The Cubs dismal playoff run ended in another whimper.
Since the 2016 Championship, the Cubs have steadily gone down hill in October.
And it is surprising since they had home field advantage for this run.
The promise of a Cub dynasty was an illusion.
Theo Epstein has one season left on his contract. He will leave the Cubs because he is being handcuffed by the Cubs business side and the bitter taste of bad contracts which led to his down fall.
The Cubs only have 16 players under contract for 2021 (assuming the Cubs are not stupid to exercise $25 million option on Lester).
The projected payroll for those 16 is still $162 million.
Another $16 million is minimum to fill out 40 man roster. That is $178 million.
You have your starting OF and IF in tact, but no bench.
And you only have two starting pitchers (Darvish and Hendricks).
And you are stuck with Kimbrel as your closer (Jeffrees is a FA).
Consideringwe estimate Ricketts lost at least $75 million on baseball and his failing real estate development (many tenants went bust during the pandemic), the Cubs will not spend any money (again) as the core 4 become free agents after 2021 (Rizzo, Bryant, Baez, Schwarber). There will be no "let's go for it" final charge by this team. It looks more likely it will fizzle before the end of next spring training.
The prospect of another LONG rebuild is here. The Cubs minor league system is barren. Epstein did not draft and develop one quality starting pitcher during his tenure. The post-2020 pandemic season may lead to a very tense stand-off with the players union in the last year of the CBA. Owners will demand lowering the luxury tax (as a means of repressing salaries). Owners will probably try to keep the 60 man bubble taxi squad program in lieu of spending millions on a minor league system that did not play in 2020. (It is important to note that minor league players won the first part of their class action lawsuit against minor league owners and MLB for being paid less than the minimum wage.)
Another fall out from 2020 is that the Cubs (and most clubs) terminated most of their scouting and training staffs in order to save money. The Cubs were an administrative top heavy organization so it is doubtful that Epstein in his final year will have the budget to spend to re-hire his former troops.
If the Cubs 2020 was a lost season, then 2021 could be a dead one.
