Latest MLB power rankings scream of the purgatory the Cubs are trapped in

Under any other circumstances, the offseason the Chicago Cubs have had would be considered a successful one.

The Cubs traded for a Top 5 position player in all of Major League Baseball, stabilized their bullpen with three separate trades, and elevated the floor of their bench. In other words, outside of adding an established starting pitcher at the top of their rotation, the Cubs did exactly what we hoped they would this offseason. The issue is that not only have Cubs had public swing-and-misses on multiple top targets this offseason, but the aftermath of each whiff has highlighted the restraints from Tom Ricketts are plaguing the front office from doing exactly what they should be doing: operating as if they are big-market franchise. Mind you, this is all while the Cubs' value has grown immensely since Ricketts took control of the franchise.

This leads us to the latest MLB Power Rankings over at The Athletic. The exercise looks at MLB franchises over the last 25 seasons and awards them points based on postseason success.

The two teams at the top of the list are the two you have come to expect: the New York Yankees and the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Yankees totaled 83 points while the Dodgers followed with 73. The St. Louis Cardinals being third may come as a surprise, but that lends credence to their dominant run in the early 2000s, where they were the prevailing authority in the National League Central. Rounding out the Top 5 are the Boston Red Sox and Houston Astros.

The Cubs are a far cry from MLB's elite franchises

For the Cubs, yes, they had the World Series win in 2016 while reaching the NLCS in three consecutive seasons, but outside of that brief window, postseason success has not been the definition of the franchise. With that in mind, it's no real surprise to see the Cubs fall in at No. 13 with a total of 27 points. Some of the teams ahead of the Cubs are the Los Angeles Angels, Cleveland Guardians, and Arizona Diamondbacks. The Diamondbacks finished with 27 points but the second World Series appearance in the last 25 years gives them the tiebreaker.

Anyone who follows the Cubs on a daily basis shouldn't be surprised at what this list confirms, the Cubs are not a big-market MLB franchise. Sure, the Cubs are in the third-largest market in Major League Baseball but that doesn't give them the right to the honor of being a big-market franchise. That right comes with a level of spending on the Major League roster that the Cubs haven't done since the offseason prior to the 2018 season when they signed Yu Darvish. Which, even then, the Cubs were dependent on Darvish's market falling back to them. Making things even worse is the reality that unless Ricketts sells the team, there is no reason to expect that anything will change with the new way of doing business for the Cubs.