Yes. Hopefully our teams win a lot or lose a lot.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Right. So why do you continually say "when are they going to sign Manny and Ortiz?"
It comes off like you're saying they wont win without just spending on free agency.



Im not sure Ricketts is a big market owner.

Hopefully the young guys do well on both sides.


So many IFS.

Sox fans seem pretty confident in their guys though.

Yeah, he's like the guy who buys way more house than he can afford, has no money for furniture or proper upkeep, and then wonders why no one wants to come over.

_________________

I think it's because there is at least something to be excited for. I think future MLB Executive of the Year Rick Hahn still has a lot of work to do.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I mean specifically the Fab 4 prospects.


Sox fans pretty excited. Over the moon about these Hahn deals.


You have to wonder if Cub fans would be mocked for such a stance.

The Sox get a pass for being a Championship fanbase.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I guess that kills the ol' "Sox fans are negative and/or ultra realistic about their team".


That 05 team was something else though. So good.

It's not ridiculous. An NBA lottery pick is usually ready to play in the league for which he was drafted. Most minor league players will never succeed in the big leagues. I just don't worry about them. When they're on my team, they're on my team. When they're in the minors, they're nobody.

And that's what I think the difference is between most Cubs fans and most Sox fans. You can deny this as much as you want, but it seems pretty clear that a large portion of Cubs fans think the core of a future World Series champion is sitting in Batavia or Daytona right now. They know it. It's gonna happen.

Sox fans, on the other hand, aren't ecstatic about the great things we think Eaton and Davidson are going to do. We're just happy we don't have to see Conor Gillaspie at third and Alejandro DeAza playing center and leading off anymore.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Why shouldn't Sox fans be excited about our GM acquiring talent that will be playing in the big leagues in 2014 (Kris Bryant not withstanding)? If Sox fans were celebrating guys that would be playing in Birmingham next year, I would say mock away. All the time. Mocking, mocking, mocking, mocking, mocking. All the time!

_________________

you and other Sox fans keep beating this drum, but it is just not the reality.

Who of the several Cubs fans around here have ever said this in a serious statement?

_________________
"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Frank blew up your theory about Sox fans with the next post


I don't think about it like "The guy who leads us to the series us in Daytona!"

I look at it like a good pipeline of talent is a big aid in trying to win consistently. Especially pitchers

But you act like highly thought of prosdoects never work out


I do think Kris Bryant will be good and help them win. And that's pefectlyh reasonable

Also who gives a shit?! Are we having a who is the most prudent fan contest?

I'f I'm unrealistic to some, so be it

I think its fine

But I thought Sox fans didn't get excited about players who haven't proved it at the MLB level?

Keyser has that department covered. He has enough excitement for shitty prospects that the other 76 fans in Sox nation can wear their pessimistic prick badges with pride.

Sure, some do. I just don't think you- or Theo Epstein- can say which ones will. And it wouldn't be unheard of for an entire group not to work out. I understand the concept of stockpiling talent and figuring a certain percentage are going to hit. It's what I did with racehorses. I figured I needed one out of four to hit and pay the bills on the other three. But I knew pretty much the number that the horses needed to make. If one earns $100,000, he's earned it. Measuring a baseball player and a baseball team isn't as simple. Pieces have to fit together in ways that are difficult to understand. It's not like the top WAR guy at each position would just make the best team. If you say Juan Uribe is "bad at baseball", you can back that up with a lot of evidence. But obviously, there are positives he brings to a ballclub that may be more difficult to measure than his wOBA.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

So Cub fans don't think Theo has built a great minor league system? if that's true, why aren't more of you agreeing with jimmypasta?

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

I'll just say this- I've never seen a Sox fan wearing a t-shirt or waving a sign that said, "IT'S GONNA HAPPEN". Not even when they had a 3-0 lead on Houston.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Thinking that Theo has done a good job in starting to rebuild a minor league system that has been awful for a number of years is not even close to saying that you believe the core of a WS championship is sitting in the minor leagues right now.

Once again, personally I am happy with the plan he has put in place. I am glad they are putting energy and resource into rebuilding. I understood the plan when he started. I understood it was going to be a few years before they had a chance to be competitive.

Could all of this blow up in their face? Sure. But I am willing to give them the time to see how it will play out. This is a similar view that the majority of Cub fans around here have held recently.

Jimmy and a few others are not happy with it. That is fine. They can scream and yell for more Keppinger all they want. But that does not mean that the majority of Cub fans think a WS champion team is in Daytona. For anyone to think that is just stupid.

_________________
"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Right, they were too busy trying to familiarize themselves with the roster.

I don't have a problem with "the plan" relative to building the minor league system to create a steady flow of talent to either trade off for proven major leaguers or to promote and have cost control over as they produce for the big league club, but a big part of "the plan" is to have the resources to spend when the time is right to spend as well. And right now, there are serious questions as to the financial health of Ricketts and the debt load they took on.

If you read closely some of the comments that have come out, one of the most telling was during the initial Tanaka talk, Theo (or someone in management) mentioned that signing an international player was allowed under the debt covenants. The fucking debt covenants? WTF is that about? Who the hell is running this franchise??

The bottom line is as the fan base crumbles (i.e. attendance etc.) and the revenues decline, it is obvious Ricketts does not have the capital to move this thing forward. Maybe that is the real reason no work is being done on the renovations? All this BS about rooftop lawsuits is just that - BS.

Do you really think Mark Cuban or any actual billionaire owner that really wanted to win would not have already begun upgrading the player facilities, adding batting cages for in-game use, etc.? Would they not already have begun realizing some of these revenue streams now being missed? All of this can be done while the big league team sucks but under Ricketts, it's not being done.

I support the concept of getting the minor league system up to speed and drafting high and developing/trading for top shelf talent, but if the resources aren't there when the time comes to step up to the plate and add proven talent, then the franchise clearly will be at a disadvantage.

That's why I asked in Page 1 of this thread if Theo will be bolting either before his contract is up or simply moving on after year 5 and no one really responded.

That's my concern: shitty underfunded/debt burdened ownership. What I see this offseason is highly disconcerting. No renovation work, no aggressivity in acquiring upper tier talent and nothing but double talk by Ricketts. Even now, Mooney is already playing his violin on Tanaka saying the Cubs won't step up to the plate with the 100M+ it will take to sign him if he becomes available. Do you think Theo et al is happy about that??

Theo is doing his job. Top minor league talent is being drafted, traded for and being developed. Svuem was a mistake but they axed his sorry ass. Renteria seems to be a development guy which is a good thing so that hire seems logical, so Theo is doing what he can do. What isn't known is how pissed off he is as to the lack of available captial moving forward. Yea Ricketts can talk all he wants but something tells me his messenger boy Crane Kenney and Theo probably ain't golfing buddies and Kenney is nothing more than a corporate ass kisser and Theo is probably sick of seeing and hearing his double talk.

The sad reality for me, a Cubs fan, is that we are stuck with a shitty ownership group not committed to winning but more committed to the bottom line and paying down the onerous debt they took on to buy the team. And clearly the old lion Joe Ricketts is not willing to bail his kids out since he could give a fuck about sports as he himself has said.

Maybe we will get lucky and Ricketts will get pressure from his old man and sell. But since that is not likely, we Cubs fans have to instead hope that having a mid level payroll can still result in a Tampa Bay type franchise that challenges each year for a championship.

The Theo regime seems capable of replicating that model, so let's hope they can.

Okay, I don't think there's anything crazy about building a minor league system that can produce a reasonable amount of competent big leaguers. And maybe Epstein is doing that. But it's a leap from there to a team that is going to consistently contend for championships. The Twins have produced a bunch of competent homegrown players. They aren't contending for shit.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

I was thinking about this a little more and maybe the issue here is that we are still putting the over the top optimism about the new Theo hire, which lasted more than a year, and what people are thinking now when "The Plan" isn't moving along anywhere close to as quickly as people thought. Theo was a big name hire and maybe Sox, or Bears, or Bulls fans would be acting the same way if they got a two time championship winner.

Things seem different now. I remember one conversation where Cubs expert IMU said with complete certainty that the future of the Cubs was much brighter than the White Sox. This was before the terrible season of last year too. It was literally saying "Theo is here so success is all but certain". Now, maybe IMU doesn't count, but this wasn't a position that most Cubs fans would have disagreed with. Now, with Hahn proving the hype that he is a modern day Theo Epstein, they may.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Hahn hasn't proved shit.

Can we just rename it for what it is quickly turning into (thanks to debt load & the continuing existence of Crane Kenney): "The Andy MacPhail Experience, Part II".

_________________
There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

The Ricketts family wealth took a big hit right after they bought the team. Their stock lost a lot of value. That has recovered to a large degree, but they are not as rich as some people had thought/hoped. However, they are pretty smart. They are creating new revenue streams. The new scoreboard will bring in a lot of money, so will the hotel they are building. Do you think ticket prices won't go up once Wrigley is reconstructed? The new Tv/radio contracts will of course be the biggest factor still. By the time the young, highly reguarded talent is ready to contribute at the major league level, these new revenue streams will be mostly (except for the reconstructed ballpark-that will take several years to complete as they are doing it) in place and supplying the team with plenty of money for free agents that might put them over the top. The process is taking longer than we wish it would, but if you look at how long it's been and how long it's reasonable to expect a team to rebuild THROUGH THE MINOR LEAGUES, it's not been long enough yet. They are now free of all the bad, long-term, no-trade contracts, either by them expiring, or trading the player with his consent. After this year Soriano is finally off the books. The only dumb contract they have is Edwin Jackson's. The lone stain on the organization to date. Not having Mark Cuban type money makes the process more difficult. But because of all the means by which they are creating new revenue, the money will be there when it's time to spend. But that time is not yet here. It's a good plan. they just need to stick to it and execute it well.

_________________
Go Cubs!!!!

I was just about to mention Andy MacSweatervest, but you beat me to it. He was just as touted as Theo, having won two titles himself, and was a tremendous failure.

_________________

Trust in Hahn.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

How do you know this? How do you know they won't continue to pay down debt or simply keep the extra revenues? The only reason they will spend is if they feel it is necessary to keep the fan base from abandoning them.

_________________

Jawbreaker,
Do you think this years Cub Convention will turn ugly? I'm hoping it does.

_________________
favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."