In the May 2nd Chicago Sun-Times, there was a typically snarky column by Greg Couch that included the following passage:
What’s different for you in Baltimore?
“We’re playing good baseball. We don’t get any excuses. I feel lucky over here. It’s early, but we’ve got a great group of guys that go out every day and take care of business. I’m so proud that every day there is a new hero.
“So it’s not only one guy. That’s how you win. It’s the whole team together. There are good people around here. No jealousy. Everyone is together. And we’ve got a great Skipper.”
Did you hear that? It was all about the Cubs. No excuses? He’s saying everyone blamed him unfairly in Chicago. Not only one guy? That means everyone was too critical of him. No jealousy? His Cubs teammates were to blame. A great Skipper? Dusty Baker’s fault.
All this is interesting in light of what’s happened with the Cubs in the post-Sammy era. Although the stats of his successor in Right Field, Jeromy Burnitz, are pretty comparable to the stats compiled by Sosa thus far in Baltimore, something is wrong in Chicago while Baltimore blooms. The post-Sosa Cubs offense is positively horrendous and it seems to get worse with every passing day.
The clubhouse situation is scarcely any better. Its been reported by, among others, George Offman of WSCR 670 AM that the Cubs clubhouse is as rotten as ever with the team almost completely bereft of player leadership. Of course, Kerry Wood is a leader, but his idea of “leadership” last year was to scapegoat the broadcasters, particularly Steve Stone.
As you may recall, last year the media reported that the rest of the team was also united against Sosa and his boombox. This was part of a pattern in which the media often went out of its way to paint Sosa in the worst possible light even when there was different interpretations to the “facts” that were being reported.
For example, it was common to periodically report that the other Cubs felt that Sammy only cared for himself and his stats and did not care if the team won or not. Of course, this allegation (which was never backed up by quotes from named players) was used to denigrate Sosa. However, there was always another interpretation that the media ignored: perhaps those players were jealous of Sosa.
Interestingly enough, last year during the Cubs swan song in September to the likes of the New York Mets & the Cincinnati Reds, there were precious few Cubs who were really hustling. Two of them, Moises Alou & Sammy Sosa, were players who Cubs management could not wait to get rid of and scapegoat for the team’s problems in 2004. Then again, what do you expect from a team that hired an unlicensed man to be the head trainer and which carried on with a campaign to cover up the severity of the injuries to starting pitcher Mark Prior?
Right now, the Baltimore Orioles are high flying and in 1st place in the AL East while the Cubs are walking in winning runs their way towards last place in the NL Central. You really can’t help but wonder if Sammy Sosa’s sparkplug personality is a factor in Baltimore’s rise while the lack of it is a factor in the decline of the Cubs. In retrospect, if Sosa’s boombox was really such a problem, why could not team management have sit down with him and told him to use headphones and not subject the rest of the team to his salsa music?
Last year, both GM Hendry & Manager Baker could not wait to run Sosa out of town and Cubs fans are now paying the price. If there is any justice, both Baker & Hendry ought to pay the price for this year’s debacle on the North Side.