Sammy Sosa's peak years with the Chicago Cubs were the stuff of legends

The bridge that was once burned has been re-built and Sammy Sosa has been welcomed back into the fold by the Chicago Cubs.

I've been doing this (covering the Cubs) for a long time and I've covered everything from a World Series championship to a pair of rebuilds and a lot in between. I'm more or less numb to the day-to-day of covering this team I love so much, but this news hit me right in the feels and if I wasn't already counting down to Cubs Convention in January, I certainly am now.

Cubs Twitter almost immediately started sharing stories of their favorite Sosa memories when the news broke on Thursday afternoon - and there were some really amazing memories brought up. Maybe I'll calm down enough in the coming days to share some of mine, but I wanted to take a step back and just simply acknowledge: Sosa was incredible during his peak years on the North Side.

Averaging more than 60 home runs a year over a four-year span is something that, even in the Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani era, is hard to wrap your mind around. Judge has eclipsed 60 long balls just once and the baseball world was losing its collective mind over it. Sosa did it three times from 1998 to 2001 and, to this day, remains the only player in baseball history to hit the 60-homer mark on three separate occasions.

Looking at the Cubs in recent years - they've had just one player in the last six years reach 100 RBI in a season: Javier Baez back in 2019. Sosa bagged nearly 150 RBI a year during that stretch. Since Sosa left the organization in 2004, 100 RBI men have been few and far between - a list that includes Derrek Lee, Aramis Ramirez, Alfonso Soriano, Anthony Rizzo and Baez.

Ninety-two extra-base hits per year... I don't even know how to put that in perspective for today's fan. Shohei Ohtani led all MLB with 99 in 2024 - so Sosa was, more or less, at that level for nearly half a decade.

Beyond the numbers, Sosa was the Chicago Cubs for much of this time. Kerry Wood burst onto the scene in 1998 - the year Slammin' Sammy and Mark McGwire traded home runs all summer long - but Sosa was the face of a franchise that was quickly approaching the 100-year mark in its championship drought. Now, he's back - and I know I'm not alone when I say," welcome home."