The View from Right Field

37th Annual Cubs Convention – January 12-14, 2024

Back to the Cubs Convention after a four-year break.  I went in 2020, just before Covid.  There were no conventions in 2021 or 2022 (because of stupid Covid), and then I had a little issue last year.  So, it took a while, but I am finally up to 30 Conventions (out of 37; I missed the first four, then 2005, 2017, and last year). 

It was a lot different this year than it had been recently, but that was fine – and great – because Tad and Ruth were coming (along with Ross and Emily, of course). 

We watched Friday night’s Opening Ceremonies and “Off the Mound with Ryan Dempster” on Marquee at home.  It was easier and cheaper (didn’t have to drive; didn’t have to pay to park).  Plus you had a really good view and you did not have to sit/stand for an hour or more before the Opening Ceremonies started.  Wayne Messmer sang the Anthem, which is great!

Mike Royko and the Ex-Cubs Rule

Famed Chicago journalist Mike Royko had a rule that no team could win a World Series if they had three (or more) ex-Cubs on their roster.  While Mike was a Cubs fan, he also believed that playing for the Cubs either so jinxed players or taught them such bad habits, that any team with three or more of them on their roster couldn’t win a World Series (or at least that is what he said in his columns).  And it didn’t happen until the Arizona Diamondbacks won the World Series in 2001 with Mark Grace, Luis Gonzalez, and Miguel Batista on their roster.¹ 

In any case, watching the Cubs-Yankees game on Sunday made me wonder if there is some kind of a regular season too-many-ex-Cubs rule, too.  The Yankees were leading 4 to 1 after six 5innings.  But the Yankees had five ex-Cubs (or ex-Cubs organization) players in their starting lineup: Anthony Rizzo, DJ LeMahieu², Gleyber Torres³, Josh Donaldson⁴, and Billy McKinney⁵.

Terry Francona is Still Managing Cleveland. Where is Joe Maddon?

I went to the Cubs/Cleveland Guardians (f/k/a Indians) game today, and I am going tomorrow, too.  When I saw Terry Francona was still managing Cleveland, I thought back to the 2016 World Series: the Cubs managed by Joe Maddon versus the Indians (now Guardians) managed by Terry Francona.  Joe Maddon left the Cubs a long time ago (mostly because the Cubs wanted him to go).  Terry Francona, however, is still managing Cleveland.

So remind me: Which manager won the 2016 World Series and which manager lost?

Yes, You Can Buy a Championship in Baseball. The @Cubs Did It in 2016.

In writing about the Winter Meetings, Paul Sullivan reminds us that Tom Ricketts said, back in September, “The fact is you can’t buy a championship in baseball.”  Well, yes – and no.  You can’t buy a whole team, but you can buy missing parts, maybe even a lot of them.  Because that’s how the Cubs won the World Series in 2016.  They signed Jon Lester for $155 million (five years), Jason Heyward for $185 million (eight years), Ben Zobrist for $56 million (four years), and John Lackey for $32 million (two years). 

So, yes, you can buy a championship in baseball.  Once you have a good base, you can buy a championship by signing free agents to fill in the missing parts.  To the extent the Cubs are not doing this now, it means that Cubs management and ownership do not think the Cubs have a good enough base to do it. 

Willy’s Not Coming Back, Whether He’s Traded or Not

Yesterday I tweeted:

“The worst way for a company to handle a RIF [i.e., a reduction in force] is to announce it and then tell people that the list of who is being let go will be disclosed in two weeks. Welcome to the  @Cubs at the @MLB #TradeDeadline.”

Yesterday, Willson Contreras said, with respect to today’s off-day and tomorrow’s 5 pm trade deadline: "It's going to be a long day. It's been long, long, long, long week, long, long, month for me. But I'm ready for this to be over, to be honest."

Happy Birthday, Mr. Cub

From all your fans, past, present, and future.

When You Go to a Baseball Game, There Is Always a Chance You’ll See Something You Have Never Seen Before

Which may have happened at the Cubs-Pirates game last night.  Let me set the scene: The Pirates took a 3 to 0 lead in the first inning.  The Cubs got five in the seventh to take a two-run lead, but the Bucos tied it in the top of the ninth.  Nobody scored in the tenth or top of the eleventh.¹  In the bottom of the eleventh, the Cubs had runners on first and third with one out.  Ian Happ was batting right-handed, his weaker side.²  Ian hit a really high pop up to the infield – and the second baseman totally missed it!  Sergio Alcantara scored, and the Cubs won.  Here’s the play (see at 7:40):

November 2, 2016 Seems Like Such a Long Time Ago

When we were in Portland, Oregon, in 2017, to see family, we did what people visiting Portland normally do.  We drove 100 miles south to Eugene to see the Eugene Emeralds, then a Cubs farm team.  While there, I bought this tee shirt:

Reality Check for @Cubs Fans: Trading Riz, KB, and Javy Was the Right Thing to Do

With trades of Anthony Rizzo, Kris Bryant, and Javier Baez (for more on that, see here), the Cubs are getting, to paraphrase Harry Doyle, “JUST a bit” of criticism.  A few reality-check comments.

1. Lots of fans think the Cubs should have kept all three of them and, I guess, signed them as free agents in the off-season.  Which basically means paying each of them more than they would get from any other team.  In other words, the Cubs should have signed Rizzo for more than any other team would have paid him; the Cubs should have signed Bryant for more than any other team would have paid him; and the Cubs should have signed Baez for more than any other team would have paid him.  Nobody else would have signed all three of them for the top dollar they could have gotten individually, but that’s what the Cubs were supposed to do.

Baseball Doesn’t Need to be Shorter; It Needs to be Brisker

Baseball games are too long, which is something everybody knows.  Except, it’s not really true.  Baseball games aren’t too long; they’re too slow.  The great baseball writer, Roger Angell explained it in an interview in The Wall Street Journal last September on his 100th birthday.  Mr. Angell was discussing the changes they instituted last year because of the pandemic:

“I can understand this business of putting a batter on second base, but it goes against every baseball instinct that I have, because the heart of the game is that you have to earn every base, and suddenly that’s been abrogated.  Seven inning games, I guess I understand, but seven is a very different game than nine.”