Ernie Banks, Mr. Cub

Ernie Banks is by far my favorite Cub. And I am sure there are many Cubs fans out there that feel the same way. If there was one player that made me a Cub fan it was Ernie Banks.

Mr. Cub played his entire career with the Chicago Cubs from 1953 to his retirement in 1971. He played shortstop until 1962 when he moved to first base. You could just feel that he loved baseball, Chicago, the Chicago Cubs and Wrigley Field.

He achieved numerous individual accomplishments despite the fact the Cubs were not a very good team. He was voted the National League Most Value Player in both 1958 and 1959. He won the home run title with 47 in 1958, RBI title with 129 and was tops in slugging percentage and total bases. In 1959 he came in second in home runs (46) to Eddie Matthews (47), but did bring home the RBI title with an amazing 147. These accomplishments in which the Cubs didn't play 500 ball in either season. 1959 was also the year the Chicago White Sox won the American League Pennant and lost the World Series in six games to the Los Angeles Dodgers. He also set a record in 1955 that stood for 30 years by hitting 5 grand slams in one year.

Ernie ended his career with 512 home runs, hitting is 500th on May 12, 1970 at Wrigley Field. Unfortunately there were less than 10,000 fans in the stands. He holds records for most extra hits by a Cub with 1,009, most games played 2,525, at bats with 9,421 and total bases 4,706. He played his entire baseball career of 19 years with the Chicago Cubs which is almost unheard of.

In his first year of eligibility in 1977, Ernie Banks was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. In 1999, he ranked Number 38 on The Sporting News list of Baseball's Greatest Players, and was elected to the Major League Baseball All-Century Team.

Ernie Banks wore number 14 and no one will ever wear it after him. In 1982, eleven years after he retired the Chicago Cubs retired his number 14. It flies on top of the left field foul pole and it was the first players number every retired by the organization in its long history.
It was later joined by Ron Santo's number 10.

Banks is regarded as one of the most popular baseball players in Chicago sports history. He was a constant promoter of the Cubs and of daytime play at Wrigley Field. His popularity and positive attitude led to the nicknames "Mr. Cub" and "Mr. Sunshine."

On March 31, 2008, a statue of Banks was unveiled outside Wrigley Field. Upon its unveiling, the base of the statue was revealed to contain a typographical error, reading "Lets play two" rather than the grammatically correct "Let's play two." Two days later, sculptor Lou Cella came down to the ballpark early in the morning and carved the apostrophe.

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