The Chicago Cubs are terrible. Thanks to the Houston Astros they aren’t the worst team in baseball, but they’re awfuly close. Coming into today’s matinee against the Cardinals, the North Siders were 40-57, 17.5 games out of first place. On top of that, there’s a pretty good chance that 3/5ths of their supprisingly-not-so-terrible starting rotation will be wearing a different uniform this time next week.
Theo Epstein is the new President of Baseball Operations and Jed Hoyer the new GM. They knew they’d have to rebuild this entire organization when they got there (that’s pretty much why they went to Chicago), so it’s not shocking that the Cubs are as bad as they are. For god’s sake, they’re toting the old, immobile, upsettingly over-payed Alfonso Soriano around from city to city. The rest of the cast is so bad-to-mediocre that Darwin Barney’s surprising, yet totally middling hitting ability is something of a bright spot.
All this brings us to Anthony Rizzo. Rizzo, a first basemen, was traded by Epstien to Hoyer when the former was with the Red Sox and the latter with the Padres. He was a significant part of the exchange for superstar Adrian Gonzalez. Hoyer promoted Rizzo to the big leagues last season and he really struggled, hitting only .141
Fast forward a little bit to last winter when both Epstien and Hoyer joined the Cubs. The duo sent Andrew Cashner, arguably their best relief pitcher, to San Diego to get Rizzo. It was Hoyer’s second trade for the prospect in less than 2 years.
This season, Rizzo started in AAA and made a mockery of it. In 70 games, he hit .342 with 23 home runs and 62 RBI. The Cubbies would have called him up to the Majors sooner than June 26, but there was some apprehension about how the young Rizzo would handle big league pitching this time around, and Bryan LaHair, the Cubs lone All-Star, was at Rizzo’s position. Finally, the Cubs could deny Rizzo no longer and they moved LaHair out to right field to make room for the 22 year old.
Since the call up, Rizzo has hit .337 with 6 homers (through the 4th inning of today’s game). I think its safe to say he’s figured this hitting thing out.
Anthony Rizzo is a beast and can absolutely mash. Just today he hit a long home run into the Windy City’s formidable wind. He’s just 22, good defensively, and under club control for the foreseeable future. He’s going to be a star like the Cubs haven’t had since Prior and Wood and Mark Grace.
It’s unclear if the Cubs will be able to keep shortstop Starlin Castro long term, but coupled with Rizzo, the two form a core that Epstein and Hoyer can certainly build around. Rizzo can be The Guy in Chicago: the household name, the jersey seller, the seat filler, the All-Star, and he can do it for the next decade.
This year, Adrian Gonzalez, like many of the Boston Red Sox, has underperformed terribly. The ‘slugger’ has 9 home runs with a sub .300 AVG and he’s being paid $21 million to do it. Think the Red Sox would trade Gonzalez back for Rizzo right now if they could? I do.
-Max Frankel
