Chicago Cubs: The 2018 season still feels like a missed opportunity

In 2018, the Chicago Cubs had a great team. Yet they were a quick one-and-done in the playoffs. That team should have accomplished more.

After the Chicago Cubs beat the St. Louis Cardinals in the first round of the 2015 National League playoffs, I was watching local Chicago TV postgame coverage. I remember the anchors of the show talking about how, with all the young talent on the team coming of age, we can now expect many years of great Chicago Cubs baseball.

I was beside myself. I had witnessed the near-miss in 2003 and the years of disappointment that followed the Dusty Baker era, learning that nothing is guaranteed in this game. I had to applaud their enthusiasm, but how could they get so ahead of themselves? So much can happen.

Of course, the next year, in 2016, the Cubs did win the World Series. Yet many folks were hoping that this would be a Cubs dynasty, that several more fruitful years, and perhaps more championships, would follow. It hasn’t happened; the Cubs have only won one playoff series since. They did somehow get to the NLCS in 2017, despite underachieving much of the year and the probable effects of a “World Series hangover.”

Then came 2018. Looking back, that was a strange year. The Cubs went into the season, again, expected to be among the best teams in the NL. Though they lost Jake Arrieta, they replaced him with Yu Darvish and Tyler Chatwood. Jose Quintana would also be there for a full season. The bullpen lost some key members but also gained some. And of course, the young core of hitters was expected just to keep getting better.

It was a crucial year in building the Cubs’ dynasty. Instead, the season ended with a thud: a 2-1, 13 inning NL Wild Card loss to the Colorado Rockies. What happened?

Chicago Cubs: 2018 was a big missed opportunity

In many years, 95 wins would be enough to avoid the Wild Card game, at least. Instead, the Brewers beat the Cubs and their disappearing offense, 3-1, in the NL Central tiebreaker game at Wrigley Field, setting up a Wild Card game at Wrigley with the Colorado Rockies. And as expected, the offense failed to show up again as the Cubs lost 2-1 in 13 innings.

Watching that game, it felt like it could have gone 30 innings, and the team still wouldn’t score. It was about as depressing of a way to watch a season end as one could imagine: watching two teams celebrate on your home turf in two days while you’re going home.

As this young core of players nears free agency, and as we witness the decline of key pitchers such as Lester and Quintana, I can’t help but feel like 2018 was a huge missed opportunity. There was so much talent on that team, and though a lot did indeed go wrong, give props to Joe Maddon for somehow guiding this team to 95 wins. For all that Maddon could do, however, he couldn’t grab a bat and hit, and the key offensive players simply didn’t get the job done.

The 2018 season especially feels like a giant missed opportunity as we look at how cash-strapped the Cubs franchise currently is. We all were upset with the lack of moves this past offseason, and it sounds like the next offseason may not be much better. It’s almost inevitable that some of the Cubs’ young core will be moving on within the next couple of years.

This is going to make it especially difficult for the team to compete in the next couple of years under new manager David Ross. There’s still enough talent that they could make the playoffs in 2020 (if we do have a season), but there are so many question marks on the current roster that it’s far from a guarantee.

I hope we have not reached the end of the “competitive” window for this current core of Chicago Cubs players. Yet if we have, I feel like we’ll look back on 2018 as the year that this team should have accomplished a lot more.