MESA, Ariz. — A piece of Cubs manager Craig Counsell’s heart will spend the upcoming season 10 miles north of Wrigley Field, along the Evanston lakefront.
Jack Counsell is a Northwestern sophomore and a middle infielder on the baseball team, in his first year at the school after transferring from Michigan.
Before heading to spring training, a Sun-Times reporter made a little stop Friday and asked Jack — 6-0, 180 pounds just like his father — to share his baseball dream.
“I want to make it to the big leagues, win a World Series and then, eventually, get into coaching as well.”
A path just like the old man’s?
“My dad is, like, my idol,” Jack said. “The life he’s lived, and the way I’ve seen him live it, that’s kind of the life I want to live, too.”
It’s not every day in a parent’s life he or she is spoken of so glowingly. At the Cubs’ spring training complex a few days after Jack talked about his dad, some of the comments were passed along.
“That’s awesome,” said the 54-year-old Counsell, a father of four. “It makes me feel great.”
This isn’t a Chris story or a Jack story; there’s no need to separate them even more than a baseball season already does on its own. It’s just a family story. There’s Brady, the eldest child, a college senior playing baseball at Kansas. Daughter Finley is a freshman student at Arizona, which is more than 100 miles from Sloan Park. And daughter Rowan, the youngest, is back home with mom Michelle in Whitefish Bay, Wis., a high school sophomore and a heck of a basketball player.
All of them, so far-flung. The baseball life, one supposes. But how does it all work?
“I think anybody who has a job that requires a lot of travel in your life, you always want to make sure you’re giving everything you can to your kids,” Counsell said. “I’ve been very intentional about that. …
“You do your best to try to keep family time important. You dream that it rubs off on your children, and it’s great when it does. But you can’t try too hard. That’s the trick of parenting, right?”
The approach strikes a chord in Jack, a sentimental type whose favorite thing about his dad is their long talks, the best of which don’t have a thing to do with baseball.
“He’s always there for me,” Jack said.
It goes both ways. Let the record show — and let ’em hear it loud and clear up in Brewers country — that Jack Counsell is 100% a Cubs fan. Brady is, too, for those scoring at home.
“I am not a Brewers fan anymore,” Jack said. “Honestly, going to games at Wrigley as a Cubs fan is just a completely different experience. So I’m fully [on] the Cubs-fan train.”
The abuse Counsell took from Brewers fans after the Cubs lured him away had nothing to do with it, Jack insisted. Not that Jack’s pals back home don’t love to pile on him because the Brewers won the division while the Cubs missed the playoffs last season, because they certainly do.
“It’s all just jokes,” Jack said.
The family history with Milwaukee and the Brewers remains rich and thick. Counsell grew up in suburban Whitefish Bay while his father, himself a former professional baseball player, worked for the Brewers. Counsell starred at Whitefish Bay High School and became, after a long big-league playing career, the Brewers’ leader in managerial wins. Brady starred at Whitefish Bay as a two-year varsity captain. Jack took the baton and captained the team the two seasons after that, winning a state championship as a senior.
Jack vividly remembers being on the road with the Brewers as his dad’s playing career ended in the 2011 National League Championship Series in St. Louis. Even better were the trips to the ballpark when his dad was managing, all those times on the outfield grass shagging balls and hanging out with players.
It never was better than last summer, when Jack and Brady got to play together for the nearby, amateur Lakeshore Chinooks of the Northwoods League, the brothers regularly manning shortstop and second base, often switching positions with each other.
“Just to see them in the same uniform,” Counsell began, looking down and smiling. “It’s not necessarily about seeing them play. It’s about knowing that they’re getting to sit next to each other on the bench or sit on the bus together. That’s the best part.”
That’s a lot to leave behind.
“It was all pretty special,” Jack said.
Transferring to Northwestern brought him closer to his family, but it was a baseball decision, first and foremost. The Wildcats’ season opener is Friday, and Jack — a blazing runner and a huge fan of the Cubs’ Pete Crow-Armstrong — hopes to be standing out at second base as a starter.
A race between Jack and Dad in his prime would be no contest, they agree.
“I am faster,” Jack said, “and I don’t think it’s close, either.”
What does the Cubs’ skipper want for his boy out of all this?
“Really, college is about finding something you’re passionate about,” Counsell said. “And if it’s baseball when you get out of college, and if you’re good enough, then that’s a great thing, too. But that’s really all I hope for all of them. As far as the results? As a parent, you just hope for the best.”