For the third time in about a week, a Cub player has gone off on the manager.
This time closer Kevin Gregg got into it with Dale Sveum.
Patrick Mooney of CSNChicago writes that the meltdown may have been partly miscommunication by Gregg on the other two pitcher incidents and partly Gregg giving up 4 runs to Atlanta in yesterday's 9th inning. It also boils down to Gregg being threatened by Sveum's comments that he would use Pedro Strop in save situations in September. But after making that statement, Sveum kept Strop in the 8th inning role. So why was really Gregg upset?
Gregg was signed off the scrapheap by the Cubs after the season started; no other team wanted Gregg. After Friday's appearance, Gregg hit a $500,000 contract bonus for appearances. Not bad for a guy who may not have played at all this season. But Gregg, who is 35, has no job guarantee for 2014 so he may have been defensive about his situation.
During his Friday interviews, Gregg made some strong comments to the media.
“A professional courtesy would be nice," he said in response to the question about Strop becoming the new closer. “I expected to be treated a little bit better than this, but they
have decisions to make. When they want to go in a new direction, they
can treat the players how they want. Unfortunately, we’re under their
control. It’s not necessarily how I would have done it.”
Gregg was a former teammate of Strop's in Baltimore. He was asked about Strop's ability to become a closer. “Can Pedro close next year? I don’t know. They’re going to have to
take the chance and see. Is September going to be a telltale sign of
what’s going on? No, it’s not the same baseball this time of year.”
A follow-up question Mooney reports was: Is your issue with Epstein or Sveum?
“Unfortunately for Dale, I think it’s guilty by association,” Gregg
said. “But I think the decision — from what I understand — is from
above. And they want to see what they have for next year. And they’re
going to use 10 games to figure out if Pedro can close next year.”
Afterward, Gregg was pulled into the manager's office by Epstein who was not happy about Gregg's comments. Epstein told his closer that he felt "disrepected" by his comments, demanded an apology and said he would make a decision on whether to release the pitcher. "Unfortunately, there was miscommunication or Kevin misunderstood. But he
ran to the media and that was his decision. I told him, as a man, I
didn’t respect that,” Epstein said.
Gregg then started to make some apologies to the media, but it seems clear that Esptein's approach to player issues is to snap back and threaten to release them on the spot ("the Boston way?") Epstein's reaction shows that he may not have a good handle on player relations since he could not recognize that Gregg was upset with his manager's comments that personally affect his job status and livelihood. Epstein took Gregg's actions as being disrespectful to him (personally) which is not how human relations departments deal with high pressure employees.
Gregg and his fellow veteran pitchers are upset with the Cubs and the front office. Epstein has put together another year of a bad roster. It is frustrating for players who want to win to know that they do not have enough resources to win.
But this latest dust-up shows that Epstein is still more focused on his plan and his process than actually solving immediate problems. For example, releasing Gregg with 10 days to go in the season serves no purpose but to signal to other free agent players that the Cubs management does not address player concerns in a rational manner.
Also, if Gregg was not in Epstein's 2014 plans (since he signed Fujikawa to be the closer anyway), why did he trade Gregg to another team by the July deadline? Yes, a 35-year old reliever may not get back much in return, but he was a bona fide closer and contenders would pay something for that insurance. Instead, Gregg remained oddly a Cub for the entire season.
Gregg in 60 games played (50 game finishes), he is 2-5, 3.45 ERA with 32 saves and 1.383 WHIP. Strop, in 34 games played (6 game finishes), he is 2-2-, 2.78 ERA, with 0 saves and 0.928 WHIP.
There is no doubt that an organization should look to the future in meaningless September games. If the Cubs wanted to try out Strop at closer, there is nothing stopping Sveum from doing it. However, professionalism in the locker room would dictate that Sveum should have told Gregg first so he would not learn it from the media (which clearly happened in this case).
This incident is another strike on Sveum's record as well. A manager is supposed to be the communicator in the locker room. Sveum failed to do so in regard to the Gregg situation. It quickly escalated into a media circus and upset Esptein, his boss, who seems more focused on image than results.
The fall out of the incident is that Gregg will not be back in 2014. Strop will be given a try out at closer during spring training. And many potential second tier free agents may question whether Chicago is a good place to land this off season.
