Elkhart family shows true meaning of die hard Cubs fandom
When Bob and Nikki O'Hara get set for baseball season every year, it's hard to miss who they're rooting for.
"We were born to bleed Cubbie-Blue," Bob O'Hara said.
"My room was decorated in Cubs and Mark Grace posters and he said he liked the Cubs and I didn't realize how much until I saw his room decorated in Cubs posters and went to some Cubs games and that's where our love grew," Nikki O'Hara said.
Dates at Wrigley Field eventually led to marriage, and then starting a family, and picking out names was easy for the couple from Elkhart.
"My wife's favorite player was Mark Grace and we said if it's a girl, we're going to name her Grace," Bob said.
A Cubs connection everywhere you turn.
"When Ryne came, Ryne Sandberg was my favorite player of all time, I mean he was my idol as a baseball player when I was growing up," Bob said.
After Grace and Ryne, Bob and Nikki then had two more girls, and they admit it's tougher to come up with more girls names directly related to the Cubs than it is for guys. So they decided on Addison, one of the streets that runs parallel to Wrigley Field, and Sammi after Cubs great Sammy Sosa.
So to recap, Grace after Mark Grace, Ryne after Ryne Sandberg, Addison after Addison St. and Sammi after Sammy Sosa.
"Usually don't tell people unless they're Cubs fans because they don't get it or appreciate it or they think we're kind of crazy," Nikki said.
This past winter, the family had one more swing for the fences. The Cubs posted a twitter contest for fans to enter, with the winners getting to be ring bearers at the Cubs ring ceremony earlier this month. The task, show your love of the Cubs.
"We named our four kids and we have all this Cubs stuff, he went to the game in 2003, I have all this stuff I can put in there," Nikki said.
"I didn't think anything would be witnessing them finally win the World Series but the fact that my wife and kids had gone through the trouble of making the video, that was great enough," Bob said.
Turns out the Cubs were convinced, and Bob was selected to be a ring bearer where he handed out a ring to outfielder Matt Szczur.
"Then to actually win it was definitely the icing on the cake, it helped me kind of extend that moment, that World Series moment further out," Bob said.