FanHouse

By now, everyone knows today is Lee Elia day. 25 years ago today, Elia went on a post-game rant that indicted his team's entire fanbase, setting the bar for unintentional, rage-filled brillance impossibly high. In a world including Dennis Green, Tony La Russa, and Jim Mora, Elia's rant remains the Joe DiMaggio hit-streak of screamery. It may never be topped.

Elia fell out of favor with Cubs fans for a while there -- that will happen when you claim an entire swatch of fans are jobless bums -- but Cubs fans have since forgiven Elia, rationalizing the rant in the proper context. It's just funny now, and nothing more. Which is why Elia can still make mad bank, 25 years later:

And Elia's move? He's autographing baseballs for a company called A&R Collectibles in Prospect Heights, Illinois. For $89.95, fans get a baseball signed by Elia, with the inscription "And PRINT it!"

The inscription is a reference to the part of Elia's rant when he said, "If they're the real Chicago f*ckin' fans, they can kiss my f*ckin' ass right downtown--and PRINT it."

Rovell makes clear at the end that a good portion of the proceeds from the autographs will go to Chicago Baseball Cancer charities, as Elia is a prostate cancer survivor himself. Still, it's pretty incredible that schwag from a silly, profanity-laced rant a quarter of a century old is still worth money. Such is the nature of Cub fandom: hilarious, inexplicable, and ridiculously tied to its own inglorious past.