This Cubs Team Just Isn't Fun To Watch Right Now

[Brian Kelder]

Things won't stay this bad forever. But I'm not sure they'll get much better, either.

Image courtesy of © Jonathan Dyer-USA TODAY Sports

I'm in a bad, bad place as a Cub fan.

I don't believe in this plan or that this iteration of the Cubs will ever be more than it is right now, for this season, anyway. No, I'm not going to rail about how Ricketts is cheap right now. Nah, it's not time to say Hoyer is not smart enough to do this job. It's some simple facts in team building this roster, two to be exact, that lead this team to be perceived to be performing below the sum of its parts.

Let's discuss defense. Dansby Swanson and Nico Hoerner are elite. Cody Bellinger is very good. Pete Crow-Armstrong is a joy in center field. How, then, do the Cubs rank among the bottom ten defenses in the league? I took a trip to the Savant page to check out some things.

It turns out that Swanson isn't getting to play up the middle like some do, and Hoerner isn't covering to his left, either. It almost seems like they might be covering for a terrible defender at third base or something.

Oh, wait. That guy, the youthful, exuberant, nose-ringed, and fake grenade-tossing Christopher Morel, is by the numbers one of the five worst defenders at any position. You can't do that, Jed! There's no way you build a team around defense and then compromise it with the worst defensive third basemen you can find. It's affecting the entire infield.

Jed's second mistake was the bullpen. He could have brought in more than a heart attack, but that's not my focus. Adbert Alzolay has been injured in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022, 2023, and now 2024. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say this could have been predicted. Julian Merryweather has had arm issues since 2019. Mark Leiter Jr has no track record of sustained success over multiple seasons. Counting on these guys again was, in my opinion, Hoyer's blunder.

Why did Jed have to stick with these cheap, injury-prone retreads? Six reasons:

• Kyle Hendricks
• Drew Smyly
• Trey Mancini
• Jameson Taillon
• Tucker Barnhart
• Dansby Swanson

He's overpaid all of these guys, and they account for 70 million in payroll. He missed straight up. These are job-jeopardizing mistakes for a roster philosophy of depth and zero holes.

A lot has been made of Jed's reluctance to commit to long-term deals, and that's a legitimate Cub fan complaint. But Tom Reinsdorf, oh, sorry, Ricketts, is also culpable. He pulled the rug out on Theo Epstein when he wouldn't allow a Bryce Harper offer and pulled the rug out on all Cub fans after the biblical losses the billionaire claimed to have had after that pesky pandemic. I'm not trying to rehash all of what 2021 was, but the lessons about how the owner operates should persist.

Guys who behave cheaply in the past tend to behave cheaply in the future. I have been a cheap Dutchman for years. It's an engrained pattern for us. Hoyer is a smart guy and knows if he locks in a guy and it's a mistake or injury, he's just lost that major piece of the puzzle with little recourse to add it back (You can only spend that money once, right?)

Look, I know this is negative, and I know a good number will disagree and point to the starting pitching and prospects. To you, I say yes! These are wonderful things! But how did we waste this pitching start by not fully buying into it? With a properly built roster, this staff would be a true contender. Let's see if they can shut random writers up and turn this around.

They have to. Help isn't coming through that door. It'll be interesting to see how it plays out,

Either in success or failure.

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