The fabricated legend of Kerry Wood

With Kerry Wood’s career circling the bottom of the drain it’s time to take a look at the larger than life Cubs myth that surrounds Kerry Wood. We all know about the great stuff: the 20 K game, the wins in Atlanta in the 2003 NLDS, becoming the closer for the 2008 NL Central Champs. Of course we all know about the constant arm issues and his spot on the alltime leaderboard of simulated game appearances.

Last winter when Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer gave into the Tom Ricketts and signed Kerry Wood I was disappointed. The reason I was disappointed had nothing to do with Kerry personally, like most fans I like Kerry Wood and have enjoyed watching him pitch. I was disappointed because:

  1. The Cubs hired Theo and Hoyer so moves based on emotion and loyalty would be a thing of the past.
  2. Kerry Wood is just not very good anymore. The Cubs would have been better off giving his role to a minor league pitcher.

Still there are some of you that feel the Cubs somehow owe Kerry Wood like he’s been this hall of fame pitcher or great ambassador for the Cubs. Want to know the truth about Kerry Wood’s career? Surf on over to baseball-reference.com and look at his career numbers. His career line in it’s simplest form is 86-75 over his 14 seasons. His career ERA is 3.67.

Take a look at his similarity scores:

  1. Bobby Bolin (942)
  2. Kelvim Escobar (917)
  3. Moe Drabowsky (917)
  4. Al Benton (914)
  5. Don Larsen (909)
  6. Juan Berenguer (907)
  7. Greg Harris (907)
  8. Stan Williams (906)
  9. Ike Delock (902)
  10. Eric Plunk (898)

Now there’s a list of baseball greats! Eric Plunk, Juan Berenguer and Kelvim Escobar. Correct me if I’m wrong but I’m pretty sure there was never a fanbase dying to sign any of the players on the above list, certainly not at the end of their careers.

It’s shocking how much the blinders are on with Cubs fans when it comes to this guy. His contribution to the Cubs since the end of 2003 is minimal at best (mostly in 2008). Yet people still hold onto the myth, the legend.

Checkout where Wood ranks alltime in Wins for the Cubs:

Wins

RankPlayerWinsIP 1.Charlie Root2013137.1 2.Mordecai Brown1882329.0 3.Bill Hutchinson1803022.1 4.Larry Corcoran1752338.1 5.Fergie Jenkins1672673.2 6.Guy Bush1522201.2  Clark Griffith1522188.2 8.Hippo Vaughn1512216.1 9.Bill Lee1392271.1 10.John Clarkson1371730.2 11.Ed Reulbach1361864.2 12.Rick Reuschel1352290.0 13.Greg Maddux1332016.0 14.Pete Alexander1281884.1 15.Carlos Zambrano1251826.2 16.Claude Passeau1241914.2 17.Pat Malone1151632.0 18.Bob Rush1102132.2 19.Jack Taylor1091810.0  Lon Warneke1091624.2 21.Fred Goldsmith1071516.2 22.Larry French951486.0 23.Bill Hands921564.0 24.Carl Lundgren911322.0 25.Orval Overall861135.0 26.Dick Ellsworth841613.1 27.Rick Sutcliffe821267.1 28.Sheriff Blake811455.1 29.Ken Holtzman801447.0  Kerry Wood801276.2 31.Larry Cheney761061.0 32.Jack Pfiester701028.1 33.Johnny Schmitz691198.2  Hank Wyse691063.0 35.Jimmy Callahan661043.2 36.Tony Kaufmann63999.2 37.Ryan Dempster621114.0  Paul Minner621196.1 39.Glen Hobbie611218.2  Steve Trachsel611163.2 41.Terry Larkin601019.1 42.Ad Gumbert58934.0  Jake Weimer58839.1 44.Claude Hendrix571076.0  Jimmy Lavender571078.0 46.Ray Burris551068.2 47.Vic Aldridge53838.2  Bill Bonham531152.1  Bob Wicker53726.1 50.Warren Hacker521091.2  Larry Jackson52838.0

LMAO. Calling this guy any sort of ‘franchise legend’ is absolutely wrong. He’s been a nice player, but nothing more than that. He was not worth signing again and deserves no loyalty from the Cubs as they move forward. 

Obstacles to Wrigley modernize are obnoxious

Today’s Bright One printed the expected moronic neighborhood reaction to Mayor Emanuel’s plan to modernize Wrigley Field. Take a look at these golden thoughts:

“I do not like it — I like the charm of this stadium,” said Wrigleyville resident, Amy Kalas, 40. “I’ve been to Fenway. I’ve been to all of these other parks. Wrigley is cool because it’s so neighborhoody and low key. I just don’t like the idea of big Jumbotrons.”

Is this that ’person on the street’ segment in the Onion? Amy doesn’t like Jumbotrons. She likes that Wrigley Field is low key. Apparently Amy has never spent 12 innings in the right field bleachers on a 95 degree day. If people like Amy were making decisions you’d have a team full of Bobby Scales. Great! But Amy’s opinion is held by many. There is this fear of a Jumbotron at Wrigley Field. What people like Amy don’t realize is the revenue Jumbotron advertising makes it a necessity. This is not an option people.

Joe Spagnoli, who owns Yak-Zies in the 3700 block of North Clark, says the Cubs should be able to do whatever they want “inside their four walls,” but he worries that street fairs would cut into his business and be a nightmare for area residents.

“They’re not paying tax dollars for the streets,” Spagnoli said of the Cubs, “and they’re inconveniencing the people in the neighborhood. A lot of these street are one-way. How do you get to your house?”

Joe is very concerned about the area residents. LMAO. Let’s face it, this guy only cares about his business. So the question for Joe is real simple: “how will his business fare with the Cubs playing elsewhere?”

Wrigleyville resident Caryn Steinman, 23, a graduate student, has similar concerns about game-day street closings.

“We would never be able to leave,” said Steinman, a Cubs fan who lives on Sheffield near the stadium. “We would never be able to grocery shop. … It would be quite the inconvenience.”

This might be the best one on here. Caryn, you’re 23 and in grad school. Don’t bet your Prius on the idea that you will live anywhere near Wrigley Field in 2 years (yet alone 5). Who cares what a transient student has to say about an issue like this anyways. Go get your Ramen noodles somewhere else.

And finally there’s a voice of reason in all of this:

“As a business owner, I would be really pissed off if my hands were tied,” said Zach Strauss, general manager of Sluggers on North Clark.

Strauss said the Ricketts family, the owners of the Cubs, “have the right to go to their alderman, go to the mayor — whatever they want to do, they have the right to go get permits and do it; just like I have the right to get a permit for my sidewalk cafe and use the public way for that.”

The irony is that it’s the Wrigley Field Preservationists that threaten the future of the ballpark. It is not the evil owners, the mayor or even the (gasp) signage or (gasp, gasp) jumbotron. What threatens Wrigley Field’s future is the ballpark not being modernized. This really is simple people.

Keeping the big picture in mind

Most Cubs fans went into this season with a realistic view of where the Cubs are. The first ten games did nothing to change the low expectations that this will be a subpar year for the Northsiders. The 3-7 start, while disappointing if you are following on a game-by-game basis, comes as no surprise. Yeah, it’s a small sample size but it is what it is. While the Cubs won’t play .300 ball, it’s a pretty safe bet they won’t be playing .500.

The challenge as a fan is keeping a ‘longview’ of this team while following them everyday. I have to be honest, I struggle with it. While I want to complain about things that happen in individual games, I realize most of these players will not be around when the Cubs contend some where down the road. I watch for Starlin Castro’s development and that’s about it. (Defensively that has not been good.)

Somehow with 152 games to go in a lost season there has to be a big picture. I’m not Tom Ricketts, Theo Epstein nor Jed Hoyer so all of this is out of my control. I’d say if you’re going to bother going to or watching the ballgames this is a good year to be the stereotypical casual Cubs fan that is more concerned with the goings on around them than what is happening on the field. Drink heavily people!

The noise that is the Chicago Cubs narrative

As spring training came to a close in 2012, Theo Epstein met with reporters that cover the Cubs. He spoke in a way that no Cubs Executive before him has spoken. He was respectful yet dismissive of a narrative that has surrounded this club as long as I have been alive:

“I can go ahead and write your stories for you now if you want,” Epstein told beat writers at HoHoKam Stadium. “At some point you’re going to wake up and write about ‘Oh, the honeymoon is over. We’re not seeing enough progress.’ I don’t know when that’s going to be. It might be two years from now, it might be three years from now, it might be two months from now, it might be two weeks from now.

“But because progress as an organization isn’t linear, that’s coming, and we just don’t let it bother us. I think it’s important to just focus on what we’re doing internally and understand that everything outside is really, no offense, just noise. Whether it comes from (the media) or even comes from some fans who are deservedly upset at a given point, it’s really just noise and if we let it affect our decision-making, shame on us.

“So as (Bill) Parcells said, ‘If you listen to the fans in the stands, pretty soon you’ll be sitting with them.’ Don’t take that the wrong way. I care more than anything what our fans think. But I also operate with the belief that ultimately the only way to make them happy is to be able to provide for them baseball in October on a consistent basis, and a World Series championship eventually.

“Any time they’re frustrated, or there’s negative feedback, it’s just a reminder to me of what the ultimate goal is.”

Next he called all of this what it really is “noise”:

“We’re not going to be deaf to the concerns of the fans and to what’s going on around the club,” he said. “But we also will recognize, especially with respect to the media, that it’s primarily just noise and we have to continue to focus on what we’re trying to do despite the occasional cacophony.”

Of course the use of cacophony sent most Cubs beat writers to the Google. But while they were trying to pinpoint the meaning, Theo had pinpointed the constant preoccupation that both the fans and media have with the Cubs dreadful history. It’s not just a concern with what is going on — on the field, it’s this overwhelming media and fan based focus on the narrative of the ‘woe is me’ Chicago Cubs.

I have been guilty of falling back on this Cubs narrative for years. Always with the line, ‘what did you expect it’s the Cubs?’.

At the end of the day the Chicago Cubs narrative is just a fabrication, something we use as fans to explain the unthinkable idea that the Cubs never win. Well the Cubs futility may seem to run against the odds, and any team can accidently win a title, except of course the woe be gotten Chicago Cubs. Of course, this is the easy way out. It’s the easy way to explain away failure and for the media it’s an always available crutch, when you have no idea what to write about and a deadline looms. It’s an easy fallback position. (It’s a shame that with all the change on the Northside a new team of beat reporters wasn’t part of the change.)

In Sunday’s Chicago Tribune, Paul Sullivan took Theo’s bait. Remember what Theo said above:

At some point you’re going to wake up and write about ‘Oh, the honeymoon is over. We’re not seeing enough progress.’ I don’t know when that’s going to be. It might be two years from now, it might be three years from now, it might be two months from now, it might be two weeks from now.

Two years, three years, two months? Try two fucking games. Take a look at this headline in the Tribune:

Cubs fans already restless after listless start

Here’s what he wrote:

The new era is off to a familiar start, and Redsmanager Dusty Baker was prescient when he scoffed in spring training at the idea of Cubs fans being patient because of the new management.

Relievers Kerry Wood and Carlos Marmol were booed in the opener and again Saturday.

Yep two games in, and the new era is off to a ‘familiar start’. The same old fucking narrative. Never mind the months and months of Cubs brass mapping out their plan for you to report on. Never mind the fact that earlier in the week Theo called your writing what it is: ‘NOISE’. 

Not to be outdone by the Tribune the Bright One sent out one of their columnists to tackle the Cubs narrative the great Rick Telander penned this:  

This is the Cubs.

This is what they do.

They lose 7-4 heartbreakers at home, to teams such as the Nationals.

They trot out two famed set-up and closer dudes named Kerry Wood and Carlos Marmol in consecutive games — every game this season, for those of you keeping score at home — and blow both games, in which they were leading after the seventh inning.

Yes, it’s just two games.

There are 160 to go.

But the Cubs should be undefeated and are instead two games behind the division-leading Cardinals. Sound familiar?

To Cubs fans, of course.

So you may be wondering, young brain trust: How do the Cubs do it?

There, my friends, is the mystical Grail, the secret that has never been fully revealed. Discover it, and perhaps you can find a remedy, and then your praises will be sung for centuries like those of Odysseus and Beowulf. Or at least Orval Overall.

This my friends is craziness.

After opening day I was in a few establishments and heard several fans echo the same sentiments. One idiot bitched to no end about the Cubs running the contact play in the bottom of the ninth that day. He said only the Cubs lose that way. Wake up people. Wake the fuck up. The Cubs are not being run by the college of coaches. They are being run by arguably the best baseball GM of the past decade. A man who thankfully got used to ignoring plenty of noise and plenty of crack pot fans and media while running the Boston Red Sox.  

The narrative of the Chicago Cubs is bullshit. It’s an excuse. It’s hocus pocus. The Billy Goat Curse was a marketing manuever by a small business owner that should be taught in business school (h/t to @dafowc). The black cat at Shea, the grounder through Durham’s legs, the Bartman incident, yeah while they may be part of the lore and they may hurt you as a fan they have nothing to do with the real story of what this team is doing now.

Right now the Cubs are in the midst of the biggest change to their organization since Dallas Green took over prior to the 1982 season. The baseball operations are being brought up to the level of the elite clubs in baseball. These things don’t happen overnite. The final results of this will not be seen for several seasons. That’s a complicated story to tell. So it’s easier to fallback on the Cubs narrative.

Fuck that narrative.