1 forgotten Cubs injury that completely changed the 2024 season

Thinking of early-season injuries Cubs fans may have forgotten by the time we closed the book on a disappointing 2024 campaign, the obvious one - simply because it literally happened on Opening Night - is Justin Steele's hamstring strain.

That injury sidelined the Chicago left-hander until early May. After shaking off some initial rust, Steele picked up right where he left off in 2023, working to a 3.07 ERA and 1.099 WHIP in 24 starts - virtually mirroring the numbers from his breakout campaign. But in my mind, the knee injury Dansby Swanson suffered in late April is the one that changed everything on the North Side this year.

For over a month following that April 25 injury, Swanson put up some of the worst numbers of his nine-year MLB career. Through the end of May, the two-time Gold Glover slashed just .175/.241/.238 - which works out to a nauseating 40 wRC+ for those wondering at home. That perfectly aligns with the Cubs' sudden tailspin, a stretch of games where Chicago ran off an 11-21 stretch that saw them go from a 17-9 record to 28-30.

The team's handling of the injury is an issue in and of itself - but the Cubs' record with Swanson playing at well less than 100 percent shows just how important their $177 million man is to their success.

Once he was fully healthy, the former first-rounder got back to doing what he's done for much of his career on both sides of the ball. He continued to play defense at an elite level and, over the final two months of the season, Swanson batted .283/.351/.471 - good for an .822 OPS - a dramatic difference over the performance we saw from him while he tried to gut his way through an injury.

As my colleague Jordan Campbell pointed out earlier this week, trotting Swanson out there injured wasn't ideal - but given a complete lack of quality bench depth, there were few alternatives. Everyone is hoping for a major splash from the front office this winter, but the Swanson injury - and the impact it had on the 2024 Cubs - should be a wake-up call for Jed Hoyer.

Hopefully, it prompts him to round out a bench heading into 2025 and give Craig Counsell some quality pieces to plug in when his key guys are hurt. This club cannot afford to repeat the mistakes made last year - and must learn from the tough lessons that followed.