Chicago Cubs fans might do well to beware getting the object
of their desire. I have nothing
against Theo Epstein and by all accounts he has done a fine job with the Red
Sox franchise. But it is not as if
he has not made decisions that in retrospect do not look a whole lot better
than some of the moves Jim Hendry made during his tenure with the Cubs.
There is a very informative piece at MLB Trade Rumors
detailing the rotations that Epstein has built during his tenure with
Boston. Bottom line: they don’t
look a whole lot better than Hendry’s.
Pitching has never been Boston’s long suit. In addition, if Epstein were to leave his current post, he
would be leaving behind several long-term disappointing contracts, most notably
Carl Crawford, John Lackey, and Disuke Matsuzaka.
I don’t categorically oppose hiring Epstein per se. I mean, anybody would be an upgrade
from the prior Cubs regime. However,
you have to wonder what it is that attracts Cubs owner Tom Ricketts most about
him. To my way of thinking, there
are two points of attraction from Ricketts point-of-view. First, he is a safe choice. Ordinary fans can’t knock his record of
success. He proves that Ricketts
is serious.
Secondly, and I think maybe foremost in Ricketts’ mind, is
the whole marketing miracle surrounding the rehabilitation of Fenway Park and
its environs. This process has got
to make any greedy owner salivate, but should the Cubs decide to follow the
same path, be prepared for the franchise to take advantage of any way they can to
make money and to market the team and its ballpark.
My primary misgiving in the whole quest to obtain Epstein,
though, is the fact that he is under contract and that the Red Sox are likely
to want substantial compensation should the Cubs lure him over. Some pundits have suggested Starlin
Castro would be the price. I don’t
like the idea of trading real everyday assets for a front office guy anyway,
but the Cubs don’t exactly have a bunch of chips to put on the table, do they? Even thinking about something more than
the kind of compensation the White Sox got for Ozzie Guillen is just crazy.
Of the other names of current GMs that have been bandied
about, Andrew Freidman of the Rays has always struck me as a better bet. His achievements with the low budget,
no attendance Tampa franchise are far more impressive than those of a guy who
has had virtually no financial constraints.
There are also quite a few prospective top executives who
are working as assistants now with impressive credentials. Picking one of these would be daring
for the excessively cautious Ricketts, but for me it would be a gutsy and
correct move given the state of the Cubs franchise. The success stories we are looking at now were once, to use
Steve Jobs’ term, “hungry and foolish.”
Another thought occurs to me respecting Epstein, and that is
he is possibly just playing Ricketts to get an extension and more control from
the Red Sox ownership. It’s not as
if a similar scenario did not play out before between the parties when he
resigned for a few months back in 2005.
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