Know Your Enemy: Chicago Cubs
Your Enemy
The Cubs
I have to hand it to the Cubs, their marketing strategy really worked. They managed to get and keep legions of devoted alcoholics buying overpriced tickets for bad seats in a crumbling stadium to watch their team lose for 108 years. This not only earned the Cubs the nickname of “Lovable Losers” but also Wrigley as the “biggest bar in the city.”
And the current-day Cubs have a fair share of drama all on their own.
Anthony Rizzo, one of the faces of the franchise, likes to pretend he's this "aw shucks" nice guy, but I'd like to point out that he's a big fan of the hard slide in to the opposing players. To the point of them getting them getting injured. I know there's all kinds of old-school arguments out there about how players have gotten soft and the game used to be played hard, but you all know that if someone knocked Willson Contreras's legs out from under him with an illegal slide we would never hear the end of it. Need I really remind you about what happened to Jonathan Lucroy last season? But I digress ...
Ownership changes and Tribune messiness brought us to 2009 and the Ricketts family. Despite the built-in good PR the family had through buying the Cubs, they still managed to show their ass over the years via a treasure trove of embarrassing e-mails, questionable political leanings, and using the World Series-win goodwill in a bid to turn Wrigleyville in to Rickettsville. They threatened to move the team to Rosemont because the mayor was mean to the owners or something, but then realized that the Cubs are more valuable in the city so they sucked it up. And don’t forget their deal with Sinclair that sat the mess of Marquee Sports Network to the table in 2019, bringing their deal with WGN to a close. The slight against WGN is particularly gross, because WGN gave the Cubs exposure to baseball fans outside of the Chicago area.
But don’t worry! These lovable losers give Chicago national exposure! Even though they were mediocre for 108 years! So much so that Friday night's broadcaster, ESPN, forgets pretty often that there are two baseball teams in Chicago
This is a fun game, but doesn't ESPN have a fact-checker or something?
Cubs fans love to make attendance jokes, like they should get a medal for showing up when their team is tanking, and like attendance jokes aren't just the knock-knock jokes of baseball humor.
Enemy Manager
The Cubs took a page out of the Mets playbook here and picked a former player with no managerial experience that the front office could just boss around. The only benefit for the Cubs here is that they have neither Jeff Wilpon nor Brodie Van Wagenen in their front office making bad baseball decisions from on high.
By all accounts, Ross is a nice guy. He doesn’t come close to clearing the weirdness bar set by Joe Maddon. Being a nice guy could work against him where he ends up taking too much shrapnel for dumb front-office decisions. White Sox fans are familiar with goodwill only making it so far on players-turned-managers, and if Ross doesn’t turn steer the Cubs back to prominence, he could find himself out on his ass sooner than later. Or not, because Cubs fans aren't a fickle bunch and he might just ride it out that Grandpa Rossy goodwill for the next decade of losing.
Your Enemy’s 2019 Record
84-78
The Cubbies finished third in the NL Central last year, Maddon peaced out, and everyone on the north side wandered around asking, "How do we get back to 2016?"
The problem with the Cubs is that since 2015 they've assumed they're entitled to take the division without having to put in actual work. They cruised through 2019 — until the bottom dropped out and the Cards swooped in to take the division. What's weird is that 2019 is the first season that Maddon as manager hadn't made the playoffs, and he spent the whole season like a kid with a bad case of senioritis, except when he started a weird fight with Sean Doolittle during a game.
Trading for Nicholas Castellanos worked out and kept things lively, even though it was a pit stop on Castellanos' way to the mighty Cincinnati Reds (turns out complaining about Comerica Park gets you a one-way ticket out of dodge). Yu Darvish turned it around for the second half of the season, and kept the sinking ship afloat for a brief moment.
The baby bears inexplicably signed Craig Kimbrel last June in an attempt to get a closer. I know that Theo Epstein is supposed to be some kind of baseball savant, but we can all agree that it's probably not a great idea to hang your hopes in June on a closer who hadn't pitched since the previous season.
The sad off-field drama of Ben Zobrist and the ridiculous critiques lobbed at Kris Bryant did nothing to help team morale. Also do we need to talk about Addison Russell, or is everyone up-to-date on his special sort of scumbaggery?
Enemy pitchers
Friday's matchup is going to see everyone's favorite Dallas vs. yips master Jon Lester. Lester is currently 2-0 with a 2.74 ERA. During his last outing against the Brewers, Lester gave up five runs and two homers in six innings. Keuchel had some back stiffness against the Cards, but it's not enough to keep him out of his first Crosstown start. He's sitting pretty with a 3.07 ERA and 16 strikeouts so far this season.
Saturday is going to see Dylan Cease vs. pride of Dartmouth Kyle Hendricks. Cease was originally drafted by the Cubs, and this is the first time he's facing them. He's currently 4-1 with a 3.16 ERA this season, and after a shaky start seems to have found his footing on the mound this season. Hendricks is 3-2 with a 3.31 ERA in 2020. He allowed three runs on three hits over 6 ⅓ innings against St. Louis on Monday.
Sunday is rumored to be Reynaldo López vs. Darvish. Darvish quietly has returned to pre-Cubs form with a 4-1 record and 1.80 ERA. He made it through six innings against the Cards, allowing one run on eight hits. López has been on the IL for the last three weeks with shoulder inflammation. López has had some pretty shaky outings this season, so we'll see how long he can go during this start.
I'm just going to leave this here though:
What sucks for the Sox
The Cubs are off to a great start, sitting first in the NL Central. Ian Happ is leading the team in batting with .315 BA, followed closely by Jason Kipnis at .282. "MVP" Javy Baez is second-to-last with a sad .189, which doesn't suck for the Sox but does amuse me.
Unfortunately, the Sox are facing the top three pitchers in the Cubs rotation. Hendricks has the highest 2020 ERA — at 3.31. If the Sox bats force the Cubs to go to the bullpen early, it'd be a huge benefit. Getting to face Kimbrel will help the Sox in the long run, as the "closer" has an ERA sitting at an eye-water 11.12.
What might not suck for the Sox
Hat tip to James Fox for pointing out that the Cubs lefties could be in some trouble this weekend:
With the sweep of the Tigers and a five (!) game winning streak, the Sox are on fire. Especially the offense.
Tim Anderson is especially thankful for the Tigers' throwing batting practice, because it meant he was not only eating a ton of spaghetti at home but his average got a huge bump to .371.
Luis Robert coming back could give the Cubs a run for their money. As he's developed (quickly) at the plate I expect to see him hitting a whole lot of balls onto Waveland.
The Cubs are having a great season, so the Sox need to keep up the offensive power and stay tight on the mound and on defense. Kris Bryant is currently out of the lineup with wrist issues, and Baez is not hitting at all, so missing those two can definitely mean good things for the Sox.