Mark Manuel

Mark Manuel

Mark Manuel can be heard in the Quad Cities on 101-3 KISS-FM and BIG 106.5, as well as in Iowa City and Cedar Rapids on 100.7 The Fox. Thanks for...Full Bio

 

Rizzo Fired Up Cubs With Speech Before WS Game 7…Naked?!

Last year, the Cubs broke their 108-year World Series drought in grand fashion, as they became just the sixth team in MLB history to come back from a 3-1 World Series.

And now we come to find a big reason from that may have been because of a passionate pregame speech from first baseman Anthony Rizzo that literally left nothing to the imagination.

Rizzo, one of the clubhouse leaders, did his best to fire up the team before Game 7 of the World Series. He played theme from “Rocky” in the team’s pregame meeting to pump them up, thanks to an excerpt from Tom Verducci’s new book, entitled “The Cubs Way: The Zen of Building the Best Team in Baseball and Breaking the Curse.” And he did it naked.

But thanks to the world of shameless promotion we have this excerpt given the story’s bare essentials:

An hour before the seventh game of the World Series, Rizzo stripped off all his clothes, cranked the theme from Rocky on the clubhouse stereo one more time, jumped on top of a coffee table and began quoting lines from the movie and throwing his best shadow-boxing punches.

See, that’s the type of entertainment that Cubs skipper Joe Maddon has always endorses to help fuel his team.

He always makes sure his players are locked in and focused to the task at hand, but does so by having fun and keeping them loose.

I mean not that Rizzo didn’t give his teammates something to focus on but I’m sure when Maddon said keep your eye on the prize, he meant a World Series ring. And if you want a brass ring of your own, crank up “Rocky” and head to the bookstore. “The Cubs Way: The Zen of Building the Best Team in Baseball and Breaking the Curse” is set to hit the shelves latef this month. Just do yourself a favor and wait until you get home to get naked.

Source: The Sports Daily

PHOTO: Getty Images North America


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