Chicago Cubs: Panicked musings from the Cub-o-sphere

Has the Cup-o-Joe gone cold?

Starting with those awful those decisions in the 2016 postseason to pitch Aroldis Chapman until his arm fell off.  And ever since it’s been one series of blunders after another. And those ever-changing never a player in the same place line-ups!

The players can’t hit, field, or pitch

It usually starts with Kris Bryant. Clearly, he’s lost it.  Last season saw a decline in every hitting metric.  He was terrible at the plate and never was very good at third and should be in left field.  Some have gone as far to propose trading him.

Speaking of left field and trades, Kyle Schwarber should be traded to an American League team to be a DH because he’s terrible in left field and can’t hit for average.

They don’t have a center fielder or a leadoff hitter since they failed to sign Dexter Fowler.  And right field…do I need to go there?

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• Cubs: It’s time to start thinking about potential September call-ups
• Cubs: P.J. Higgins deserves to be in the lineup on a daily basis

And Javier Baez had a one-off year in 2018 and he’ll regress to the same free-swinging K machine he was in 2014 and 2015.  Anthony Rizzo is plateauing and now the Cardinals have Paul Goldschmidt.  Then there’s Addison Russell, or not, maybe, who knows?

Willson Contreras had a terrible year, is a blundering fool behind the plate, and can’t frame pitches.

And the pitching! Jon Lester is over the hill, Kyle Hendricks has lost his velocity, Jose Quintana was never worth the trade, Cole Hamels is a hope and prayer at $20 million, and Yu Darvish…again, do I need to go there.

And the farm system is depleted too, by the way.  We have developed no pitching and traded away our best prospects.