Chicago Cubs are fortunate to find themselves in the hunt for October

The Chicago Cubs have not had the start they expected – but are somehow still in the hunt, just a half-game out of first with two games left in the first half.

“Every game matters”. That’s what all Chicago Cubs fans have heard since the end of last season – with the mantra even taking up prime real estate on the team’s advertisements across television and social media this season.

In the 2018 end-of-year press conference, Cubs president of baseball operations, Theo Epstein, mentioned many times that every game matters. Then at the start of spring training, the Cubs came out with their “slogan” for the year. “Every game matters.” This was all due to the fact of how last season ended with having to play Milwaukee in a winner-take-all Game 163. One more win last year and that game never happens – who knows where it goes from there.

This slogan was something Cubs fans really got behind – personally, I know I sure did. I thought things would be different had they really played with a sense of urgency all year, ensuring a series of events like those that transpired last year didn’t happen again.

Then coming into the season, looking at the division and seeing that all five teams made moves to get better during the offseason as the Cubs largely stood pat was concerning. Right then, we knew the NL Central would be really tough this year, all but guaranteeing that ‘every game matters.’