Going into today’s game against the Pittsburgh Pirates, the Cubs find themselves in a position that absolutely nobody expected them to be in. They are one game below .500 and trail the Milwaukee Brewers by 4.5 games in the NL Central. Add to that, they got embarrassed at home yesterday by those same Brewers and were relegated to having a position player (Jon Jay) pitch which as we all know, is not something you want to see your favorite team have to do.
Needless to say — things are pretty shaky on the North side of Chicago.
We are now beyond, “Well it’s only April (or May or June)” that many Cubs fans would say early in the season and now we find ourselves only days away from the All-Star break. The Cubs have played mediocre baseball at best which has resulted in the team never being four games above or two games below .500 all season. Cubs fans know the team’s struggles — the starting rotation is very bad, everyone has seemingly under performed offensively, and they still cannot get a goddamn hit with a man in scoring position.
However, within the last week or so, the urgency to right the Cubs ship has slowly been starting to appear. Responding to the players comments about welcoming some trade deadline acquisitions to add some “energy” to a dormant ball club, Cubs President of Baseball Operations Theo Epstein responded,
“The talent rests inside our clubhouse, inside players who are wearing our uniforms right now.”
Those players in Cubs uniforms were summoned to a team meeting yesterday by Cubs manager Joe Maddon. If you know anything about Maddon, the fact he called a team meeting should be relatively surprising in and of itself. He has stated on numerous occasions that he hates holding team meetings and traditionally only holds three meetings per year: Spring Training, All-Star break, and before the post season. In addition to that, he doesn’t like to hold team meetings at home because he believes that most team meetings have a bad vibe and he never wants to give the home facilities a bad feel.
So with that said, the fact that he bumped his All-Star break meeting up a few days, paired with the fact that it was held in the home facilities since the team played Milwaukee at home yesterday, shows you the urgency Maddon must have. Never one to panic however, Maddon shared the message of yesterday’s lengthy team meeting.
“The message was to continue to stay together as a group, and the answers will come out of the room itself.”
While Theo and Joe both think that the answers are within the current team itself, the team’s 42-43 record says otherwise. They need to add AT LEAST one arm to the rotation and I just can’t wrap my head around watching Lackey or Eddie Butler get handed the ball in the post season. Lester and Arrieta haven’t been as sharp this season and Hendricks’ health is still in question. Can the team pitch and play better baseball in the second half?
Absolutely.
Does the team need to make some moves at the deadline to inject some life into this team?
My opinion says yes but there’s a reason why I’m not a MLB front office executive. Neither Maddon or Theo believe in making a trade just to make one and Epstein was even quoted saying the team wouldn’t “force” a trade even though every fan is screaming for changes.
Of course I want to see some form of a trade happen because watching the Cubs the first half of this season has been pretty painful. However, I remember when Theo got hired back in 2011, I was so pumped that I bought a shirt that has a message that still holds true today even though the team has limped through the first half of the season:
“In Theo We Trust.”
