As I sat and watched the second through ninth innings of Game 4 where the end of the Cubs 2015 season had pretty much already been decided after the first inning, I tried to appreciate the small moments we still had left with this team.
I clapped along to Starlin's walk-up music each time he came up, knowing we might never hear it again at Wrigley. Rizzo's "Bad Blood." Schwarber's "No Diggity." I even enjoyed David Ross' "Forever Young" in his at-bats.
They seemed to be doing their best to work the counts and get something good to hit. Even when they failed, the approach was still there more often than not. Right down to the last two batters as Montero worked a walk and Fowler got rung up on another bullshit, off-the-plate strike call that plagued the Cubs all series long, particularly in big situations. If they didn't strike out, they'd often hit the ball hard right at a Met. It was insanely frustrating.
But this was the 2015 Cubs. They hit homeruns. They take lots of pitches. They strike out. They don't play particularly great defense. The starting pitching can be an adventure outside of Arrieta and Lester. The ragtag bullpen of misfit toys was better than most people gave it credit. They were who they were and for this series against the Mets that wasn't good enough.
And now the 2015 Cubs are no more.
Sure, the team is young and a high percentage of this core will be back for many years to come. But it will never again be like this.
The 2015 Cubs were a phoenix rising from the ashes of a devastated organization that was rotted to the core until Theo, Jed and the Superfriends arrived in 2011 and started burning it all down to start over.
The organization's entire baseball operations were overhauled and enhanced at tremendous expense. If you haven't seen it yet, please read Brian Costa's excellent piece in the Wall Street Journal detailing how prehistoric the operations were when the Ricketts purchased the Cubs:
The office Tom Ricketts inherited when he took over the Chicago Cubs in 2009 was a windowless room beneath the upper deck of Wrigley Field. A closet just outside his door contained all of the team’s computer servers, which were covered by a cafeteria tray to shield them from the water that would leak through the ceiling when it rained.
The Cubs were still processing season ticket orders by fax machine. They kept up on trade news by employing someone to scan the Internet for articles and deliver printouts to executives’ desks. Some of their staffers were barely on e-mail. And space was so limited that half of them worked in trailers in the parking lot.
The bolded part is mine because HOLY SHIT THEY WERE LITERALLY MAKING SOME KID (probably) PRINT OUT INTERNET ARTICLES THEY FOUND IN ORDER TO STAY UPDATED ON TRANSACTIONS.
THIS IS HOW THEY RAN THEIR MAJOR LEAGUE FRONT OFFICE!
IN 2009!
I mean…. HOLY FUCKING SHIT!
Meanwhile, the culture of the Cubs wasn't exactly one of winning and positivity. You can bring in talent and that will be the biggest step, but if everyone in the organization is waiting for The Curse to kick in, or a #Cubes moment, or a Cubbie Occurrence, or whatever you want to call it, there's a pretty decent chance there's a self-fulfilling prophecy in there somewhere. As much as there is no mystical curse, the psychology of working for a team that is believed to be cursed has to be different than, say, working for a team like the Cardinals or Yankees where they believe God has pre-destined that their team will always triumph.
So that was a whole other thing that needed to be changed on an organizational level. Have you ever tried to change a culture of an entire company? It isn't easy and it isn't fast. As Sahadev Sharma wrote for BP Wrigleyville, the Cubs new braintrust managed to change the Cubs' culture in less than 4 years:
When current Cubs first base coach Brandon Hyde was promoted to Director of Player Development towards the end of the 2012 season, the front office plucked the highly respected Tim Cossins from the Miami Marlins to fill the position Hyde left open as the team’s Minor-League Field Coordinator. In the duos first instructional league, Cossins came up with the saying, That’s Cub.
and
Jason Parks has worked in the Cubs scouting department for a little over 14 months now, but the positivity that’s been built in the organization and being ‘Cub’ was quickly ingrained in him as well.
“That’s so Cub is not a pejorative term,” Parks pointed out. “That so Cub means I’m gonna outwork you. I’m gonna polish my skills to beat your skills, and if our skills are the same, my heart will win out. When I go out to scout a guy, I’m going out to beat the other team, because that’s Cub. When I write my report, I’m going to write a more articulate report, because that’s Cub. When we get guys into the org, we look for guys who have Cub in them. And then the player dev takes that and they turn those guys into Cubs. That’s the way it is from top down in this organization. That’s Cub means something to us.”
This might actually be a more impressive feat than building the proprietary in-house data analysis system they dubbed Ivy. Turning "That's Cub" into something that means positive, winning things? Unpossible. But here we are.
So this was the 2015 Cubs. A Cubs team that was built on a foundation of advanced analysis and improved efficiency in scouting. A team that was built ignoring the colossal history of failure that has burdened the team for my entire lifetime. A team built with the idea that multiple chances at the World Series is better than singular chances. All of that combined with the 97 wins and the playoff eliminations of the two best teams in baseball all while maintaining one of the best minor league systems in baseball make for a wonderfully fantastic season.
But for me there is even more.
Joe started the tone for the year off by offering to buy the press a shot and a beer at his introductory press conference. He provided a basic theme for the season, "Don't ever permit the pressure to exceed the pleasure."
The clubhouse was loose. And when they started to tighten up Joe brought in magicians and petting zoos and had pajama parties. They celebrated every victory down the stretch like they had clinched something. And it made the actual clinching act less of an obstacle. It was just a thing that they do. They show up and they win or they die trying. I can count on one hand the Cubs teams in my life that even came close to that mentality.
And they are babies.
Addison Russell is 21. Kyle Schwarber and Javy Baez are 22. Jorge Soler and Kris Bryant are 23. Grizzled veterans, Anthony Rizzo and Starlin Castro are 25. TWENTY FUCKING FIVE.
Miguel Montero looks like an ancient old fart on this team. He's only 31.
David Ross looks like he is the grandfather of most of these guys. He's 38.
These guys, as a group, are going to get better. Yeah, Kyle Schwarber looked out of place in the outfield. He's played a total of 77 games there in his professional career. 43 of those games were this season at the major league level.
Yes, they tended to look lost against the Mets' elite pitchers as they threw offspeed pitches and breaking balls from hell to a very generous zone. In case you had stopped paying attention by the 8th inning, Theo noted in his press conference today that Kris Bryant's final HR of the season was off a changeup.
*whispers* They're learning.
This team isn't a bunch of veterans that will all get old in one year like the 1984 team. It isn't a bunch of young guys that nobody outside of Vineline had ever hyped like the 1989 team. It isn't a team built around one singular superstar like the 1998 team. It isn't a bunch of bitchy veterans like the 2003 team. It isn't a bunch of hired mercenaries that collectively shit their pants twice the moment the post-season started like the 2007 and 2008 teams.
This 2015 team was an unfinished product and they still damn near caught the two best teams in baseball for the division and they actually did eliminate both of them from the playoffs.
And they did it while rubbing their helmets…
#Cubs Herrera wearing a helmet with 2 hands on it. He's the one who started it pic.twitter.com/IcQZy4jXCf
— Carrie Muskat (@CarrieMuskat) October 6, 2015
Clapping away to Starlin's walk-up music…
Pissing off Cardinals fans…
Pissing off Cardinals players…
Walking off their opponents a major league leading 13 times…
#HighStepping pic.twitter.com/WC3I2DSgYQ
— Chicago Cubs (@Cubs) August 24, 2015
Wearing pajamas…
Wearing dresses…
Rookie dress up! pic.twitter.com/0BQ9mcyb6w
— Kyle Schwarber (@kschwarb12) October 1, 2015
And just generally being adorable the whole damn year.
But 2015 is over now. It's time to let them go.
I'm still going to need a moment.
God, I loved this team.
Comments
Applause.
Rice CubeQuote Reply
Really good article.
Speaking of pajama parties, isn’t the annual OV Pajama Party this weekend at Adam’s?
dmick89Quote Reply
I’m pretty sure it is. Or is it at our corporate headquarters this year?
aisle424Quote Reply
Bullshit there’s no crying in baseball, cause this team got me too. Well written, boss.
Gregg TomlinsonQuote Reply
Absolutely right on.
UrkQuote Reply
Rice Cube,
Gregg Tomlinson,
Urk,
Thanks, guys.
aisle424Quote Reply
Great stuff. Well done.
JoelQuote Reply
Beautiful. Tonight, by the way. 9:00PM until February 12.
andcountingQuote Reply
And that last KB homer was my favorite. Just a perfect “fuck you” to every opposing pitcher in baseball.
andcountingQuote Reply
berseliusQuote Reply
This still might be my favorite thing this season (dying laughing).
berseliusQuote Reply
https://youtu.be/NgYudFmmOl4
GBTSQuote Reply
I needed this. Thanks for the great season guys.
https://youtu.be/pcN0HzbchR0
WaLiQuote Reply
This was one of my favorite moments too https://vine.co/v/eKP72PaWn0D
GBTSQuote Reply
The likelihood that this intern also printed out all of Hendry’s emails and gave them to him each morning has to be somewhere around 98%.
berseliusQuote Reply
There may have been some classified information in those emails. Congress should look into this.
dmick89Quote Reply
I bet it was mostly emails from Alvin complaining about how discounted tickets were a slap in the face to the Cubs’ best customers.
PerkinsQuote Reply
And to think I wasn’t all that sad about 2015 until I read every word of this. Now I am. Thanks.
Smokestack LightningQuote Reply
Perkins,
There could also have been dinner reservations that were talked about. Terrorists that came from Mexico because we don’t have a wall could have targeted Hendry.
dmick89Quote Reply
dmick89,
Targeting Hendry’s strategic doughnut reserves. I hear their next objective is Alvin’s baloney stash.
PerkinsQuote Reply
Perkins,
It’s no joke. Once terrorists have those locations, the American way will be lost forever. And when that happens, we’ll no longer be able to invade other countries. Our soul will have died.
dmick89Quote Reply
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VastXQ_hPb0
EnricoPallazzoQuote Reply
Taking a closer look at this upcoming winter, man, this one’s not going to be easy for the Superfriends. I don’t think the money will really be there for Price or Greinke given all the arb raises and other needs, not forgetting that Theo probably isn’t excited at all at the prospect of signing another well-run arm over 30 to multiple years and north of 175MM. Which means 2nd and 3rd tier shopping, which carries the high risk of still significant dollars spent to merely run in place, or trading a young hitter who could break out and be a monster.
Tough stuff. I mean, Schwarber seems the most logical choice to ship off for pitching, given how difficult baseball becomes for him once he’s handed a mitt and forced to stand in grass, but how do you justify dealing him now when the bat is quite possibly the best on the roster (and his popularity is thru—or at the very least on top of—the roof)? How do you deal Soler after seeing what he’s capable of? Downshifting to Baez or Castro won’t be near enough for a high-quality arm by themselves, and will likely require dipping deeply into farm depth, which will limit the ability of this FO to make other moves in-season.
Not to mention do you even want to deal Baez or Castro at this point? Castro’s resurrection and smooth play at 2B looks kinda keeper-ish to me at this point, and nobody wanted to launch him into space more than me during the season. But it was undeniably impressive to see him take his lumps, work his ass off, and get it all back and beat the ball over the yard and force himself back into the lineup down the stretch. I fully expected him to sulk and suck the rest of the year and force a trade. Never been more happy to be wrong about a player than I was about Starlin Castro. He’s still only 25 years old. His shift over to 2nd couldn’t have gone better, imo. And if he can finally learn to avoid the long swoons, he’d suddenly very valuable, even more so at a more manageable position, and at a still very good price.
Anyway, I’m babbling. I’ll stop. But anyway you look at it this isn’t going to be easy and the penalty for getting this offseason wrong could be severe.
Smokestack LightningQuote Reply
Smokestack Lightning,
I’ve just started on a payroll piece I’m hoping to post today. I wasn’t entirely sure where the Cubs were at and I can link this piece in the future. Plus, it helps if I do some work looking into this so I can remember it better later on. After getting the data all in one place, I agree, it is not going to be easy. uncle dave was right. I’ll post something in a few hours or less.
The problem with trading Schwarber is that if he does figure out how to catch or play left field, it’s going to look like such an awful trade. It’s possibly the kind of trade that even gets someone like Theo fired if it doesn’t work out well for the Cubs too. I don’t see that happening. Ricketts just needs to push hard for the DH in the NL. It’s long past time anyway.
dmick89Quote Reply
Assuming the Cubs don’t resign Fowler, the possible spots to upgrade seem to be CF, C, SP, and RP (specifically LOOGY).
I don’t think it will be as tough as Smokestack seems to think. I’m sure there will be tough decisions like every year, but they could also lose Fowler and do nothing else besides sign a back-of-the-rotation SP and still compete for the division title.
The Pirates & Cardinals have a much more difficult offseason than the Cubs IMO. Cardinals have to decide whether or not to pony up on Jason Heyward. Sounds like he’ll get >$150m. Do they keep Jhonny Peralta at SS for another year? The Pirates need to fill the void of AJ Burnett & Aramis Ramirez.
JonKneeVQuote Reply
Heyward’s agentSources say that the Cubs are very interested in Heyward.berseliusQuote Reply
Any offensive upgrades would seem to be used on high-contact, high-OBP guys.
CF
Denard Span
Dexter Fowler
Austin Jackson (bleh)
Jason Heyward
Yoenis Cespedes
C
Matt Wieters
AJ Pierzynski (vomit)
Willson Contreras (internal, last played AA Smokies)
SP
Wei-Yin Chen (30)
Bartolo Colon (43)
Johnny Cueto (30)
Yovani Gallardo (30)
Zack Greinke (32)
J.A. Happ (33)
Hisashi Iwakuma (35)
Scott Kazmir (32)
John Lackey (37)
Mat Latos (28)
Mike Leake (28)
Justin Masterson (31)
David Price (30)
Jeff Samardzija (31)
Jordan Zimmermann (30)
JonKneeVQuote Reply
Honestly, if the Cubs are going to spend big this offseason with $175m on a single player, I’d prefer Heyward over Grienke/Price.
JonKneeVQuote Reply
I think it will be harder than that. Arrieta isn’t going to be close to as good as he was this year (he should be good, but not that good). Hammel and Hendricks probably won’t be as good either.
It comes down to what the payroll will be. Anybody seen any indication of what it might be?
dmick89Quote Reply
I’m just watching Cubs highlights today, since there’s officially no more baseball left.
Rizzo the RatQuote Reply
I don’t see Montero going anywhere. He’s got a pretty big contract for the next 2 years. He’s also a pretty good hitting catcher overall. David Ross is signed through 2016.
dmick89Quote Reply
I could watch highlights from The Schwarber Game forever. http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/11493214/v281047783/must-c-clutch-schwarber-excels-in-ohio-homecoming/?game_pk=415046
Rizzo the RatQuote Reply
dmick89,
Yeah, I don’t think the Cubs will actually trade Schwarber, or Soler, for that matter, as the potential for disaster is just too high. The problem is, at that point, who can you deal that will land the kind of arm the Cubs should be shooting for?
Unless the Cubs are fine with 2nd and 3rd tier shopping for pitching. And maybe they should be. Have to wonder if given Cueto’s 2nd half struggles whether he could be had for something in the Shields’ range, or even better than that, if he’s looking to rebuild value and strike it big in another year or two. While Zimmermann wasn’t any better than Hendricks this year, he has been in the past, and at the very least he’d be a sizable upgrade over Hammel (and Hammel would then be where he’ll be most valuable, at the back-end of the rotation). Maybe just add Zim and a reclamation project to compete with Hammel and Hendricks at the back end and call it good?
This. Big time. If the Cubs have some dollars to work with I’d rather they roll with the 6 WAR player at age 26, especially when they’d be taking the 6 wins away from a division rival.
Smokestack LightningQuote Reply
Same here. He doesn’t strikeout a whole lot so that would be kind of a nice addition to this lineup.
dmick89Quote Reply
Agreed. Expecting another 7 WAR season out of Arrieta would be foolish. 5 wins seems doable again, tho.
Smokestack LightningQuote Reply
I’m not suggesting this, but if there was a team in need of middle infielders, Baez/Castro would be a pretty good package. This would assume the Cubs are comfortable with Coghlan or La Stella at 2nd every day.
I don’t see that happening. I also think Baez alone is probably worth more in a trade than people think. He undoubtedly has a ton of potential and that’s what a team is buying. He’s shown what he can do at the minor league level. There are 1st round draft picks from 2014 who are his age or older who haven’t performed as well as Baez at lower levels. He’s got 5-6 years before he’s eligible for free agency.
Is it going to land them an ace? No, but they could get something good in return.
dmick89Quote Reply
I don’t think it’s Heyward’s agent that is talking up the possibility of the Cubs interest in their client. I recall us talking about how the Cubs would probably be interested in him a year or two ago. His age right now fits right into what Theo has talked about in terms of signing free agents. The Cubs will definitely be interested if the Cardinals don’t lock up him up before free agency starts.
dmick89Quote Reply
Baez plus other farm pieces for Tyson Ross? Wouldn’t mind another SP with extreme GB tendencies with Addison Russell scooping behind him.
Smokestack LightningQuote Reply
Tyson Ross is exactly who I had in mind. Wasn’t there a Baez/Ross rumor earlier this summer? I’m guessing the Cubs wanted more (as they should have). Perhaps an improved 2015 will get the Cubs that extra piece now.
dmick89Quote Reply
I believe there was, and given what we heard around the deadline, I think it was relatively close to going down before Preller went off his meds.
The Ross fit seems almost too perfect, which means the Cardinals will get him. (dying laughing)
Smokestack LightningQuote Reply
I could see Baez plus netting Tyson Ross or someone of that caliber.
My guess is the Cubs try to re-sign Fowler and then try trading him in a year or two if Almora or McKinney can play a competent CF, and target Zimmerman or maybe Cueto in the free agent market. But that’s a wild-ass guess.
PerkinsQuote Reply
Why is everyone so quick to say Jake Arrieta isn’t as good as he was this year? Back to back 5+ WAR seasons (2014 wasn’t even a full season for him). Are you as quick to say that Kershaw, Scherzer, etc. aren’t going to be that good next year? BR had 8 pitchers at 5+ WAR and Fangraphs has 13.
I mean, we’re not talking about a guy that just gets by on talent.
JonKneeVQuote Reply
I fully expect, barring injury, Arrieta to be one of the top 5 pitchers in the MLB.
JonKneeVQuote Reply
Yes. We should not expect them to be as good as they have been either.
dmick89Quote Reply
I would say top 10. I’m expecting somewhere between 5-6 WAR from him, which I’m guessing puts him in or near the top 10.
dmick89Quote Reply
How many pitchers have been worth 7 WAR over the last 3 years? Maybe 6? Maybe. Kershaw has done it 3 times I think. The only pitcher that should be projected to be worth nearly that many wins next year is Kershaw.
dmick89Quote Reply
Exactly. It’s the smart move to assume regression after a monster season, regardless of who puts it up, and plan accordingly. If it turns out Arrieta can sustain this another year, well then, all the better, Cubs win even more games. But they should plan for a comeback to earth for Jake, just as the Dodgers should plan for a semi-off year for Kershaw every season and the Nats age-related regression for Scherzer. It’s how you avoid the kind of dumb shit that befell Hendry back in the mid-aughts when he banked everything on a return to form from Prior and Wood every year until the team bottomed out in 2006.
Smokestack LightningQuote Reply
It’s also not always performance related. Some of the regression that I’m considering here is that I’m not expecting him to make every single start and throw as many innings as he did. I’m not expecting him to have significant injuries, but I’m not expecting perfect health either. Same thing goes for Rizzo and Bryant. I’m not expecting either to be worth as many WAR as they were this year.
dmick89Quote Reply
http://obstructedview.net/the-cubs-offseason-plans/
New Shit
mylesQuote Reply
Great article. Well written and healing.
Mr. David M. BeyerQuote Reply