READING THE TEA LEAVES

There is little news coming from the Cubs as the season winds to an end.

But there are little tidbits and rumors that begin to create a bigger picture.

First, the shutdown of Jeff Samardzija was interesting. The reason was that this was the most innings he had pitched since 2008. A starter to reliever and now a converted starter is a different mind set for a pitcher, a different routine. Since the Cubs have been out of the race since May, there really was no reason for the Cubs to even start Samardzija this weekend. But they did. And he went out and threw his best game of the year: a complete game victory over the Pirates.

Afterward, the Cubs web site writer reports that Samardzija is slated to be the #1 or #2 starter in the rotation in 2013.  That is good news for Samardzija, but a question mark for the rest of the staff.

Then, there is a rumor that after six weeks of rest, Matt Garza is still not throwing a baseball. The implication is that his elbow injury is much worse than we were led to believe in July. An injured Garza equates to zero trade value so one would expect he would return to the Cubs for 2013. But if he needs to have surgery, Garza may not even be in the picture for most of 2013. Either scenario is bad news for the Cubs.

Another piece of news was that the Cubs continue to purge old management employees.
The Cubs have dismissed six members of the Minor League coaching staff, including Dave Bialas, who has been with the organization for 18 years, most recently as Triple-A Iowa's manager. Bialas was the Cubs' Minor League field coordinator for 10 seasons before returning to managing this past season for the first time since 2001.

Also gone are Class A Daytona pitching coach Marty Mason, Class A Peoria manager Casey Kopitzke and hitting coach Barbaro Garbey, and Mesa Rookie League pitching coach Frank Castillo and hitting coach Jason Dubois. Kopitzke is headed to Marquette University to enroll in its sports law program. Castillo and Dubois both played for the Cubs. Garbey was in his third season with the Chiefs and seventh in the Cubs organization. Kopitzke was in his fourth season as a Minor League manager in the Cubs' system.

It means that Epstein and Hoyer are on a drive to replace all the old Hendry-Tribune baseball employees with their own people. It is consolidation of power and loyalty. It is also a move to insulate the baseball side from the Tribune dominated business side run by Crane Kenney. It foretells a power struggle.

It also may be an indictment of the minor league system which continues to lack the development of skilled major league players. Catcher Steve Clevenger's antics in the Nationals series sums up the point: throwing at Bryce Harper because the Nationals were continuing to play hard in the 5th inning up 5 runs is no excuse to throw at a batter. Clevenger claims he was sticking up for his team. But it was a boneheaded move and instigated another on field scrum. Clevenger was suspended one game by the league.  The result may be he will lose his job, because the new front office has brought in former A's catcher Antony Recker, another career minor leaguer who has some power numbers in AAA. Recker is not a long term solution at catcher, but he is another AAA guy filling a roster spot in the short term.

Epstein and Hoyer are looking to fill the system with "their" guys. While it is normal to blame the previous administration for the inability to develop talent, the move to consolidate all aspects of the operation will lead to full accountability on Epstein in the near future. The question is whether the Cubs can hold on long enough for his talent to reach the majors.

The Cubs drafted many pitchers in June, but none will be ready for at least 2 years. This puts the weakness of the Cubs current minor league system in the spotlight. Here are the last of the Hendry era starters vying for a rotation spot next season: Rusin, Raley, and Coleman. None have impressed. Further, Epstein's pitchers on the 40 man roster for next season are not much better: Brigham, Castillo, Concepcion, Germano, Socolovich, or Volstad. Vizcaino is on the 60 day DL for arm surgery and his prognosis for 2013 is unknown.

In the best case situation, the 2013 Cubs rotation is Garza, Samardzija, Vizcaino, T. Wood and Germano. In the worst case it is Samardzija, T. Wood, Germano, Volstad and Rusin.

The other tidbit last week was the promotional special featuring Jorge Soler, the Cubs $30 million Cuba exile outfielder who just finished up in short stint in Class A. A thirty minute special on a Cubs prospect is early propaganda to try to keep some level of nominal interest in the Cubs as the season ticket renewals are mailed to fans. But even if the Cubs try to fast track their new signees like Soler and Almora, they will start at best in AA next season. And if there is that arbitrary 500 AAA at bats promotion milestone, they will not be able to reach Wrigley until mid 2014. If Brett Jackson and Josh Vitters continue to struggle under .200 BA, the move to promote may become acute if projected season ticket sales drop 25 percent this off season.

RAW MEAT

The news that Jeff Samardzija will be shut down after his next start is surprising. If the Cubs are really concerned about his career number of innings pitched, 165.1, the most since 145 in 2008, then WHY not shut him down now to avoid injury, instead of adding another 6 IP to his season total. The season is over. The logic is so irrational it grinds the back molars to dust.

So the Cubs picked up another piece of discarded raw pitching meat to fill this rotation slot for the last three weeks of the season. The Cubs claimed pitcher Jason Berken off waivers from Baltimore. It is the second Oriole cast off pitcher the Cubs have claimed in less than a month. Miguel Socolovich was the other one. It just seems odd that Epstein is collecting discarded Baltimore pitchers to add to his collection of woeful bullpen arms. Then you have to realize who is in charge in Baltimore, Dan Duquette, the general manager who built the roster for the Red Sox championships but who was forced out of Boston in a power struggle with the front office. Is Epstein trying to live off the scraps of his old boss? Trying to find some gold dust in a landfill?

Berken fits the recent Cub "profile." He is 28 years old. He pitched one game for the Orioles this season. His ERA is 18.00. Last year in relief for the O's, he appeared in 40 games. His record was 1-2, 5.36 ERA and 1.787 WHIP. Holy crap that is bad, but not Lendy Castillo bad.

So the Cubs picked up a failed 2009 major league starter and a bad 2010-11 major league reliever to ride out the season.  Berken gets a three or four start "showcase" to see if he can get a spring training invitation.

In order to pick up Berken, the Cubs placed Blake Parker on the 60 day DL.

OBSCENE FRUSTRATION

It has to be the worst series performance by the Cubs in my lifetime.

The Cubs lost all four games in D.C.: 2-1, 11-5, 9-1 and 9-2. The pitching staff was mostly throwing batting practice and the hitters unable to put together quality innings. The whole season can be summed up on the final out of the game, where Jackson hit a ball deep to the wall but jogged around second base not knowing where it was or the call on the play. He did not pick up his coaches, he just stopped after rounding second and was easily tagged out to end the game. Broadcaster Bob Brenly growled that Jackson deserved to be tagged out because he did not run hard around the bases. It was another frustrating lack of basic baseball IQ that has been the calling card for Cub players for years.

The Nationals smacked 15 home runs to the Cubs 3 (2 by Rizzo, 1 by Soriano). The Nationals batted .366 for the series, the Cubs batted only .195. The Cubs were outscored 31-9.

The Cubs have lost 17 of their last 18 road games. The Cubs have only won a meager 17 road games all season. The Cubs record of 51-86 is a pace for a team record for losses in a season. There is no life is this dullard team.

And when there is a spark, it is the bad kind. Bench coach Jamie Quirk got into an obscene laced shouting match with Nationals third base coach Bo Porter in the 5th inning. Apparently, Quirk took issue that the Nationals "were running up the score" by swinging at 3-0 pitches. Come on, this is not little league without a slaughter rule! But no, Quirk went nuts and the benches cleared with no fights. Quirk was ejected from the game.  As home plate umpire Jerry Layne said, "All that stuff that happened, it was instigated by Quirk screaming out at Porter. And the obscenities that he screamed out I just felt was inappropriate, and that's what caused everything. The reason he was ejected was he was the cause."

Quirk is part of the Cause, indeed. Why it took 137 games to realize that the Cubs team is horribly bad and the players collectively have stopped competing is hard to fathom. The Nationals are in a pennant race. Their players know that in order to win they have to continue to perform. They are not going to throttle back when a weak team comes into town. If the Cubs coaches were looking for mercy or sympathy from their opponents, this is not the time or sport for that garbage. The Nationals accomplished the goal at the start of every game: to win. So they took the Cubs to wood shed in the process. Epstein and Hoyer always talk about "the process." The process so far has not been good.

The fundamentals are horrible. Pitchers can't throw strikes. Batters can't make contact with the ball.
But the baseball IQ is just as bad. Players don't seem to instinctively know what is going to happen before and during the play. There is no anticipatory action, just eye to hand reaction to events in front of them. The Jackson out to end the game stuck in Brenly's craw because it should have never been an out if the player understood the situation he was in; if he assumed he hit a home run, don't assume it until an umpire signals a home run.

It is hard to feel any sympathy for the Cub players who got chippy all game. When Lenny Castillo, a wasted Rule 5 roster spot, threw deep inside at Bryce Harper's knees, things once again got ugly. Harper started to the mound, but catcher Steve Clevenger stopped him. When the benches emptied, Clevenger was the one looking to punch someone, anyone. Clevenger and Manny Corpas were ejected for fighting, as well as a National reliever, Mike Gonzalez. The real punishment for manager Dale Sveum was that he was NOT ejected from the game; so he had stand in the corner with an imaginary dunce hat on as his club got walloped for the third night in a row.

"It's probably one of the biggest butt-whippings I've ever gotten in my career, as a coach or player," Sveum said. "I don't remember getting man handled that bad in any kind of series I've ever been a part of." So what is Sveum going to do about it? Nothing. And that is the frustrating thing for Cub fans. The team checked out of the season this week in D.C. There really is nothing left for Cub fans to watch expect more bad baseball. The Bears NFL season starts Sunday so that is where the fan base will gravitate towards - - - expected victories in the NFC North.

Every baseball team has it faults. The Cubs currently have all the faults. Competency appears at a low ebb right now. The minor league system is still not training players to be able to perform at the major league level. The major league coaches are still not getting their players to  perform consistently at a major league level. The team's baseball IQ has to be at the low end of the league. And the front office is more focused in on pimping out players for paid lunches for additional fan revenue than developing the talent that is part of the alleged process. It is one thing to blame the last regime for the sad state of the organization, but Epstein and Hoyer have to take full blame for the ugly record and further regression of the team of this season.

A MANAGER'S WORTH

The Boston Globe reports that the Red Sox are keen on trying to acquire John Farrell, the current Toronto Blue Jay manager, to take over Bobby Valentine's position in 2013. Farrell is under contract with the Blue Jays for the 2013 season, so a trade is the only way for Boston to get their new skipper. Apparently, before hiring Valentine, the Red Sox sought to get Farrell from Toronto. Farrell was the former Red Sox pitching coach, and may have mutual interest in returning to Boston.

But major league baseball frowns upon "trades" involving managers. The Ozzie Guillen to Miami "trade" had to involve players.

The Globe writer speculates that the Blue Jays would want someone like pitcher Rubby De La Rosa in return. De La Rosa was just acquired from the Dodgers. In 2011, he appeared in 13 games, went 4-5 3.71 ERA in 60.1 IP with a 1.401 WHIP. An arm injury has sidelined him, but he is still considered a top pitching prospect.

The question is whether a manager's talent equates to team wins. The old baseball adage is that a good manager can "win" one or two games a season, a great manager maybe three or four. But how can a manager "win" a game when he is not a player on the field?

The major league manager's role is simple: fill out a daily line up card and "manage" the game from the bench by a) positioning fielders, b) giving signs to batters, c) telling runners to steal bases, d) and replacing pitchers and hitters during the game to get the best match-ups. But a manager is only as good as his talent.

A manager may have more influence on his team by leadership skills, motivational skills and teaching skills than the slight differences in line up card adjustments or giving in-game direction like bunting or hit-and-run calls with a runner on first base. It is believed that a manager's influence on his team is giving his players the best opportunity to succeed, managing the pitching staff, and keeping his reserves fresh and into the games.

On the other side, a bad manager can directly influence wins and losses on the field. Keeping a starter in the game when he is clearly out of gas, leading to more hits and runs by your opponent, is an avoidable disaster. Playing players out of their natural position, leading to errors, base runners or "four" out innings, is another avoidable disaster. Overusing your bullpen so they have tired arms is another managerial offense. Fans can see when their manager "has blown the game."

From an objective standpoint, does a manager's ability truly contribute to wins? Baseball Prospectus looked at this question and acknowledged that strategic blunders can influence a team's win-loss record, but such an effect is hard to trace over a long season of 162 games. For every decision a manager makes, the outcome is decided by his player's performance and the opponent's adjustment to the situation. In other words, managerial decisions are made in a vacuum, in the down time of the game. The results of the decisions play out on the field, which is solely based on the talent of the players.

Baseball Prospectus concluded that over a season, and from season to season, over-achieving or under-achieving teams had little impact from a managerial prospective. The conclusion: a manager has little consistent impact on whether a team over or under achieves its projected talent level in team wins and losses.

The Valentine situation in Boston is a different animal. It is a disruption. The players came out not liking the manager. The manager came out criticizing veteran players. Team performance suffered, but that may also have been a carry over from the 2011 swan song disaster. As many commentators say, when everything is said and done, it is up to the players in any sport to perform. The accountability must start on the results on the field of play. Everything else sounds more like excuses than reasons for failure.

So when we look at the proposed Farrell for De La Rosa trade, it is clear that a good manager cannot guarantee an extra one or two wins for his team. On the other hand, De La Rosa earned 4 wins in his last season, which is a tangible result on the field. It would be a bonus to the Blue Jays to acquire a player who can add 4 or more wins to the team.

Management also seems to think newer managers are fungible commodities. The Cubs new front office went through a whole series of interviews and tests of candidates, but in the end wound up with "one of their guys" in Dale Sveum, who worked with Epstein in Boston. The managerial ranks are members of a closed fraternity, because teams continually recycle fired managers from season to season. Some Cub fans believe that Sveum is nothing more than Mike Quade, version 2.0.

REBUILD OR IMPLODE

The Cubs have just become a sad team; a AAA team that is going through the motions until the last game of the season is over.  The $108 million payroll will get cut dramatically when the season ends as $26.5 million comes off the books for dead money deals like Byrd and Zambrano. But almost half of the roster could be arbitration eligible, leading with injured Matt Garza, who will still seek a raise from his current $9.5 million salary.

Things could be worse.

Epstein's old club, the Red Sox, are imploding their team as a means of purging the malcontents and rebuilding from the rubble. In 2011, the Red Sox had one of the worst September collapses in history. Epstein fled town, and player-friendly manager Terry Francona got fired. Reports had players drinking beer and eating chicken in the clubhouse during games. The players were running the asylum. Ownership was not pleased.

But ownership continued to appease the players. The team kept most of the old coaching staff (some people call that keeping the enablers). The team president pushed and got an old school manager to shake things up. He hired Bobby Valentine, who has a gruff opinionated personality.  The first shot across the complacency bow was Valentine trying to get some accountability for the poor start of third baseman Youkilis. Veterans were upset that a veteran was called on the carpet. The real situation was that Youk was going to lose his job to a rookie, which is never something veteran players like to see. The result was like smashing atoms together. The players texted management and ownership about their displeasure. Then they had a non-Valentine stealth meeting with management. Nothing was resolved. The team continued to struggle and lose. Big money players continued to have nagging injuries, dead money contracts and the overall public impression that the players were no longer likeable individuals. Recently, in Seattle, team owners and management went to "observe" their team and gather "facts" about the current situation. That is never a good sign.

YahooSports reported that the Red Sox players continue to gripe about their situation. The players also don't trust management, claiming they are the source of leaks and backstabbing comments in the press. But Boston has a long history of backstabbing people as they leave town. But now, it is an open street fight. Ken Rosenthal reported that it appears that Valentine will not be back as Red Sox skipper in 2013. If so, the players will think that is a victory.  But it is a Pyrrhic victory.

When the Red Sox shuffled $250 million worth of player baggage to the Dodgers, the only team dumb enough to take Beckett and Crawford's deals in order to get Gonzalez's offense, management pushed out of town some of the biggest clubhouse complainers.  The purge may continue this offseason as the Red Sox are in the position where they can turn over most of their roster.

The current $175 million payroll loses Ortiz ($14.575M), Matsuzaka ($10.33M), Loney ($6.375M), Ross ($3 M) , Cook ($1.5 M), Padilla ($1.5 M) and Podsednik . That is more than $37.5 million. The team is still committed to 5 players for $45.63 million (Lackey, Pedroia, Lester, Bucholz and Iglesias). Ellsbury, Bailey, Saltalamacchia, Breslow, Sweeney, Bard,  Aceves, Aviles, Miller, Morales and R. Hill are arbitration eligible, but some of them may not be tendered contracts. Arbitration may add $25 million to the payroll so in theory the Red Sox could field a roster with 9 other minimum salary players for a total 2013 payroll of  $75.2 million. An immediate $100 million in payroll reduction is a huge factor for any sports franchise.

The savings question means there are three ways to deal with the team's fortunate luck. One, save the money and hope the minor leagues will produce major league talent like Middlebrooks showed this season. The Red Sox have a lot of young arms in Melancon, Carpenter, Atchison, Beato, Doubront, DelaRosa, and Stewart. Or two, use the bankroll on the free agent market and become an overnight contender. But the free agent market may not be a blockbuster winter. Top FAs include Josh Hamilton, B.J. Upton, Nick Swisher  - - - all who will be seeking a $100 million plus contract. There are a few quality starters on the market like Greinke, Edwin Jackson, Marcum, or Sanchez. Or three, do a combination of both. Promote your best system talent and fill in with veteran pick-ups. The team really has first base, left field, right field, catcher and starting pitching holes to fill.

You would think that the Red Sox would need to do "something big" in the offseason to right the ship. But the Yankees are in a tailspin, with the lowly Orioles making a run for the divisional lead. The Blue Jays are in transition and the Rays are unpredictable. It is possible that the rest of the AL East ma, on paper, fall back this winter towards the Red Sox. After winning championships, any lovable loser persona was lost. Fans expect more championships, a dynasty like the dreaded Yankees, not more losing steaks.

The Red Sox have a unique situation drop in their laps. They can quickly rebuild their club by imploding the existing roster in another horrible losing season.

TALE OF THE BOX SCORE

In last night's Cubs loss, Sveum used 7 rookie pitchers. The Cubs have now matched a team record of using 51 different players this season. Both facts are not good signs for the future.

The box score tells the tale of woe:

Pitchers             IP     H     R    ER    BB    SO    HR    PC-ST    ERA
C Rusin
(L, 0-2)             1.0    8       5     5        1      1         2    43-27      9.00
J Chapman        1.0    0      0     0        1       1         0    15-9        0.00
B Parker            1.0    2      0     0        0       1         0    17-13      1.59
R Dolis              1.0    3     3     3         0       1         2    22-14      7.12
M Socolovich    2.0    2     1     1         0       1         1    29-18      4.50
A Cabrera          1.0    2     1     1         0       2         0    14-10       8.44
J Beliveau          1.0    2     1     1         0       1         1    28-17       4.05
Totals                 8.0    19   11   11        2       8         6   168-108


It took the rookie corps 5.75 pitches per out.  64.2 percent were for strikes. At least
36 strike zone pitches resulted in contact by the Nats hitters, or about a third of the time.

The rookies gave up almost as many home runs as strike outs. The Nationals set
a team record for number of home homers in D.C. 

It looked like spring training batting practice.

It is September, and a team needs to test its prospects to see what they may have going into next season. From this box score, we can see Chapman was rushed up the system. He was part of the Maholm-Johnson trade from Atlanta. Socolovich is another recent pick-up. Call their initial impressions incomplete.

But as a group, it looks like this is a bunch of one inning middle relievers. 

TALENT EVALUATION

Most objective observers will now conclude that the Epstein-Hoyer deal for Ian Stewart was a bust. Stewart, who was in the minors last season and had nagging injuries, was the guy to replace departing Aramis Ramirez at third. As a result, the Cubs shipped off Tyler Colvin, who lost any chance of being the Cubs right fielder to the new front office's first signee, David DeJesus.

Here is the stat lines from before the weekend:

Colvin 104 G 319 AB 93 H .292 BA 15 HR 58 RBI .334 OBP 7 SB

DeJesus 121 G 410 AB 108 H .263 BA 6 HR 39 RBI .352 OBP 6 SB

Colvin, in less games with the Rockies, has had significantly move offensive production than DeJesus.

DeJesus is waffling around Koskie Fukudome numbers. For a corner outfielder, those weak offensive and non-existence power stats (home runs and RBI) are line up killers.

It brings to mind the question of how well Esptein and Hoyer are at in evaluating talent to assemble rosters. A majority of the rosters for the Red Sox championships had roots with the former GM and his staff.

Was Stewart and adequate replacement at third? No.
Was the mid-season replacement Luis Valbuena any better? No.

Was DeJesus in RF the player people expected? No.
Was DeJesus better RF than Colvin? No.