{"id":109651,"date":"2025-10-19T13:01:34","date_gmt":"2025-10-19T13:01:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=109651"},"modified":"2025-10-19T13:01:34","modified_gmt":"2025-10-19T13:01:34","slug":"column-trolling-the-chicago-cubs-with-an-l-flag-backfires-on-milwaukee-brewers-with-nlcs-flop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=109651","title":{"rendered":"Column: Trolling the Chicago Cubs with an \u2018L\u2019 flag backfires on Milwaukee Brewers with NLCS flop"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The Milwaukee Brewers learned a valuable lesson last week.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t mess with the \u201cL\u201d flag.<\/p>\n

It might have been a coincidence that the Brewers were swept in four games by the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League Championship Series after taking a team photo with the \u201cL\u201d flag following their division series-clinching win over the Chicago Cubs.<\/p>\n

The \u201cL\u201d flag did not factor into any of Shohei Ohtani\u2019s three majestic home runs Friday in the Dodgers\u2019 NLCS-clinching win, or any of Ohtani\u2019s 10 strikeouts over six scoreless innings. And surely the \u201cL\u201d flag had nothing to do with one of their fans losing her job after going viral for threatening to call ICE on a Dodgers fan who happened to be a United States citizen and a veteran of two wars.<\/p>\n

But considering all the bad things that happened to the team with the best record in baseball after the \u201cL\u201d flag incident at American Family Field, it makes you wonder.<\/p>\n

The \u201cL\u201d flag, for those not paying attention, is the sad cousin to the \u201cW\u201d flag, which Cubs fans fly at Wrigley Field after wins. The tradition began in the 1930s when the Cubs began flying a \u201cW\u201d or \u201cL\u201d flag atop of the center-field scoreboard to let riders on the \u2018L\u2019 know whether the team had won or lost that day.<\/p>\n

It was a tradition that few players thought about until 1998, when Cubs closer Rod Beck suggested flying the \u201cL\u201d flag was \u201cbad karma.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not blaming anything for it,\u201d Beck said. \u201cBut I\u2019m a believer in positive energy and karma. When you lose a ballgame and fly an \u2018L\u2019 over the park, you leave a bad aura around the ballpark and it can go all the way into the next day.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey do it, obviously, so the people on the (train) can see whether we won or lost. It\u2019s a good theory, but maybe they can change it to where they can drive by and when they don\u2019t see any flag they can assume it\u2019s an \u2018L.\u2019 Or maybe they can fly a `W\u2019 for \u201cWanted to win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beck was not serious, but he was a man who enjoyed stirring debate.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a strong theory,\u201d he told me. \u201cBut it\u2019s something to make you think.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Column:
Fans watch during the fifth inning of Game 4 of the National League Championship Series between the Brewers and Dodgers on Friday, Oct. 17, 2025, in Los Angeles. The Dodgers won 5-1 to sweep the best-of-seven series. (Mark J. Terrill\/AP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Beck\u2019s suggestion was widely ignored until 2008, when the Cubs marked the 100th anniversary of their last championship season and had a team that was good enough to end the drought. In July of that season, with the Cubs in first-place, team executives considered the idea of not flying the \u201cL\u201d flag after losses\u00a0but decided to leave the tradition intact. Instead of blaming the flag, they turned their attention to the Billy Goat curse.<\/p>\n

Before Game 1 of the 2008 NLDS against the Dodgers at Wrigley Field, unbeknownst to general manager Jim Hendry and manager Lou Piniella, Cubs executives Crane Kenney and Mike Lufrano invited a Greek Orthodox priest onto the field for a pregame ceremony to bless the Cubs dugout with holy water and remove the curse.<\/p>\n

Long story short \u2014 it didn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow I\u2019m just another Cubbie occurrence,\u201d the priest, Rev. James Greanias, told the Chicago Tribune that night.<\/p>\n

The Cubs were swept in three games by the Dodgers and would not get back to the playoffs for seven years.<\/p>\n

The \u201cL\u201d flag went back into semi-obscurity until 2017, when Brewers fans began bringing them to what was then named Miller Park in response to a mass migration of Cubs fans to their ballpark for Cubs-Brewers games. It really took off in 2018, as the Cubs-Brewers rivalry began to heat up under Brewers manager Craig Counsell.<\/p>\n

\"Column:
Brewers fans display an “L” flag after the Brewers defeated the Cubs in Game 5 of the NL Division Series on Oct. 11, 2025, at American Family Field in Milwaukee. (Chris Sweda\/Chicago Tribune)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But trolling the Cubs was typically something done by fans, not the players.<\/p>\n

After the Brewers beat the Cubs last week in Game 5 of the NLDS, the Brewers brought an \u201cL\u201d flag to the field, and reliever Trevor Megill held it high in the team photo. The Brewers\u2019 X account, @Brewers, then trolled the Cubs by tweeting the photo and creating an AI-generated video of an \u201cL\u201d flag covering the iconic Bean, adding the caption \u201cHEY CHICAGO, WHADAYA SAY?\u201d<\/p>\n

MLB\u2019s X account, @MLB, added to the story by tweeting their own video with a laughing emoji.<\/p>\n

It was all in good fun, though the backlash from Cubs fans suggested many weren\u2019t amused by the trolling. Counsell and Cubs players had congratulated the Brewers and complimented the team after losing Game 5, so to some it seemed like the trolling by Brewers players and the organization\u2019s social media employees was classless and beneath a professional sports team.<\/p>\n

Would the Cubs have mocked the Brewers had they won? Doubtful. Would their social media team have piled on? Possibly.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll never know.<\/p>\n

Either way, the controversy figured to die down until next season when it would obviously be brought up again when the teams met again. But the Brewers lost the first two games to the Dodgers at home, and their fan who threatened to have a Dodgers fan arrested by ICE quickly became famous. Cubs fans helped amplify the video, which quickly became a national story.<\/p>\n

When the Brewers lost Game 3 at Dodger Stadium, more fans jumped in, and included the woman referred to as \u201cBrewers Karen\u201d as part of the \u201ccurse of the \u2018L\u2019 flag.\u201d Game 4 became an instant classic thanks to Ohtani\u2019s performance, and the Brewers\u2019 dream season ended in disappointment. The team scored four runs and had only 14 hits in the four games.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe pitching performances by the Dodgers basically put the hammer down,\u201d Brewers manager Pat Murphy said afterward.<\/p>\n

True enough. The Dodgers were the superior team and proved it in the NLCS. They\u2019ll head into the World Series as favorites over the Seattle Mariners or Toronto Blue Jays, and MLB can only pray the series isn\u2019t as short and lopsided as the NLCS turned out to be. A ratings flop seems inevitable if it\u2019s another sweep.<\/p>\n

The \u201cL\u201d flag will no doubt return to American Family Field when the Cubs and Brewers play there in 2026, and it\u2019s now part of Brewers team lore, just as the curse-busting episode of 2008 became part of the Cubs lore.<\/p>\n

Kenney later called it \u201cone of the dumbest things\u201d he had ever done, taking blame. Will Megill and the Brewers ever admit that holding up an \u201cL\u201d flag for a team photo was one the dumbest things they\u2019ve ever done?<\/p>\n

Check back in spring training.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A dream season for the Milwaukee Brewers ended in disappointment Friday with an NLCS sweep. Did the \u201ccurse of the \u2018L\u2019 flag\u201d loom large?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":109658,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[4202,282,4203,39,290,3062,53,4204],"class_list":["post-109651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb","tag-l-flag","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-crane-kenney","tag-los-angeles-dodgers","tag-milwaukee-brewers","tag-pat-murphy","tag-shohei-ohtani","tag-trevor-megill"],"yoast_head":"\nColumn: Trolling the Chicago Cubs with an \u2018L\u2019 flag backfires on Milwaukee Brewers with NLCS flop - NEWS USA<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sportnews.azontree.com\/?p=109651\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Column: Trolling the Chicago Cubs with an \u2018L\u2019 flag backfires on Milwaukee Brewers with NLCS flop - NEWS USA\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A dream season for the Milwaukee Brewers ended in disappointment Friday with an NLCS sweep. 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