The final days of Spring Training often overwhelm Major League players. Most of them, pitchers excluded, want the regular season to begin yesterday. The NCAA basketball tournament provides a welcome respite from the ongoing tedium.

The tournament will be on more than a few clubhouse televisions this weekend, and many eyes will be focused on it.

In accordance with the Sweet 16 weekend, MLB.com presents here its fourth annual Sweet 16, this one devoted to the Cubs. The Mets, Yankees and Red Sox have appeared the past three years. What follows are 16 facts, or sets of facts, that celebrate the beloved Cubbies.

1. The Cubs have won 16 league championships, but only one -- in 1945 -- since 1938. The other championships years are 1876, 1880, 1881, 1882, 1885, 1886, 1906, 1907, 1908, 1910, 1918, 1929, 1932 and 1935.

2. Beginning in 1982 and through 1997, Harry Caray brought Cubs baseball to the masses for 16 seasons.

3. Sixteen Cubs players have won BBWAA Awards: seven MVP Awards -- Ernie Banks (1958, 1959), Phil Cavaretta (1945), Andre Dawson (1987) , Gabby Hartnett (1935), Ryne Sandberg (1984), Hank Sauer (1952), Sammy Sosa (1998); four Cy Young Awards -- Ferguson Jenkins (1971), Greg Maddux (1992), Bruce Sutter (1979), Rick Sutcliffe (1984); and five Rookie of the Year Awards: Ken Hubbs (1962), Geovany Soto (2008), Jerome Walton (1989), Billy Williams (1961), Kerry Wood (1998).

4. Mr. Cub, Ernie Banks, played 16 full seasons, beginning in 1954 and running through 1969. Banks averaged 150 games during those seasons and never played in few than 130 games. The franchise record for most seasons for a pitcher is 16, by Charley Root.

5. Sixteen is the Cubs' record for home runs hit by a pitcher. Carlos Zambrano holds the record. He has hit six, two and four the past three seasons.

6. A Cubs pitcher has allowed at least 12 runs in a game 16 times, but only twice since 1900. George Zettllein was responsible for the other 14 -- all in 1874. He allowed 29 runs in a complete game. That's right, 29, but only 19 were earned.

7. Sutcliffe won 16 games for the Cubs in his Cy Young season, 1984. He also won 16 consecutive regular season decisions, a club record he established by winning the last 14 decisions in '84 and his first two starts in '85.

8. Sixteen straight losses. The Cubs lost their final two games in 1996 and the first 14 the following season. The 14 straight losses constitute the longest single-season losing streak in franchise history.

9. Sixteen is the one-game National League record for extra-base hits, established by the 1883 Cubs (July 3, vs. Buffalo).

10. The Cubs had 16 doubles in the 1945 World Series, their most recent Fall Classic appearance.

11. Mark Prior struck out 16 Brewers in his 16th start of the 2003 season, on June 26.

12. The Cubs lost 16 of the 20 games Elvin "El" Tappe managed in 1962 as a member of the Cubs' infamous college of coaches, a bizarre concept implemented by Cubs owner P.K. Wrigley in '61 and '62. Tappe and four others rotated as the big league manager and as Minor League coaches and managers. The Cubs lost 90 games in 1961 and 103 the following year. Their 59-103 record in '62 stood alone as the worst record by an established team in an expansion season until when the Mets duplicated it in 1993. The Marlins exceeded it in 1998, when they lost 108 games.

13. Hubbs wore No. 16 during his Rookie of the Year Award season in 1962.

14. The Cubs scored 16 runs, a franchise record Opening Day record, in 2005 in Arizona, and again in '06 in Cincinnati. They never scored as many runs again in either season.

15. Cubs home run leaders Cavarretta and Bill Nicholson combined for 16 homers -- eight each -- in 1946. Rookie Ralph Kiner of the Pirates led the National League with 23.

16. The Cubs have played 16 games that have ended in 16 innings, beginning with a 6-6 tie against the Phillies on Aug. 19. 1930. They didn't play another 16-inning games for 16 years.

• A year later, a terrible oversight must be corrected. The Red Sox Sweet 16 ran last year, and a Sox devotee pointed out that "Cheers" proprietor Sam Malone had worn 16 in his days with the Sox. Thank you, and sorry about that omission.