Anthony Rizzo explains what it feels like that the Cubs are going to the World Series for the first time since 1945 and why the fans and the city of Chicago deserve this moment. (1:21)

The Chicago Cubs are going to the World Series. They stared down Clayton Kershaw in Game 6 of the National League Championship Series and sent him to the showers after five innings. They stared down the ghosts of Wrigley Field. They stared down curses and goats and history and every other excuse every Cubs fan has made through the years. Most of all, Kyle Hendricks stared down a good Dodgers lineup and crushed it, allowing just two hits over 7 1/3 innings of beautiful pitching during the 5-0 victory.

1. Party like it's 1945! The Cubs were the best team in baseball coming out of spring training. They were the best team when they soared to a 25-6 start. They were still the best team even when the Giants briefly passed them for baseball's best record. They were baseball's best team when they got their mojo back with a 22-6 August, and they were the best team as the regular season ended.

Of course, you still have to go out and put those first 162 games behind you and win when it matters most, and as we've documented in various places, owning the best record -- even by a large margin -- doesn't mean a whole lot heading into the playoffs. There was the dramatic Game 4 rally to clinch the National League Division Series against the Giants. There was intense panic after the Dodgers shut out the Cubs in Games 2 and 3 of the NLCS. The series turned in Game 4 when the game was tied 0-0 through three innings. A huge hit came from Javier Baez -- swing-at-anything Javier Baez -- dropping an 0-2 changeup from Julio Urias into left field. Three batters later Addison Russell hit a two-run home run and it was 4-0.

Over the final three games, the Cubs outscored the Dodgers 23-6. They pounded out 33 hits and hit five home runs. They beat the best pitcher in baseball.

A big Cubs fan texted me in the seventh inning. "I'm numb to this. I can't believe what I'm seeing," she wrote. Believe, Cubs fans, believe.

2. The Kyle Hendricks Game. The last Cubs Game 6 of the NLCS went down in history as the Bartman Game. This one will be remembered for the majesty of Hendricks, who grew up in California and went to college at Dartmouth because it was the only school to promise him a baseball starting job as a freshman. He was an eighth-round draft pick, acquired from the Rangers at the trade deadline in 2012 for Ryan Dempster. The Cubs were 43-59 that day. They'd lose 101 games that year in the first year of the Theo Epstein/Jed Hoyer regime.

That trade came together at the last minute. "Was it five [minutes]? It might have been less than that," Hoyer said at the time. "It came down to the end."

Hendricks allowed a hit to the first batter of the game but had retired 17 in a row entering the eighth inning. He threw 88 pitches -- 33 fastballs that danced, 26 changeups that sang, 20 cutters that confused and 9 curveballs that confounded. He was in complete control, calm and efficient. He didn't walk a batter, flew first-pitch strikes to 17 of the 23 batters he faced, went to just five three-ball counts. And get this: Hendricks and Aroldis Chapman, who got the final five outs, faced the minimum 27 batters, as all three Dodgers baserunners were erased on double plays.

Fly the W.

A crowd of 42,386 came to see an elite pitcher at his best with the stakes high. And Kyle Hendricks delivered, giving up one hit so far. — David Haugh (@DavidHaugh) October 23, 2016

Kyle Hendricks: Demeanor of an accountant, arm of an ace. — JJ Stankevitz (@JJStankevitz) October 23, 2016

3. Dexter Fowler delivers. Fowler started the game with a soft double to right field. According to the Statcast guys, a ball hit at that velocity and launch angle goes for a hit only 7 percent of the time. Maybe it is the Cubs' season after all. In the second inning, Kershaw's 0-2 fastball got too much of the plate and Fowler grounded a hard single into left field to make it 3-0.

When the Cubs got off to that great start in April, it was Fowler who carried the offense, hitting .347/.474/.613 that month with 19 runs scored. He slumped in June and missed much of July with an injury -- one of the few injuries the Cubs sustained this season -- but has played well again down the stretch. He's the spark at the top of the lineup before big boys Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo come up.

Dexter Fowler has a .408 average and 20 career hits off Clayton Kershaw, twice as many hits as he has off any other pitcher. — Tyler Kepner (@TylerKepner) October 23, 2016

4. We have to talk about Clayton Kershaw. We say all this with the caveat that Kershaw missed more than two months with a herniated disk in his back, so while he seemed healthy during the postseason and his velocity was fine, it’s impossible to know what ramifications there may have been as a result of the injury. He did pitch a gem in Game 2, when he tossed seven shutout innings. But he struggled all of Game 6, unable to put batters away. Here's what I mean: Through the first three innings, he got to two strikes on 10 batters, but put only two of them away -- Hendricks after a seven-pitch battle, and the free-swinging Baez. During the regular season, when Kershaw got to two strikes, he recorded a strikeout 53 percent of the time.

Look at those at-bats during the first two innings as the Cubs took a 3-0 lead.

First inning

Fowler: 1-1, double

Bryant: 1-2, single

Rizzo: 1-2, ball, foul, error on Toles

Ben Zobrist, 0-2, sac fly

Baez: 0-2, foul, ball, foul, foul, ball, popped up to first

Willson Contreras: 0-2, ball, foul, ball, grounded out to shortstop

That was a 30-pitch first inning. Andrew Toles' dropped fly ball led to an unearned run, but Kershaw's inability to put batters away -- like he does so easily in the regular season -- led to balls in play and sometimes bad things happen when balls are put in play. Credit the Cubs, of course, for some good at-bats, fouling off pitching, and running up Kershaw's pitch count.

Second inning

Russell: 1-2, ball, double

Albert Almora: grounded out

Hendricks: 0-2, ball, ball, ball, foul, strikeout looking

Fowler: 0-2, RBI single to left (out trying to advance)

Once again, Russell doubled with two strikes, and Fowler hit a hard grounder into left on an 0-2 count. After that, Contreras lined a home run in the fourth, and then Anthony Rizzo hit a fastball out in the fifth when Kershaw dropped his arm angle down on him.

Bottom line: Kershaw did not pitch well. He has also been cursed -- that word! -- by a lack of run support. In his four NLCS starts since 2013, the Dodgers have scored the grand total of one run for him. He has had zero margin for error, and he has made some errors.

I love Kershaw, but watching the apologists after this one should be amusing. So adamant this series that postseason failures all a myth. — David Todd (@DTonPirates) October 23, 2016

Clayton Kershaw has allowed the @Cubs to hit 4 balls 105 MPH+... That's the most he's ever given up in a game. — Daren Willman (@darenw) October 23, 2016

5. Next up: the Cleveland Indians. You can make a case that this will be the most anticipated World Series ever, with a combined 176 years without a World Series title between the two franchises.

It's going to be something.