One of the reasons, and quite possibly the main reason, that Theo Epstein decided he’d had enough of Joe Maddon’s pop psychology, better known as Zen And The Art of RV Maintenance, is that he wanted a manager to give the team an edge.
Rossy1 hasn’t even managed these guys yet, but it doesn’t mean his players didn’t arrive with just the kind of edge Teddy was looking for.
Anthony Rizzo showed up for camp and criticized the Cubs for two straight offseasons of not spending any money. I’m sure the fact that they don’t seem interested in sitting down with him to talk about a contract extension is part of that, but not all of it.
Kris Bryant got to camp on Saturday, which probably means he’s safe from being traded for about five months, and the guy who never says anything interesting, said a lot of interesting stuff.
First, he addressed all the confident hot takery about how he’ll “never” sign a contract extension with the Cubs, and that he already turned down a big offer from the Cubs.
“I’ve always had the stance that, yes, I want to play here. I love the city. The biggest thing with the trade rumors that have disappointed me is I feel like people–not everybody–but the main reasoning behind it is: Let’s get rid of him now because he doesn’t want to be here in two years. He turned down this monster extension ‘well north of $200 million.’”
I’m like, Where was that? I never saw that. It’s just these rumors and sources and people just saying things. The only thing that matters is what comes from my mouth. Never once have I said I never wanted to play here. I’m pretty sure you guys can go through all the recordings, all the interviews. I’ve always said I respect everyone in this organization, everyone in this city, the fans. We have it so good here. Of course I would love to play here.”
We have it so good here.”
The idea that the Cubs can’t re-sign Bryant has always been bullshit. They might not want to pay him what he’s worth, but they certainly can. And, if they do let him go, or trade him away early, it’s a disgrace, because they clearly have the inside track to sign him. How often does a team have first crack to sign a great player?
The normally dull Bryant was just getting warmed up. He had some thoughts on the Astros, too.
“What a disgrace, just watching their apology. There’s no sincerity, no genuineness when it comes to it. I certainly know that if I messed up big in that way, I’d be the first one to let you know just how big of a mess of it was.”
“If they didn’t get caught, they’d still be doing it. They’re only doing this apology because they got caught, and that’s it.”
He even preemptively addressed Dusty Baker’s plea for Major League Baseball to preemptively warn teams about throwing at the Astros for years of cheating.
“If teams are going about it the right way, you know if you do get hit and you’re not going after people’s heads and stuff like that, I think they’re definitely going to experience some of that this year.”
Bryant said that he didn’t envy the Astros for the crowd reception they’ll get on the road all year long. He said it’s going to be of a magnitude worse than the boos he gets in St. Louis for (accurately) calling that festering infected boil of a town “boring.”
Bryant wasn’t alone. Yu Darvish, who has lived with two awful 2017 World Series outings now knows that the Astros were doing anything they could to steal signs. Yu didn’t hold back.
Darvish, on Correa’s response to Bellinger: pic.twitter.com/a1rRi48COx
— Mark Gonzales (@MDGonzales) February 16, 2020
He also handled the inevitable Astros fans trolling on Twitter pretty amazingly.
“A lot of players were doing the same as me,” Báez said. “They were getting loose during the game. You can lose the game in the first inning. Sometimes when you’re not ready and the other team scored by something simple, I feel like it was cause of that. It was cause we weren’t ready. We weren’t ready to throw the first pitch because nobody was loose.”
The Cubs outscored opponents 101-78 in the first inning of games last year, and those 101 runs were the second most they scored in any inning2.
So either with all of this wonderful, magic, David Ross teambuilding they’ll score 200 runs in the first or it’s all just talk.
Spoiler alert: It’s all just talk.
You can’t credit Joe’s loose ship for bringing along a young team and getting them ready to win a World Series sooner than anybody expected and then blame that same approach for them falling short the next three seasons. The reason the Cubs haven’t been back to the World Series is because the can’t miss kids didn’t all pan out, the vaunted scouting department didn’t unearth any pitching prospects worth a shit and the Cubs have played four straight seasons without any offensive production from center field or right field.
But I’m sure assigning batting practice buddies with fix it all.
Javy was right to lament the loss of Pedro Strop to the Reds.
“He meant a lot. He’s one of my brothers. He’s one of the guys who taught me a lot of things mentally. He’s a guy that you want to have right next to you. He’s a leader, even through he’s from the bullpen.”
And I love the fact that Javy uses the phrase “even though he’s from the bullpen” like it’s a neighborhood.