A brief history of Chicago Cubs home openers
The Cubs will mark another home opener Friday at the Friendly Confines, taking on the San Diego Padres after officially kicking off the 2025 regular season in Japan and playing a couple of series on the road.
Wrigley Field also turns 111 this year — the historic stadium on that iconic block bounded by Clark and Addison streets and Sheffield and Waveland avenues is only a junior to Fenway Park in Boston amongst standing Major League Baseball parks. But the first Cubs home opener was not held at Wrigley Field — it happened many years before the ballpark was built — and the first professional baseball home opener at Wrigley Field was not a Cubs game.
Here is a breakdown of some memorable home openers and other Cubs history going back 155 years.
Back to the very beginning
The Cubs did not go by their current name until 1902, but they trace their history back to 1870 — when they were officially just called the Chicago Base Ball Club, and were colloquially known as the Chicago White Stockings.
The White Stockings' first-ever game was an away game, held on April 29, 1870, in which they beat the St. Louis Unions 47-1. For their home in those earliest years, the original White Stockings first used Dexter Park — primarily a horserace track on Halsted Street alongside the Union Stock Yards, on the same site that was later occupied by the International Amphitheatre. The team also used Ogden Park, located on Ontario Street east of Pine Street — the old name for Michigan Avenue north of the Chicago River.
The website Wrigley Ivy said neither of these ballparks was any good.
"Ogden Park had no benches or seats for fans, and Dexter Park was too far from the heart of the city for easy accessibility," a Wrigley Ivy article notes.
In 1871, the White Stockings got a new stadium — Union Base-Ball Grounds at Michigan Avenue and Randolph Street, where the northwest corner of Millennium Park is now located. Also in 1871, the Great Chicago Fire destroyed that stadium — as well as all of downtown Chicago, the Near North Side, and some of the Near West Side. This was also the end of the White Stockings until 1876.
That year, a new White Stockings team was launched as a charter member of the National League. They played at 23rd Street Park, located at 23rd and State streets on the Near South Side beyond the southernmost reaches of the Chicago Fire.
But the Society for American Baseball Research notes that these new White Stockings played their first home game on May 10, 1876, against the Cincinnati Reds — winning 6-0.
In 1878, the White Stockings moved to Lake Front Park, a new stadium on the same site as the one destroyed in the Chicago Fire. In 1885, they moved in turn to West Side Park — at Harrison and Loomis streets on the city's Near West Side — and in 1893 to a second West Side Park — bounded by Taylor Street, Wood Street, Polk Street, and Wolcott Avenue (then called Lincoln Street).
The team became known as the Colts during the 1890s, and finally the Cubs beginning in 1902.
In 1908, the Cubs played their home opener at West Side Park against the Cincinnati Reds on April 22, in front of 18,000 fans. Retired Cubs icon Cap Anson threw out the first pitch, Johnny Evers scored 2 and drove in 2, and pitcher Chick Fraser had two hits and an RBI, according to This Day in Baseball, the Cubs won 7-3.
The Cubs also won the World Series in 1908 against the Detroit Tigers. It was their second consecutive World Series championship, and also their last for 108 years.
On April 23, 1914, the first home opener was played at Wrigley Field. But this was not a Cubs game, and Wrigley Field was not yet called Wrigley Field — it was called Weeghman Park.
Wrigley Field was built on the former grounds of a seminary in Chicago's Lakeview community for the Chicago Whales of the long-defunct Federal League. It was commissioned by team owner Charles H. Weeghman and was originally called Weeghman Park.
The Whales played their home opener — the first major league game at the ballpark — on April 23, 1914. As recounted by MLB.com, Whales catcher Art Wilson hit the first home run at what would become Wrigley Field during that game, a two-run shot in the second off Kansas City pitcher Chief Johnson.
A permanent home at Wrigley Field
The Federal League went out of business in 1915. At that point, Weeghman bought the Cubs and moved them to Weeghman Park.
The first Cubs home opener at Wrigley Field took place on April 20, 1916. As recalled by Bob LeMoine of the Society for American Baseball Research, this home opener was quite the spectacle.
LeMoine describes a "mile-long parade from downtown to the ballpark with every car bearing a banner," half a dozen bands performing, and a black bear from the Lincoln Park Zoo that performed tricks for the fans.
Pitcher Charles Hendrix took the mound for the Cubs, and gave up two runs in the first inning, LeMoine recalled. But the Cubs tied the game in the bottom of the first, and the game was a nail-biter all the way through — going into extra innings and lasting past 6 p.m. Cy Williams scored the winning run for the Cubs on a line-drive single by Vic Saier in the 11th, and the Cubs won 7-6.
The Cubs' 1925 home opener, on April 14 of that year, also marked the first radio broadcast for a Cubs game. The game aired on WGN Radio with Quin Ryan broadcasting from the grandstand roof. The Cubs beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 8-2 in that game, with pitcher Grover Cleveland Alexander hitting a home run.
On April 20, 1946, the Cubs were also starting a new season after winning the National League pennant, but losing the World Series, the fall before. This home opener at Wrigley Field did not go so well for the Cubs, as they were shut out 2-0 by the St. Louis Cardinals.
This home opener was supposed to be the first televised Cubs game, but this did not work out either. As Phil Rosenthal recalled in the Chicago Tribune in 2019, the game was supposed to be shown on WBKB-TV 4, Chicago's first television station, but the broadcast failed due to electrical interference from the elevators at the State-Lake Theatre building downtown. The interference ruined the picture to the point where station director William C. Eddy would not show it on the air, the newspaper reported.
However, the Cubs did raise the NL pennant flag that day for their victory the year before.
On April 20, 1956 — nine years after Jackie Robinson broke the color line in Major League Baseball with the Brooklyn Dodgers, but still a time when only one in 15 MLB players was Black — the Cubs were led by five Black players to victory in their home opener against the Cincinnati Reds at Wrigley Field. Monte Irvin, Solly Drake, Gene Baker, Sam Jones, and the legendary Ernie Banks combined for 10 hits in 19 at-bats — including two home runs, four doubles, and seven RBIs, according to the Society for American Baseball Research.
Jones also pitched a four-hitter, and the Cubs won 12-1.
Banks, who played for the Cubs from 1953 until 1971, was the main draw for Cubs fans during many years when the team was less than stellar overall. After his retirement, "Mr. Cub," as Banks was known, served as a team ambassador for the Cubs until his death in 2015.
On April 8, 1969 — at the start of a season of promise and high hopes for the Cubs that ultimately ended in disappointment — nearly 41,000 fans were in attendance as the Cubs took on the Philadelphia Phillies. Newspaper columnist Mike Royko was there, and wrote about the atmosphere 10 years later.
"Ernie [Banks] hit a homer in the first. Then he hit a homer in the third, and we all jumped up and down and screamed and acted like crazy people. Then the other team tied it, and the suspense mounted until a fine hulk named Willie Smith pinch-hit a homer in the 11th inning," Royko wrote for the Chicago Sun-Times in 1979. "[Broadcaster] Jack Brickhouse screamed himself into a hernia, some fans didn't fall out of the nearby saloons until closing time, and the city was gripped with season-long pennant fever."
The Cubs won that game 7-6.
Cold weather, packed stands, and excitement on the field in the 70s and 80s
On a frigid April 6, 1971, the home opener at Wrigley became famous for a pitchers' duel between the Cubs' Fergie Jenkins and the Cardinals' Bob Gibson.
As recalled by the Society for American Baseball Research, Jenkins and Gibson kept striking out batter after batter—with each having given up one run by the ninth. Johnny Callison had driven in Ron Santo for the Cubs with a double in the fourth, while Joe Torre had homered for the Cardinals in the seventh. Finally, the Cubs won the game with a walk-off homer by Billy Williams in the 11th.
The Cubs home opener on April 14, 1978, is famous for its massive crowd, which topped out at 45,777 — a record for a home opener. According to the Chicago Baseball Museum, people were already waiting in two-block lines along Waveland and Sheffield avenues for the bleachers to open as early as 6:30 a.m.
The bleachers were filled four hours before the game started, and fans had food fights to pass the time, the Chicago Baseball Museum reported. Meanwhile, 8,000 fans bought tickets and came in with no seats left.
The Cubs won the game 5-4 against the Pittsburgh Pirates with a ninth-inning walk-off home run by Larry Biittner. Meanwhile, the Chicago Baseball Museum reported the Cubs never sold day-of-game tickets for a home opener again after that.
Four years later, attendance was considerably lower for the Cubs' home opener as temperatures were cold and Chicago was covered with snow. Bleed Cubbie Blue reports as the Cubs took the field on April 5, 1982, people on the rooftops along Sheffield Avenue were throwing snowballs at the people in the bleachers.
The Cubs shut out the New York Mets 5-0, with a two-run homer in the fourth by Bill Buckner and six-and-a-half shutout innings by Fergie Jenkins. It was 34 degrees — a mere 2 degrees above freezing — for the game.
The Cubs also played the Mets for their home opener on April 13, 1984, with Steve Trout pitching for the Cubs. That year, the Cubs clobbered the Mets 11-2, with a first-inning double by Ryne Sandberg and a two-run homer by Jody Davis. This Cubs team went on to win the National League Eastern Division championship that fall.
On April 4, 1989, the Cubs began their first full season with lights in Wrigley Field for night games — though the home opener was a day game as usual. According to the Society for American Baseball Research, expectations were not high for the Cubs that season — with star slugger Andre Dawson remarking during spring training, "This is not a championship team. Whether it can be competitive remains to be seen."
But Cubs pitcher Rick Sutcliffe and Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Floyd Youmans kept the game scoreless until the bottom of the third, when singles by Joe Girardi, Sutcliffe, and Jerome Walton brought the Cubs their first run. In the fourth, Dawson blasted a home run into deep left and drove in Sandberg. The Cubs won 5-4, and Sutcliffe became the first Cubs pitcher to win back-to-back home openers since Grover Cleveland Alexander in 1926, and the Cubs went on to win the NL Eastern Division again that season.
Memorable moments in the 90s and 2000s
The 1994 Major League Baseball season was cut short, and the playoffs and the World Series were called off, due to a players' strike. But no one knew that was going to happen yet on Monday, April 4, when the Cubs played their home opener against the New York Mets before a standing-room only crowd of 38,413.
Karl "Tuffy" Rhodes was first at-bat for the Cubs that day. The count was full with three balls and two strikes when Rhodes hit a home run off Mets pitcher Dwight "Doc" Gooden into the left-field bleachers.
"High fly ball! Way back! It might be! It could be! It is! Holy cow!" broadcaster Harry Caray said jubilantly. "Wow, did he hit that ball!"
Rhodes went on to hit two more home runs during that game. But the Cubs lost 12-8.
On April 1, 1996, Mark Grace was the hero of the Cubs' home opener against the San Diego Padres. As remembered by the Society for American Baseball Research, the game was tied 4-4 in the 10th inning when Grace scored a hit off down the third-base line with the bases loaded, sending Rey Sanchez to home plate and the Cubs to a 5-4 victory.
Meanwhile, fans were beyond excited to see Ryne Sandberg back in a Cubs uniform and back at second base — he returned in 1996 after retiring midseason in June 1994. The '96 home opener was also Pat Hughes' first game in the radio broadcast booth alongside Ron Santo.
The 1998 Cubs season would become known for Kerry Wood's golden arm and Sammy Sosa's home run record chase with the Cardinals' Mark McGwire. The Cubs played their home opener that season on a chilly April 3 — dispatching the winless Montreal Expos 6-3. Steve Trachsel and his fellow Cubs pitchers allowed three hits and three RBI between them, North Side Baseball recalled.
The 1998 home opener also doubled as a memorial service for Caray, who had died that past February. His widow, Dutchie, became the first of decades' worth of guests to sing 'Take Me Out to the Ballgame" during the seventh-inning stretch in Caray's memory.
Fans remember 2003 as the year the Cubs came so, so close — five outs away from going to the World Series before that ball that went up for grabs between Moisés Alou and fan Steve Bartman sent everything on a downward spiral. The Cubs' home opener that was supposed to be played on April 7 year was thwarted too — it was snowed out.
When the game went ahead the next day on April 8 — with temperatures still wintry — the Cubs beat the Montreal Expos 6-1. Published reports note that Matt Clement allowed only three hits, while Alou drove in three runs.
For the Cubs' home opener against the Milwaukee Brewers on March 31, 2008, all the attention was on Kosuke Fukudome, whom the Cubs had signed that past December. As recalled by Cubbies Crib, Fukudome hit a double to center field in his first at-bat. Much later, with the Cubs down 3-0 in the ninth, Fukudome hit a home run, driving in Derrek Lee and Aramis Ramirez and tying the game.
But the Cubs ended up losing to the Brewers 4-3.
The most magical season of all, and beyond
On April 11, 2016 — at the start of that magical season that finally put all the talks of curses and "lovable losers" to bed at last — the Cubs' home opener made for some impressive baseball too.
It wasn't looking so great for the Cubs for most of the game, As the Associated Press reported at the time, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Brandon Finnegan pitched six and two-thirds innings before allowing a single to David Ross, while the Cubs' Jon Lester allowed three runs and five hits in six innings.
But Ross and Jason Heyward each scored runs in the seventh, and then Addison Russell hit a game-winning homer off the first pitch the Reds' Jumbo Diaz threw his way. Closer Hector Rondón sealed the deal, and the Cubs won 5-3.
That game, and the Cubs' World Series victory that November, may seem like yesterday. But nine years have passed since then.
For the Cubs' home opener on April 10, 2017, Anthony Rizzo hit a game-winning single off Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Kenley Jansen for a 3-2 Cubs victory — and the World Series championship banner was also raised triumphantly at Wrigley Field that day before a sellout crowd. On April 8, 2019, the then-Mayor-elect Lori Lightfoot threw out the first pitch as the Cubs clobbered the Pittsburgh Pirates 10-0.
At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic 2020, the Cubs' home opener was pushed back all the way to July 24 and was played with no fans in the stands. But despite the circumstances, Kyle Hendricks pitched a nine-inning shutout — while Ian Happ hit a two-run homer in the third and Rizzo homered in the eighth. The Cubs won 3-0.
By March 30, 2023, it was a much different scene with fans out in force despite the fairly typical cold weather. Fans enjoyed a Billy Goat Tavern popup at Wrigley Field — where members of The Second City troupe offered up a "cheezborger, cheezborger, cheezborger." They also got to take photos with the 2016 World Series trophy.
The Cubs beat the Brewers 4-0 that day, with Dansby Swanson racking up three hits and Marcus Stroman working six scoreless innings.
On April 1, 2024, it was raining in Chicago. But fans turned out anyway, and the Cubs beat the Colorado Rockies 5-0 as Shota Imagana pitched six fantastic innings in his MLB debut.
The next entry into the annals of Cubs history will be entered on Friday, April 4. The organ — which made its first appearance at a Cubs baseball game in 1941 and has been heard continually since 1967 — will be playing. Fans will gather at Gallagher Way ahead of the game. And the Cubs will take on the San Diego Padres.
