Or more like the 2014 Cubs… or maybe somewhere in-between?

At the end of the 2014 MLB Season, the Chicago Cubs finished sixteen games under .500, finishing in last place in the NL Central. During that offseason heading into 2015, the Cubs made radical changes, and that started with hiring Joe Maddon as manager. We all know the story behind that move, and how a contract loophole with Tampa Bay’s front office led to Joe being able to walk away and get hired elsewhere. Continuing on to the offseason, Theo Epstein signed SP Jon Lester, SP Jason Hammel, C David Ross, and RP Jason Motte. They did not stop there, however, as they acquired CF Dexter Fowler in a trade with the Houston Astros. Obviously we know in hindsight how much of a contribution most of these players made in 2016. However, this was the year they signed, and their first season as a Cub was 2015.

Kyle Schwarber and Kris Bryant debuted in 2015. Javier Baez debuted in 2014. The Cubs did not really have any breakout prospects ready to start 2023 with the main club. There are one or two that are on the not-too-distant horizon, but I can’t see them helping this team to the postseason - at least not from April’s vantage point.

If you want to just scratch the surface and look at wins and losses, the 2015 team was twenty-four wins better than the previous season. However, they still finished third in their division, thanks to bigger win totals from the Cardinals and Pirates (the Pirates?!). Taking a deeper look, you had a Cy Young season from Jake Arrieta, who had a record-setting second half of the season. In 2014, the Cubs’ monthly record hovered around, or several games below .500 all year. In 2015, they were 42-18 from August 1 onward. In one of my favorite stats - when scoring four runs or more - the Cubs were 71-20 in 2015 (improvement over the 54-20 record in 2014).

Thanks to the Wild Card playoff qualifier, the Chicago Cubs made the postseason in 2015, thanks to having a better record than the rest of the teams in the hunt. They took care of the Pirates in that Wild Card game, and advanced to the NLDS where they played rival St. Louis and vanquished them as well. They made it all the way to the NLCS, taking on but losing the series to the New York Mets. Now I’m not writing this to take you down memory lane (good or bad). 

The point I am getting towards is: the 2014 Cubs were bad, and began an overhaul in that offseason looking towards 2015 as an improvement year - not necessarily with an eye to the postseason. They overachieved and had a great run in the second half. The 2022 Cubs were bad in the first half, but gained a little bit of momentum in the second half, finished strong, and provided some hope for 2023’s improvement. During the offseason, Jed Hoyer signed SS Dansby Swanson, CF Cody Bellinger, SP Jameson Taillon, DH Trey Mancini, 1B Eric Hosmer, among others. Manager David Ross remained, but he is not Joe Maddon.

Now I’m not in any way saying the 2023 Cubs are a 97 win team. Far from it. They don’t even have a set “core” in place yet, as they did before. What I am asking is, who are the 2023 Cubs? Are they still in the 2014 realm, if we’re comparing rebuilds towards a championship? Are they going to be overachievers and show more improvement than projected? Can they make the postseason in the now-expanded Wild Card Playoff format? Perhaps more realistically – are they somewhere between 2014 and 2015, comparatively speaking?

I will say this: the age-old adage of “You cannot win a division in April, but you sure can lose one” always rings in the back of my mind every season. As I sit here and write, we are only five games deep to the 2023 season. The Cubs are 2-3. In 2014 the Cubs were 1-4 after five games, and 9-16 in April. In 2015 the Cubs were 3-2 after five games, and 12-8 in April. Does any of that mean anything? Of course not. But … What can we possibly expect? 

Time will tell.