My apologies for not having posted in over a month. Lots of things going on in my life, not so much in the life of the Cubs, who seem remarkably content to remain one of the worst major league teams in baseball whilst holding out the hope of future greatness blossoming just beneath the surface.
The big news this week is the Cubs lost out in the Tanaka sweepstakes, just as they lost out in Year 1 of the Epstein reign in both the Cespedes and Darvish courtships. Beyond the bad luck part of it is the simple truth that no free agent of difference-making quality in his right mind would want to play for the Cubs now no matter how much money or how many years the team guaranteed.
Gordon Wittenmeyer, in a recent column, pointed out these and other sad flaws in the Cubs plan, most of which points we have been emphasizing in this blog for quite a while. The Cubs have a business plan, not a baseball plan, nor even anything remotely resembling a hybrid of the two. They are a major market team that makes a lot of money but refuses to spend as a major market team needs to spend.
I'm not suggesting the Cubs go out and blow a ton of money on overpriced free agents like Pujols or even guys like Ellsbury who have some good years left. But there are guys around every year who can elevate the team to at least mediocrity, so that somehow when a real established talent who might take the team up a level comes along, he will not just look the other way at a serious offer.
The other thing is the Cubs really cannot afford to trade decent starting pitchers who are under team control at the trade deadline for A and AA prospects. This off-season the Cubs pretty much stood pat. They picked up a right-handed hitting platoon player to complement Nate Schierholtz. OK, but neither one of these guys is good enough to play anything but a bench role on a contending team.
They strengthened their relief pitching, which has been inconsistent for several years. Fine. However, with a pitching staff that consists of two good starters in Wood and Samardzija, one has-been or never was in Jackson, and one failed prospect in Arrieta, plus a swingman in Villanueva, and a pitcher to be named later, that bullpen is going to burn out in two months max.
There are three decent free agent pitchers now on the market, Matt Garza, Ubaldo Jimenez. and Ervin Santana. The Cubs need to make a run at one of these if only to demonstrate they are serious. Any of the three make more sense than Edwin Jackson did last year. They also need to extend Samardzija. The last thing they need to do to have any chance at finishing somewhere near .500 is to get themselves a real center fielder who can catch, get on base, and hit his way out of a paper bag. God knows where they can find one, but unless they can somehow resurrect the career of Brett Jackson, they are pretty much DOA again this year.
