariousness of the quotes that the Cubs writers are able to cobble together from their interrogations of him.  Here’s a few recent ones:

On why he came to Chicago: “Ain’t nothing I’d rather do. If I could do anything, one, I might cure the lupus my aunt has; two, another aunt got both legs cut off because of diabetes; I might give her legs back. But No. 3 on the list would be win a championship in this city so that people can have what they deserve. The good people. The bad people can jump on the bandwagon when the time comes. But everything in my heart is to win a championship here. And I ain’t done yet.”

On racial taunts from Cubs fans: “America doesn’t believe in racism,” he said sarcastically before repeating the remark.

On being the victim of racial slurs from the bleachers: “All I’m saying is I just pray the game is nine innings, so I can be out there the least amount of time as possible and go home,” he said.

In reference to the Cubs losing 15-6 to the Nationals: “We got a Rodney King beatdown tonight.”

He does seem a little preoccupied with the racial issue, but who am I to say that he shouldn’t be?  It is the official stance of NQTC that there are most likely racist Cubs fans in the bleachers, and if I were in Bradley (or Jacque Jones) position, I’d be pissed off too.  So we can boo him when he under-performs (hell, I even made the case for booing him), but let’s not judge too harshly.  You know when you just have a terrible day all around, and then you come home and you forgot to DVR some show and that makes you fly off the handle and go crazy, but really it wasn’t the DVR thing but just everything that has happened all day?  That’s like the Cubs and Milton Bradley.  You can blame Bradley if you want, but that wasn’t really the central issue, was it?

White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen was amused Wednesday by a T-shirt that sported a cartoon drawing of him cutting the Wrigley Field lawn.

“Ozzie mows Wrigley Field” was inscribed on the front, with the Wrigley scoreboard in the background.

Guillen bought a T-shirt and wore it in the clubhouse. “I might cut lawns but I don’t stand in the rain selling T-shirts,” Guillen said, laughing.

It’s been at least a week since he said or did something incredibly stupid and insensitive but uniquely hilarious.  I would say this definitely qualifies.

h/t: Player to be Named Later

I would have gone with something like “Pujols Gives Guys Hand Jobs” or “Hey Pujols, I Think The Steroids Are Working”, but how can you go wrong being racist AND stealing someone else’s bad idea? (Ok, the racist joke is a little funny, but can’t we come up with our own ideas at least?)

h/t: The Big Dead Sidebar

Hmmm.  Here’s the problem: I think that shirt is really funny.  Does that make me racist?  I suppose so.  Either way this ranks somewhere between the Hory Kow shirts and flat-out dropping the N-bomb on Jacque Jones when he was playing the outfield.  Keep it up hillbilly Cardinal fans, Cubs fans can use all the help we can get on the issue of being racist.  Your efforts to make us seem less so relative to other fans are much appreciated.

Wrigley seems like the last place an African-American player with such a well-traveled reputation for confrontations would choose to sign a multiyear contract. In the last five seasons alone, Cubs outfielder Jacque Jones and pitcher LaTroy Hawkins said they were the targets of racist taunts and fan mail. Jones also said in 2006 that he became the victim of racial slurs and threats on his cell phone when the number got out.

Former Cubs manager Dusty Baker said that same season that he received enough threatening, racist mail in Chicago that his wife and young son no longer would attend games.

This excerpt is from a piece trying desperately to link Bradley’s history of rage to racism at Wrigley Field. I have heard these rumors before, but as you can tell from the names named in that story, they were all during the Dusty Baker years.  Yeah, I’m implying what you think I’m implying.  I am not going to say that there aren’t racist Cubs fans, but I am going to imply that Dusty had a strange view of the world and may have brought those perceptions with him.

All that being said I really hope this kind of thing isn’t true.  How embarassing is that reputation for Cubs fans?

***UPDATE: I was speaking with my friend, reader Black Rob, about whether Cubs fans are racist or not in real life and not just in Dusty’s head.  Here was his reaction: 

“I’ve dealt with racist cubs fans, but not at wrigley.  Drunk assholes at the bars after the game.  It’s why I don’t go there anymore (Wrigleyville).  It’s what happens when drunk fratboys see a black kid that’s not dressed like a rapper.  It’s never been at Wrigley…I still love the Cubs and wrigley…I’m not going to let some drunk assholes ruin that for me, ya know?”" 

Rob is not a paranoid-type either, so I do trust what he is saying.  Perhaps this is just a few bad apples, but if it is true, I am hanging my head in shame as a Cubs fan.