Three reasons I like the Chicago Cubs and the one reason I don’t

Cubs: You never know what the postseason will bring

You really can’t predict the postseason, am I right? Despite all their shortcomings, I don’t know if anyone expected the Cubs to go down in straight sets against the Miami Marlins in the Wild Card round this fall. I was stunned by it. But the Marlins were a different type of team.

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The Dodgers were there from start to finish – and they won the World Series. It was a 60-game season, and they weren’t ‘pressed’ with the ups and downs of postseason baseball. The Dodgers went 13-5 in the playoffs, almost a third of the regular season schedule. But after eight-straight NL Wests? I’d say it was long overdue.

Only a handful of teams are yet to win the Fall Classic. The Padres, Rockies, Mariners, Rangers, Rays and Brewers have never stood atop the baseball world. Thankfully, after 2016, we can finally quit seeing the Cubs mentioned on title drought lists.

A history of Cubs ownership

In 2007, the Tribune Company was failing. Sam Zell bought it and announced that he was selling the Chicago Cubs, Wrigley Field and related entities, including a 25 percent stake in SportsNet Chicago. Tom Ricketts and his family were up to the task. On January 22, 2009, Ricketts and his family were selected for the winning bid.

By October, the deal was done. The Ricketts family was the new owner of the Cubs. The first eight or so years of it? Not bad – not bad at all. But in the last three years, we’ve seen the purse strings get pulled tighter and tighter. This came to a head this year and it’s not over yet, with Darvish gone, Kyle Schwarber non-tendered and more changes to come.

2020 was hardly normal, I know. Without fans in the seats, the Cubs (and every other team) lost tens of millions of dollars in revenue. We hope things will look at least a little more normal this summer, but nobody knows. The lasting impact will loom for years to come – and we’ll see how long ownership leans on it as a reason to not spend big market money.