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Why is payroll such an ongoing story for the Cubs? · North Side Territory: A Chicago Cubs Podcast

0:05
Speaker 1: Welcome into North Side Territory. Foul Territory Networks Cubs Podcast.
0:09
Speaker 1: I'm Sahadev Sharma with my partner Patrick Mooney. We are
0:13
Speaker 1: your Cubs beat writers over at the Athletic. Patrick, it
0:16
Speaker 1: is opening day at Wrigley, the home opener. Uh, this
0:20
Speaker 1: is their fourth opener of the season for them. Choked
0:25
Speaker 1: with Greig Council. If he's uh, if he's ready for
0:28
Speaker 1: all these openers. Uh, it's a it's a lot for everyone. Uh,
0:33
Speaker 1: but but they're they're finally home Wriglely. Uh, the Wrigley opener.
0:37
Speaker 1: Will see that the weather isn't the best, But you
0:40
Speaker 1: know that's I think, I think we're all kind of
0:43
Speaker 1: used to that. Up at the Athletic today is everyone's
0:48
Speaker 1: favorite topic. We are we are jumping right into the budget. Uh.
0:55
Speaker 1: It's it's a topic because uh, I mean it has
0:59
Speaker 1: to be right. The Cubs have the third highest revenue
1:03
Speaker 1: and their payroll is depending on what you look at it,
1:09
Speaker 1: it's in the twelve thirteen, fourteen area. That gap is
1:15
Speaker 1: eye opening. You know, it's hard to look at those
1:18
Speaker 1: numbers and not you know, kind of side eye at
1:22
Speaker 1: or tilt your head and wonder what's going on here?
1:26
Speaker 1: And it's not. I think it's important to know that
1:30
Speaker 1: this isn't something that you and I are the only
1:33
Speaker 1: ones focused on. It's something that people around the league
1:37
Speaker 1: talk about. You know, this is howity that the Cubs
1:40
Speaker 1: are should be. Are they the Dodgers? Are the Yankees?
1:45
Speaker 1: No they're not. But why are they behind? Why are
1:48
Speaker 1: they so far behind? Why are they not in the
1:51
Speaker 1: top five or six? That I think is the question
1:54
Speaker 1: we hear and have been hearing for a while now
1:58
Speaker 1: and continue to hear. Thought. I think we, at least
2:01
Speaker 1: I did. I got some people saying, oh, here, here
2:03
Speaker 1: the Cubs go when they got Kyle Tucker, and then
2:06
Speaker 1: where were the finishing pieces? Where were the Where was
2:09
Speaker 1: the Alex Bregman move right like that was supposed to
2:11
Speaker 1: be the next one or something like that, a big
2:14
Speaker 1: picture something.
2:16
Speaker 2: Or hiring Craig Counsel. Hire Craig Counsel. Surely you're going
2:20
Speaker 2: to give him all these you know, shining new toys
2:23
Speaker 2: that they couldn't afford in Milwaukee. I guess let's start
2:29
Speaker 2: with because part of this story was, in addition to
2:33
Speaker 2: all the people we've talked to, and this includes sort
2:38
Speaker 2: of like, you know, conversations, ongoing conversations for years, right
2:43
Speaker 2: of sort of how this thing was built up leading
2:48
Speaker 2: to twenty sixteen, how it was taken down kind of
2:52
Speaker 2: during COVID H and the twenty one deadline, and then
2:55
Speaker 2: how it was kind of gradually built back up. So
2:58
Speaker 2: the array of people were talking to like players, coaches, scouts,
3:05
Speaker 2: executive agents and not just you know, Cubs personnel. This
3:11
Speaker 2: is a league wide thing of like, if you're an agent,
3:16
Speaker 2: you want the Cubs involved, right, if you're a big
3:20
Speaker 2: name free agent, you want the Cubs involved, and you're
3:24
Speaker 2: probably pretty curious. You know, Chicago cells itself. Cubs sell themselves.
3:28
Speaker 2: That's what the Cubs always like to say. So for
3:32
Speaker 2: the central thrust of the story was what you mentioned,
3:35
Speaker 2: this disparity between revenues and what we know about payroll, right,
3:42
Speaker 2: because there are some estimates I think just suddenly came
3:45
Speaker 2: out today USA today had the Cubs at ninth in payroll,
3:51
Speaker 2: but still not the band that you would expect them
3:55
Speaker 2: to be in. In the interests of fairness, we also
4:01
Speaker 2: talk to people on the Cub's business side, you know,
4:05
Speaker 2: affiliated with ownership, you know, people who convey that point
4:10
Speaker 2: of view as well. They would say the overall baseball
4:16
Speaker 2: spend is higher. That payroll does not account for all
4:22
Speaker 2: the investments they've made, including a certain manager from Milwaukee.
4:28
Speaker 2: They said last year they were fifth. We don't there's
4:30
Speaker 2: no publicly available data to track that. They say that
4:36
Speaker 2: there is the possibility that that payroll number we see
4:41
Speaker 2: could go higher via the trade deadline. They don't know
4:45
Speaker 2: what's out there. If the team takes care of business,
4:47
Speaker 2: the business side will be there, and we have seen
4:50
Speaker 2: that in the past, right, Castianos, that was a Tom
4:55
Speaker 2: Ricketts giving a thumbs up, like this team needs something.
5:00
Speaker 2: Craig Kimber was added under sort of different circumstances, but
5:04
Speaker 2: like they have a roughly twenty plus almost thirty million,
5:10
Speaker 2: I think before they get to the CBT.
5:13
Speaker 1: Right, so there is like.
5:17
Speaker 2: An opportunity there where it could go higher.
5:20
Speaker 1: I was thinking about that, Patrick. There's no way to
5:26
Speaker 1: make that up though. You're not spending thirty million at
5:29
Speaker 1: the deadline or twenty five or twenty because it's not
5:32
Speaker 1: for the full season. It's two months of the salary,
5:35
Speaker 1: so that means you'd be adding, say it's twenty let's
5:38
Speaker 1: go on the low end and say it's twenty that
5:40
Speaker 1: still would be sixty million in salary for a full year,
5:44
Speaker 1: right because you're getting about two months so to you know,
5:47
Speaker 1: a third of their contract that doesn't happen, you know,
5:53
Speaker 1: like Wan Soto is not being traded here, Shoheyo Tani
5:56
Speaker 1: is not being traded. So it's a I get it.
6:02
Speaker 1: I get that concept, and you do like it has
6:05
Speaker 1: been something we've talked about over the years, right, like
6:08
Speaker 1: you always want to leave, as they say, like a
6:10
Speaker 1: little powder dry, but not twenty twenty five million. That's
6:16
Speaker 1: not like that's that's going to be hard to make
6:19
Speaker 1: up that groud.
6:21
Speaker 2: No, we are. The idea behind the story was that
6:26
Speaker 2: it's really hard to get some of this information, almost
6:30
Speaker 2: impossible on some of it. There is a lot out
6:34
Speaker 2: there that we are trying to piece together so that
6:38
Speaker 2: fans can make up their own minds. They probably already have.
6:44
Speaker 2: There was a graphic out there. You actually sent it
6:47
Speaker 2: to me. I had seen it. It was our got
6:50
Speaker 2: or I don't know who brook Skate is, but brook Gates.
6:53
Speaker 2: Brook Skate put together this chart that outlined comparison of
6:59
Speaker 2: revenue to payroll that really struck a nerve within the
7:04
Speaker 2: Cubs organization. That was something that they wanted to address.
7:13
Speaker 2: We can't see their books, but part of the reason
7:17
Speaker 2: that they just felt that not having aligned for expenses
7:21
Speaker 2: was totally misleading, like, oh, here's your revenue, here's your PA,
7:25
Speaker 2: which I think anyone who's walked into Wrigley Field can
7:28
Speaker 2: get a sense of what a massive operation it is
7:34
Speaker 2: when they own the ballpark. It's not fortunately, it's not
7:38
Speaker 2: a municipality paying for it. There's one of those that
7:42
Speaker 2: the White Sox play in, but capital expendituters operating expenses
7:49
Speaker 2: a huge payout in terms of revenue sharing. This is
7:54
Speaker 2: not us trying to make excuses for it. This is
7:59
Speaker 2: just trying to give our listeners and our readers a
8:02
Speaker 2: sense of where they're coming from on this. And I
8:06
Speaker 2: think you know, one thing that's stood out too is
8:11
Speaker 2: like the arms race in the National League, in their eyes,
8:18
Speaker 2: is kind of out of control and they're just at
8:20
Speaker 2: this moment stuck in the wrong league. If you're looking
8:24
Speaker 2: for an easy path to October and into the World Series.
8:28
Speaker 2: That's all of these organizations and ownerships groups that have
8:34
Speaker 2: started behaving differently basically since that post twenty sixteen window,
8:41
Speaker 2: like they're all seemingly consolidated in the National League, right.
8:48
Speaker 1: I want to touch on that because there's some important
8:51
Speaker 1: things all about the National League and their division. Let's
8:55
Speaker 1: take a quick break before we get to that.
8:57
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9:59
Speaker 1: Get's easy. I think to look at the division, right
10:03
Speaker 1: and and say, well, the Cubs outspend all those teams
10:07
Speaker 1: by quite a bit, right, And and I think it's
10:09
Speaker 1: also fair to point out that they outspend them, and
10:13
Speaker 1: they haven't won the division in a full season and
10:16
Speaker 1: quite a while. Right, it's been since twenty seventeen since
10:21
Speaker 1: they won the division, right, and eighteen since they made
10:25
Speaker 1: the playoffs, and that was they lost the division on
10:28
Speaker 1: that basically that that was a great run by the Brewers.
10:31
Speaker 1: In September, Cubs won ninety five games. That was good.
10:34
Speaker 1: That was a good Cubs team, Like we I don't
10:36
Speaker 1: want to discount that team. And then since then it's
10:39
Speaker 1: it's been, you know, not much twenty twenty. You can
10:41
Speaker 1: give them that division win. I'm not gonna complain about it,
10:45
Speaker 1: but it's you know, that's a sixty game season. Who
10:48
Speaker 1: knows what would have happened if they played one hundred
10:51
Speaker 1: more games. I think that's a fair criticism of Jed Hoyer, Right,
10:56
Speaker 1: And and and Cubs for an office, small operations in general, right,
11:03
Speaker 1: But I think you also have to, like, I think
11:05
Speaker 1: it's also unfair to say that's their only competition. The
11:10
Speaker 1: goal can't just be to win the division. You're competing
11:14
Speaker 1: against you you said this, You're competing against teams that
11:17
Speaker 1: are spending in another stratosphere. And it's it is a
11:21
Speaker 1: level that the Cubs are not competing against. And I
11:26
Speaker 1: get it. Being competing with the Dodgers and the Mets
11:29
Speaker 1: and the Phillies right now financially is a little it's
11:34
Speaker 1: it's tough to swallow for some of these owners. I'm
11:37
Speaker 1: not again, I don't want to make excuses for them,
11:39
Speaker 1: but if you want to, if you want to say, okay, like,
11:42
Speaker 1: let let those teams be. Why are the Diamondbacks spending
11:46
Speaker 1: more money than the Cubs, you know why? Like Atlanta Braves,
11:50
Speaker 1: Houston Astros. I know Houston's in the AL. I'm just
11:52
Speaker 1: naming some teams that are ahead of them. Listen, some
11:55
Speaker 1: of these teams are cutting and not spending as much
11:59
Speaker 1: as they were maybe last year or two years ago.
12:02
Speaker 1: Here's the thing. The Cups haven't been there since twenty twenty.
12:06
Speaker 1: Like they haven't been there. They've been cutting, cutting, cutting
12:09
Speaker 1: since then. So it's one thing to cut and reset
12:14
Speaker 1: every now and then and take a step back, but
12:17
Speaker 1: to not go back up there. I just don't like,
12:21
Speaker 1: we can't say. I thought the executive in our piece
12:26
Speaker 1: made a good point right like there it's a little
12:29
Speaker 1: jarring to see where they are. But essentially I thought
12:32
Speaker 1: what I took away from those quotes was, this is
12:37
Speaker 1: a rival executive, to be clear. If I didn't if
12:39
Speaker 1: I didn't make that clear, essentially saying, you know, were
12:45
Speaker 1: that they've been in on guys, they haven't gotten that deal.
12:48
Speaker 1: We knew what they were doing when they sold off
12:49
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one. They announced what they were doing,
12:52
Speaker 1: but you kind of expected them to start spending at
12:54
Speaker 1: some point. And I think Kyle Tucker is the test case, right,
12:58
Speaker 1: this is where the focus goes what happens with Kyle
13:03
Speaker 1: Tucker And when you start like those cries for him
13:08
Speaker 1: signing aren't gonna stop anytime soon. The way he's playing,
13:12
Speaker 1: the way fans have all it's been nine games and fans,
13:16
Speaker 1: fans have forgotten what it's like to watch a player
13:19
Speaker 1: like that, Like this is the way he started the season.
13:23
Speaker 1: Is the way Chris Bryant played in twenty sixteen, right,
13:26
Speaker 1: like a superstar level performance that you consider for an
13:30
Speaker 1: MVP like he that's a type of player. Is we
13:33
Speaker 1: knew this, but I think sometimes when you see it
13:35
Speaker 1: every day, it's different. Right, It's a It's a reminder
13:38
Speaker 1: of the type of talent that elevates a team and
13:41
Speaker 1: a group. I agree with that that statement that this
13:46
Speaker 1: is kind of the test case. Are are you in this?
13:49
Speaker 1: Are you a big market team that can flex your
13:52
Speaker 1: financial might? I haven't seen it for a long time.
13:57
Speaker 1: I have not seen that for years.
14:00
Speaker 2: No, I mean, and I do wonder if some of
14:02
Speaker 2: this conversation would be a little different if they had
14:07
Speaker 2: signed Tanner Scott and then maybe done that would have
14:12
Speaker 2: opened up some other moves. Obviously, if Alex Bregman had
14:17
Speaker 2: picked the Cubs, it's not this isn't the story like
14:24
Speaker 2: that would have been the guy. You can go back
14:30
Speaker 2: the previous spring training of Matt Chapman with a deal
14:34
Speaker 2: that you know was not at the time a six figure, sorry,
14:41
Speaker 2: a six year, nine figure type of commitment. It was
14:45
Speaker 2: a really short to medium term deal depending on how
14:49
Speaker 2: the he performed and the opt out decisions or not.
14:56
Speaker 2: And I mean he's a guy who had a seven
14:59
Speaker 2: I think it was a seven point point one war
15:01
Speaker 2: season per Baseball Reference. And the Cubs use seven different
15:06
Speaker 2: third basemen last year to start games, and all seven
15:10
Speaker 2: are gone from the organization. So it's just a I
15:16
Speaker 2: think we all I think most people can understand, like, hey,
15:21
Speaker 2: a fifteen year contract for a player, even when he's
15:24
Speaker 2: probably going for the Hall of Fame, is a little crazy, right,
15:27
Speaker 2: Like you have to be a little if you want
15:30
Speaker 2: to what's the Andrew Freedom quote, If you want to
15:31
Speaker 2: be rational on every free agent, you're never gonna sign
15:34
Speaker 2: for your third fevorite free something like that.
15:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, something like that.
15:38
Speaker 2: And like, you know, the perception that Steve Cohen is
15:45
Speaker 2: essentially doesn't care how much money he loses on an
15:50
Speaker 2: annual basis with the team is something that is almost
15:55
Speaker 2: impossible for another team to compete with, right, Like if
15:58
Speaker 2: he's just viewing it as this is my passion, and
16:04
Speaker 2: if this is a vehicle for something much larger, whether
16:08
Speaker 2: it's a you know, a real estate development thing or
16:11
Speaker 2: the appreciation or like he can just write that off,
16:14
Speaker 2: Like that's hard to compete with. And the Dodgers have
16:16
Speaker 2: this amazing TV deal and they've built this ideal environment
16:21
Speaker 2: that is hard to compete with. But after that, it's
16:23
Speaker 2: kind of like, what's going on? Why? You know, why
16:28
Speaker 2: is this team that really heralded itself as this you know,
16:34
Speaker 2: business baseball behemoth when the renovations were underway, and you
16:41
Speaker 2: know the team was going to the World Series, Like
16:44
Speaker 2: what happened? And I think a lot of it is
16:48
Speaker 2: how these other teams adapted or changed hands. Steve calling
16:54
Speaker 2: the biggest example. Everyone knows the Dodgers, but it's even
16:59
Speaker 2: you know John Middleton, you know, who comes from a
17:02
Speaker 2: family that had a big tobacco business, uh and that
17:07
Speaker 2: they had sold and he's taken on more investors in
17:11
Speaker 2: the Phillies in part you know that money probably helps
17:17
Speaker 2: the payroll, right. And Peter Seidler before his death was
17:24
Speaker 2: just didn't didn't care. He wanted to do something special
17:27
Speaker 2: for his city and really just totally reimagined that franchise.
17:34
Speaker 2: You have the Braves building the battery in Atlanta that
17:37
Speaker 2: has self turned. You know, that's a Wrigleyville idea that
17:41
Speaker 2: they just put when you've been there, right that like
17:45
Speaker 2: just put it out in the suburbs right by a
17:47
Speaker 2: highway and let the people come to you. Uh. You know,
17:53
Speaker 2: the Diamondbacks are just a well run team that does
17:57
Speaker 2: do kind of Corbyn burns deals uh out of nowhere.
18:02
Speaker 2: So you know those are as much as uh as
18:07
Speaker 2: underwhelming as the Central is. Like that's not the endgame
18:11
Speaker 2: or it shouldn't be.
18:12
Speaker 1: Right the center. The the reason this is an issue, right,
18:17
Speaker 1: like it's it's more than just where they sit right,
18:20
Speaker 1: Like they're too low right on that list when we
18:23
Speaker 1: look at their team payroll, but you want to look
18:27
Speaker 1: at what when you talk about their division and say, well,
18:29
Speaker 1: they're outspending everyone, they need to really hammer that home.
18:33
Speaker 1: They need to use that money like as huge leverage
18:38
Speaker 1: because they don't have the advantages and that that's their
18:41
Speaker 1: advantage finances, right. The CBA is built to force them
18:48
Speaker 1: to use that as their biggest advantage and they're not
18:52
Speaker 1: fully leveraging that because when I when I say that,
18:55
Speaker 1: what I mean is all these other teams in the
18:57
Speaker 1: Cub's division they get extra draft picks right when they
19:01
Speaker 1: sign If they decide to sign a big name free agent,
19:04
Speaker 1: they lose lesser draft picks than the Cubs would. The
19:07
Speaker 1: Cubs don't get these these extra draft picks that that
19:11
Speaker 1: the Cardinals and the Pirates and and the Brewers and
19:15
Speaker 1: the Reds get like they get draft picks every year
19:18
Speaker 1: because they're small market, not not for losing, not just
19:21
Speaker 1: for losing free agents, which they get better draft picks
19:23
Speaker 1: than the Cubs would for losing free agents. They they
19:26
Speaker 1: get it just because they're small market. Like it's this
19:30
Speaker 1: is it seems small to the fans. This is huge
19:35
Speaker 1: for building a farm system for really like front offices
19:40
Speaker 1: look at this stuff as gold, right, Like like I
19:43
Speaker 1: we don't. We don't have their internal numbers. But my
19:46
Speaker 1: guess is the valuation of those are quite high. Right,
19:49
Speaker 1: those draft picks.
19:51
Speaker 2: You can trade them too, right, or some of them.
19:54
Speaker 1: There's some of those picks that you can trade. I'd
19:57
Speaker 1: have to look at the CBA to remember exactly which ones.
19:59
Speaker 1: But I think you're I think you're right. I think
20:01
Speaker 1: it is those, So I mean, that's it's even more valuable.
20:05
Speaker 1: Where's that's another piece of leverage that the Cubs just
20:08
Speaker 1: don't have. Listen, the Cubs, I think there had been
20:14
Speaker 1: some debate about this because the Cubs had been losing
20:19
Speaker 1: for all those years from like twenty one to whatever
20:22
Speaker 1: twenty three. The Cubs are a destination. They have a
20:27
Speaker 1: lot of things that the players want. Prime among them
20:32
Speaker 1: is the city of Chicago. Like people want to come here,
20:35
Speaker 1: like talk to players. They'll they'll offense that we do
20:39
Speaker 1: that anonymous poll every year and and the when we've
20:43
Speaker 1: done it in the past, one of them like, what's
20:47
Speaker 1: the city you love to go to on a road trip? Right,
20:50
Speaker 1: Obviously we don't get these answers. I'm talking about all
20:52
Speaker 1: the other beat writers. Chicago's often way up there. It's
20:55
Speaker 1: New York and Chicago. That's where people want to go.
20:58
Speaker 1: People love Chicago. People like coming here in the summer.
21:00
Speaker 1: They want to play it Wrigley. Uh. I know fans
21:03
Speaker 1: get frustrated with the losses, but it is a destination
21:06
Speaker 1: and that they that they they'll ask Cubs players like, hey,
21:12
Speaker 1: throw throw my name out there to your to your
21:14
Speaker 1: front office. Hey, what's it like there? Hey, I want
21:17
Speaker 1: to come play for the Cubs. And they're not in
21:20
Speaker 1: on these guys. I mean to enter an off season
21:23
Speaker 1: when you know you need like you when they told
21:27
Speaker 1: us that that pitching was their number one need right
21:31
Speaker 1: going into the offseason and and not even in on
21:35
Speaker 1: Corbyn Burns and Max Freed that that says a lot, right,
21:39
Speaker 1: that can't be the way they operate, and I think
21:41
Speaker 1: that when you know it, when you look at them
21:46
Speaker 1: out spending the rest of the division, it's I I
21:49
Speaker 1: agree that. I mean, that's just a fact they are.
21:52
Speaker 1: But it has to be at a higher level. It
21:54
Speaker 1: has to again, not the Dodgers. I'm not saying that.
21:57
Speaker 1: I think fans would love that and deserve that. That's
22:00
Speaker 1: not that's not going to happen. But why are the
22:04
Speaker 1: Diamondbacks in on corporn Burns and the Cubs can't be? Why? Why? Why?
22:08
Speaker 1: Why are things like that happening?
22:10
Speaker 2: Uh?
22:11
Speaker 1: Is it's just jarring to see.
22:14
Speaker 2: Well, look, at least you won't have to ask those
22:16
Speaker 2: type of questions when the game goes through an absurdly
22:20
Speaker 2: long workstoppage. Sixth season right now, all valid points, I
22:28
Speaker 2: think at this point, I forget which coach said it,
22:32
Speaker 2: though we have more than enough to win with. I
22:34
Speaker 2: feel like that's one of those sort of like meme
22:38
Speaker 2: meme type quotes and Cubs due they should win this division.
22:44
Speaker 2: It will. This is Jed Hoyer's hand picked roster. I
22:50
Speaker 2: mean every player who's come through the door, he's been
22:55
Speaker 2: a part of the organization. There can I mean, there
22:58
Speaker 2: can't be anyone still playing who's there in twenty eleven.
23:03
Speaker 1: Uh but still around?
23:07
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, we got what I mean showda you know
23:14
Speaker 2: was they're fine? And if he stays healthy and pitches
23:18
Speaker 2: like an All star again, that's good sign. Look, Sayah
23:22
Speaker 2: needs to be He doesn't have to be the man
23:25
Speaker 2: because Kyle Tucker's here, but he's got to have his
23:28
Speaker 2: best season the one that he's shown flashes up and
23:31
Speaker 2: hasn't put together yet. Dansby Swanson, almost the biggest contract
23:36
Speaker 2: in franchise history, has to have a great year on
23:40
Speaker 2: both sides of the ball, not just on defense. I
23:43
Speaker 2: mean they've talked up this farm system all right. Is
23:47
Speaker 2: PCA gonna be on kind of more of a Jackson
23:52
Speaker 2: male trajectory or is he gonna kind of just fall
23:56
Speaker 2: a little flat this year? Matt Shaw obviously had a
24:00
Speaker 2: lot on his shoulders. Can they make keep making moves
24:06
Speaker 2: to get better? I think with the padres in town
24:08
Speaker 2: is a good reminder of what a j preller has done.
24:11
Speaker 2: Like it doesn't always it's not very conventional, it's not
24:17
Speaker 2: kind of by the front office handbook that they seem
24:21
Speaker 2: to hand out from the MLB headquarters in New York.
24:26
Speaker 2: But he made early trade trades outside of the trading
24:31
Speaker 2: traditional trading cycle to to get that team better last year.
24:35
Speaker 2: And he kept making moves. I mean that's on Jed
24:39
Speaker 2: and Carter Hawkins and uh yeah, great counsel Like I'm
24:45
Speaker 2: every time like a the bullpen blows a game, like you,
24:52
Speaker 2: it can't be this knee jerk. Well, like your council
24:55
Speaker 2: doesn't know what he's doing. But over the course of
24:57
Speaker 2: this year, we have to see the impact, right, And
25:02
Speaker 2: that's right Matt Shaw and others being great kind of
25:08
Speaker 2: Ben Brown finding his identity the next maintaining Porter Hodge
25:14
Speaker 2: and finding the next Porter Hodge. That kind of September strength.
25:20
Speaker 2: That going back to that twenty eighteen when they chased
25:23
Speaker 2: on the Cubs, Like Cubs team has to keep getting
25:27
Speaker 2: better and that falls on the manager. So it's you know,
25:31
Speaker 2: the Cubs for a team that like didn't doesn't always
25:35
Speaker 2: make the huge splash and isn't like, you know, a
25:39
Speaker 2: villain to the rest of the league. There's like just
25:44
Speaker 2: so much to unpack here, like so many levels of
25:49
Speaker 2: the organization. It's going to be it is not going
25:52
Speaker 2: to be boring.
25:54
Speaker 1: Yeah, and uh, to kind of end on a positive note.
25:58
Speaker 1: It's where we're nine games in. I think they look good.
26:02
Speaker 1: I like, you know that they've had a weird start
26:05
Speaker 1: to the year. It is a tough it is a
26:07
Speaker 1: tough league. Like like we've said, they're they're gonna be
26:12
Speaker 1: challenged against an undefeated Padres team. They missedill and ceased
26:14
Speaker 1: though that's a that's a nice break for them. I
26:18
Speaker 1: don't know. I I I have optimism for this group
26:21
Speaker 1: because I think there's talent there and I do think
26:23
Speaker 1: they're the best talent wise on paper, the best team
26:26
Speaker 1: in the NL Central. Uh. If they get some of
26:29
Speaker 1: these surprises, like like like we talked about, like you know,
26:32
Speaker 1: like Jed loves to say that outperform uh projections, If
26:36
Speaker 1: they get some of those, you know, maybe they move
26:39
Speaker 1: into that upper echelon of teams. It seems like the
26:43
Speaker 1: Dodgers are in another stratosphere that they they they were
26:47
Speaker 1: looking terrible the other night and and still win a
26:49
Speaker 1: game because they just have too much talent. Uh. It's
26:54
Speaker 1: it almost feels unfair at times. It's the first time
26:56
Speaker 1: in a while that I've watched the team and said,
26:58
Speaker 1: is it can you make like the perfect baseball team? Again,
27:02
Speaker 1: We're too early in the season to know for sure,
27:04
Speaker 1: but they look really really talented. I mean they are,
27:13
Speaker 1: But I do want to end on that positive note.
27:16
Speaker 1: I think I think Jed Hoyer has built a good
27:18
Speaker 1: team here. Is it a great team? Could it be better? Yes?
27:20
Speaker 1: I do think it could be better. It's not quite great.
27:24
Speaker 1: I think they they have a chance to be really
27:26
Speaker 1: good because they have youth, and you never know with
27:28
Speaker 1: youth where like if the if the youth performs and
27:32
Speaker 1: if multiple of those players perform. Now you're talking about
27:34
Speaker 1: a really really good team, right, But I like this group.
27:39
Speaker 1: I think it's it's early on. I've seen some things
27:42
Speaker 1: that that give me some optimism. Uh even even with
27:46
Speaker 1: the hiccups from the bullpen and some of the starting pitching,
27:49
Speaker 1: the offense just looks looks like it could be good.
27:51
Speaker 1: It's nine games. Well, there's a lot of baseball to
27:54
Speaker 1: be played, so it could be way off on there
27:57
Speaker 1: and they could win eighty three games. Again. Uh yeah, Patrick,
28:01
Speaker 1: I I don't want I don't want the this with
28:04
Speaker 1: with the home opener about to start. I don't want
28:07
Speaker 1: to crap on on the Cubs fans optimism, uh, like
28:11
Speaker 1: the spending matters and and that and what we talked
28:14
Speaker 1: about does is relevant. Uh, but you know, I think
28:18
Speaker 1: there's there's reason for optimism for the twenty twenty five season,
28:21
Speaker 1: and hope Cups fans embrace that and and get through
28:26
Speaker 1: the rain or whatever we're gonna be sitting.
28:28
Speaker 2: You'll have you'll have like office hours at g Man
28:31
Speaker 2: Tavn or something. If you want to kill everyone's optimism.
28:35
Speaker 1: Sure we can do office hours that g Man cheez. Uh,
28:43
Speaker 1: that's off the clock for sure. Yeah, all right, everyone,
28:47
Speaker 1: enjoy opening, uh the home opener. Hopefully many of you
28:50
Speaker 1: are getting out to regular field this weekend. Hopefully the
28:53
Speaker 1: sun peaks out and we get three games in and
28:56
Speaker 1: and the weather turns soon enough. Thanks so much for
29:00
Speaker 1: listen to everyone. This is North Side Territory. Make sure
29:02
Speaker 1: to subscribe to the YouTube channel Rate and Review on
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Speaker 1: all different platforms. Make sure to subscribe to The Athletic,
29:09
Speaker 1: where Patrick and I are on top of all things Cubs,
29:11
Speaker 1: and you can read that column there on the New
29:13
Speaker 1: York Times. Thanks so much for listening to everyone. Take
29:16
Speaker 1: care