Baseball fans from Maine to San Diego learned an important lesson Saturday night. That is, if you were able to stay awake long enough for the conclusion of Game 3 of the NLDS between the Cubs and Dodgers.

I was at a social function during the night at hand. Fortunately for me and a couple of other interested parties, the television was amazingly not in use, so we clicked on the baseball game to find the Cubs already at a 2-0 disadvantage, both in score and in series. General meandering and the need for socialization eventually led us away from the TV, but I went back to check again later at the approximate time I thought the game might be ending. Unfortunately, the TV had since been commandeered by a number of Rock Band 2 players, and the sites and sounds of Dodger Stadium were replaced by the Smashing Pumpkins or somebody like that.

Well, I had to be there for the ultimate demise of the Cubs, so I did the next best thing a baseball-starved lunatic might do--I left my friends to their devices, sat in the car and listened to the conclusion of the game on the radio. And every last garbled word and bit of static I had to put up with as I listened to Johnathan Broxton close the door on the 2008 Chicago Cubs for good was more than worth it.

So what lesson did the fans learn, you ask? Well, despite everything we've heard over the last seven months, it turns out that a team won't necessarily win the World Series just because it's been 100 years since they won their last one.

Yeah, I know that's a cheap shot. But I've been hearing Cubs and Cubs fans flapping their lips since March about how "it's gonna happen." And it almost did. There was, however, one fatal flaw in the plan: the Cubs apparently forgot they had to play postseason games in order to win the World Series. As such, the Dodgers swept them from the playoff ranks with nigh-impeccable ease, and I'm really happy to see them go.

Now listen, when I first started contributing this blog back in January, I promised myself I'd try to keep vitriol to a minimum. I promised myself I wouldn't let any given entry collapse into a tirade about how much I dislike a certain player or team, or how Johnny Strikeout isn't pulling his weight, or how I think my managerial decisions would be better than the managerial decisions of the guy who actually manages the team (since I have experience with that and all). But when it comes to talking about the Cubs--even now that they've already been handily swept from the playoffs--it's still going to be hard to keep myself in check. But I think I've got what it takes.

Here's the deal--I don't like the Cubs. The Cubs are the new Boston Red Sox. For years, all we ever heard about was how close the Red Sox get to winning the World Series all the time, and how they always crap out in the playoffs and are cursed and all of this business. Well, the Red Sox finally broke that curse after 86 years (against my team, of course) and have since become the new greatest team in the history of mankind. (Take that, New England Patriots--Boston's other greatest team in the history of mankind.) Since the Red Sox finally took care of business, the sports media had to latch on to the next available team of allegedly cursed lovable losers, that being our foes on the north side. It also doesn't help matters that the Cubs have actually been good for the last two seasons--it creates the illusion that the Cubs may actually perform well in the playoffs, as well, and they get a little more coverage than they otherwise normally would. Every Cubs-loyal sports analyst out there is pulling for them, and I'm really just sick of hearing about the Cubs.

It also doesn't help matters that I'm a big Cardinals fan, and I'm not the sort of fan who can root for one if the other is out of it. The Cubs must lose. Always. And when you put all of that together, the Cubs are worthy of a dislike that lands them right at the very bottom of my list.

And now they're gone, and I feel great. As I've said in previous blog entries with regard to me not liking all the good teams out there, I have great respect for the talent and history of the Chicago Cubs. And I have great respect for their fans, even though they irritate the crap out of me most of the time. Despite that, they stick with their team until the absolute bitter end, and that's a trait I can get behind. But even with all of that in mind, they're still my least favorite team, and as a sports fan, I want to see my least favorite team fail miserably. They did just that.

Lastly, to the Cubs--if you're gonna join the "it's gonna happen" hype, like Ryan Dempster did all the way back in March, you better be able to back it up at the end of the season. You didn't--in fact, Dempster walked seven guys! If you're gonna make a claim that big and that arrogant at the beginning of the season and can't back it up, you're getting no sympathy from me. That just makes me more ecstatic that you lost.

Oh well, there's always sometime during the next 100 years.