The Harry Caray Rules: A step-by-step guide to a night out with one of baseball’s most legendary characters
Bob Verdi tells a representative story about Harry Caray. It begins a few decades ago, when Verdi was a sportswriter at the Chicago Tribune and Harry was the immortal voice of the Cubs. Stan Musial called Harry the “life of baseball.” Chicagoans knew him as The Mayor of Rush Street. If he slept, it wasn’t clear when.
But as Harry aged, his health declined. So the Tribune Company, the owner of the Cubs, purchased a safety measure: a limousine to help Harry get to and from games more efficiently. That was the idea, anyway. One day on the road, Harry asked Verdi if he wanted to ride in the limo from a series in New York to one in Philadelphia. The limo dropped off Harry at his hotel first. Verdi tried to make small talk with the driver, who had been with Harry for four or five days — and late nights/early mornings.
“You taking good care of Harry?” Verdi asked. “Is he taking good care of you?’
The driver looked at him wearily in the rearview mirror: “This son of a bitch is killing me.”
In the long history of baseball, there might not be a more legendary night owl than Harry Caray. It was part of his charm. Michael Jordan hit game winners; Harry stayed out until 4 a.m. with the people. Many a night Harry could be spotted in a Chicago bar, mingling with the fans who revered him. Harry leaned into his reputation, too. A few years ago, a “drinking diary” from 1972 surfaced in the Chicago Sun-Times, revealing that Harry spent 288 straight days in bars. Harry himself estimated that he drank more than 73,000 Budweisers in his life, to say nothing of the martinis and Grand Marnier.
“Either the tales of my way of living are slightly exaggerated,” Harry once said, “or else I’m simply indestructible.”
Forty years after his first opening day at Wrigley Field, it’s time to raise another toast to Harry and remember why he went from a beloved broadcaster with the Cardinals and White Sox to something closer to a national treasure with the Cubs. Of course, the best way to understand why Harry Caray still matters — even nearly a quarter-century after his death — is to spend a night out with the legend himself.
But first, you must remember. There are rules.
Rule No. 1: Be prepared
To go out with Harry was to ring in the new year … on a Tuesday in July. “Every night might have been New Year’s Eve for him,” said Ned Colletti, the former Cubs exec. Ed Lynch, the former Cubs general manager, says that Harry had “the constitution of a mule.” Barry Rozner, a former columnist at the Daily Herald, had one word for his alcohol tolerance: “Indescribable.”
“It would have killed a much younger man,” he said.
If you were smart, you didn’t try to keep pace. And if you were smart, you’d prepare.
“I used to tell him: ‘If we’re going out, I need three or four days’ notice,’” Colletti said.
For much of Harry’s career, he actually started in the first inning, when the local papers reported he’d crack a beer in the booth. One time, former Expos broadcaster Elliott Price tuned into a Cubs game. Harry was calling the action from the bleachers, right there among the fans, and it was clear to Price that Harry had had a beer or two.
“Because somewhere during the game, Harry started to sing,” Price said. “And he’s singing, ‘Joooooooody Davis. Jooooooooody Davis.’ It was incredibly entertaining. Harry was having a great time. But then there’s a big rain delay. We come back after the rain delay and there are only nine Expos on the field and there’s nobody in the dugout, because all of them decided to stay in the clubhouse to listen to Harry (on the tv).”
The party continued all night. According to Colletti, a typical Harry night consisted of:
— A couple beers (or six) during the game
— Martinis at dinner
— More beers after dinner
— A nightcap of Grand Marnier
It didn’t matter if you were young and Harry was 65. If you weren’t prepared to go all night, you had no chance. “It was like being in a triathlon with a marathon on the end of it,” Colletti said. “You needed stamina.”
Rule No. 2: Budweiser only
Harry had a code. Verdi said he never heard Harry swear. He never turned down a fan who wanted a moment. He rarely missed an inning of baseball. “He used to stay out until 3 or 4 in the morning and every day get up at 7 like clockwork,” Colletti said.
Most of all: He never stayed at any bar that didn’t offer his favorite beer (the one that paid him handsomely). “If you were in a bar and they didn’t have Budweiser, he was going somewhere else,” Rozner said.
In 1985, Norm Clarke of the Rocky Mountain News traveled to Arizona to write a short profile of Harry during spring training. The interview took place at a bar. Before Clarke could start asking questions, he committed the cardinal sin. He ordered a Coors Light.
“Why don’t you just order a glass of water?” Harry said.
Twice a week Harry would walk into Butch McGuire’s — the Chicago watering hole — and tell McGuire that he needed to sell Budweiser. McGuire wouldn’t relent — he wouldn’t sell Bud if they were giving it away — so Harry took the fight to the airwaves. “Stop by Butch’s,” he told the audience, “he’s going to have Budweiser soon.” When that didn’t work, Harry returned, got on his knees and begged: Please put in the beer.
