By Steve Rhodes

Whoa, whoa, whoa!
“I said the other day, if we want to win 15 in a row, we’d definitely be open to it,” Theo Epstein said of holding on to Jeff Samardzija and Jason Hammel.
If the Cubs won the next 15, they’d be 49-46. You’d be looking at one of those 83-win seasons Theo hates so much.
Of course, Theo knows this team isn’t capable of winning 15 in a row. And it’s not like an 83-win season thrills us. But it just goes to show how warped this whole thing is.

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Posted on June 30, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

Just like the Cubs’ major league team, The Cub Factor has been on a bit of a hiatus the last couple of weeks. Unlike the Cubs’ major league team, we’re back. The Cubs, on the other hand, won’t return until 2018 at best.
The Week In Review: The Cubs lost three of four in Pittsburgh, won two of three in Philadelphia and opened a three-game set in Miami on Monday night with a win. Winning, of course, is counter to the plan, which is to change the Cubs culture of losing.

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Posted on June 17, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

One of Theo Epstein’s constant refrains is that the pain we are going through now is the price we have to pay for “sustained success” in the future.
But what if we don’t care about sustained success in the future?
Worrying about sustained success in the future is for normal franchises. These are the Cubs. We’ve suffered enough. We just want to win it once. After that, who cares? We’ll be more than happy to wait another 100-plus years.
This is what Theo doesn’t understand. Sustained success isn’t what Cubs fandom is about. That ship has sailed. It’s about that one moment. Win us a World Series first; then we can think about sustained success.
Because you don’t truly understand this franchise, Theo, and in particular how it differs from the Red Sox and their championship drought, you are putting the cart that is future before the horse that is the present.
Sustained success, see, is for later. Winning is for now.
In that vein, I’d like to dedicate this week’s Cub Factor to Betty J. Soedler, of Locust Grove, Virginia. We lost Betty nine days ago.
“Her two biggest regrets were that the Minnesota Vikings did not win the Super Bowl and the Chicago Cubs did not win the World Series during her lifetime.”
She couldn’t live long enough to see your plan through, Theo.
The rest of us – like the plan itself – aren’t guaranteed either.

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Posted on May 20, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

Here’s the problem with Jeff Samardzija throwing 126 pitches against the White Sox last week: According to Theo Epstein, it doesn’t matter whether the Cubs win 68 or 73 games this year.
So why is Ricky Renteria trying so hard to win that game that he pushes him past what he acknowledges was his pitch limit?
If the game mattered, that would be one thing. And even still, if this was a potential playoff team, you’d want to keep Samardzija fresh for late in the season.
But the game did not matter. It didn’t even matter to show Samardzija’s trade value; it only endangered it.
Misaligned incentives all the way around.

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Posted on May 13, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

“The Blue Jays could make up their 2.5-game deficit in the AL East by making four changes, Paul Swydan writes in an Insider-only piece for ESPN.com,” MLBTradeRumors.com notes.
“One of those moves would be an upgrade at second base, and Swydan suggests that Rickie Weeks, Luis Valbuena, Emilio Bonifacio and Danny Espinosa could all be logical trade targets.”
So that’s why the Cubs still have Darwin Barney – someone’s gotta play second once even mediocrities like Valbuena and Bonifacio are sent packing.
When the Cubs go on the road, it must be like the flea market coming to town.

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Posted on May 6, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

“The ones who have left talk as if they’ve escaped,” Gordon Wittenmyer writes for the Sun-Times.
“As if the Cubs have become baseball’s Alcatraz, where players do time until free agency or the inevitable trade while the lucky ones get reduced sentences by virtue of one-year flip contracts.
“Just listen to Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Matt Garza’s advice to Jeff Samardzija, who will be on the trading block this summer.

“All I can tell him is keep pitching; pitch your way out of it,” said Garza.

Yes, but how do we escape?

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Posted on April 28, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

Ricky Renteria is already following in the failed footsteps of Dale Sveum in one key area: He’s trying to win games.
Didn’t you get the memo, Ricky?
When a manager employs platoons and lineup systems and looks for daily match-ups, he’s trying to win every game.
Not what you were hired for, Rick.
You were hired to develop players. That means playing Mike Olt and Junior Lake every day; we don’t need to see what Luis Valbuena and Ryan Sweeney have to offer.

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Posted on April 22, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

“Stanley J. Sliwa, age 85, of Dunkirk, NY passed away peacefully Sunday (April 13, 2014) surrounded by his loving family,” the Dunkirk Observer reports.
“He was born June 18, 1928 in Niles, Illinois, the son of the late Stanislaus and Stephania Sliwa. Growing up in the Chicago area, he was an avid Chicago Cubs fan who enjoyed watching his team. Mr. Sliwa was a retired bricklayer.”
Theo Epstein’s last words to Sliwa were “Be patient.”

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Posted on April 15, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

Contrary to what many sports pundits continue to insist, Dale Sveum was never hired to simply be a caretaker manager who would be replaced by a “real” manager once the Cubs were ready to win. That makes no sense on several levels – the first being that Sveum’s bosses were counting on him to develop the team’s prospects while instilling a new culture into a locker room whose managers have notoriously allowed the asylum to be run by the inmates.
If Sveum fulfilled that mission, tossing him aside just as the team was on the brink would have been madness.
No, hiring Sveum was part and parcel of The Plan. That’s why the team made such a public spectacle of the hiring process. (The confusing failure of Sveum only goes to show how fragile The Plan really is.)
The hiring of Ricky Renteria, on the other hand, has caretaker written all over it. His chief attribute – as touted by his own bosses – is his relentless optimism (along with an ability to speak Spanish).
His lack of managerial acumen is way down the list. And in his first week at the helm, he didn’t disappoint. This guy is going to be a disaster – in a very Cubs-like way.

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Posted on April 8, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

The Cubs aren’t even fun to hate-watch anymore.
Every last ounce of joy has been sucked out of this franchise. Goodbye Dioner Navarro, you were the last Cubs legend.
The team is even celebrating the death this year of Wrigley Field (1914 – 2014).
Goodbye, Wrigley. Now you’re just a gum company again.
It’s gonna be one boring season, from Sleepy Jim Deshaies in the booth to charisma-deficient Anthony Rizzo as team leader. Some interim coach we can’t even work up an opinion about is managing the team this year and we don’t even have a closer identified yet whom we can pour our frustrations onto.
The Opening Day pitcher is nicknamed the Shark but his performance is more akin to imitation crab.
Some predictions:

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Posted on March 31, 2014