The Chicago Cubs have a dominant starting pitching, a potential Triple Crown winner and a former hitting champion shortstop. So why are the Chicago Cubs a losing club?

To answer this question, we must start early in the 2005 season. Glendon Rusch was put in the bullpen earlier in the year and Ryan Dempster was in the starting rotation. Glendon Rusch was hired to be the No. 5 left-handed starter for the Chicago Cubs. This year, which is consistent throughout his career, he has a 5.14 ERA as a reliever and a 3.32 ERA as a starter. While Dempster performed better in the rotation than his numbers indicate, the Chicago Cubs lost many games earlier in the year because they didn’t have a quality bullpen.

The Chicago Cubs have also had, like the rest of the majors, many injuries on their team this year. When Todd Walker was hit in the leg by Carlos Lee and was out for a month with a sprained knee, the Chicago Cubs selected Enrique Wilson to be their backup second baseman.

When injuries occur to a team, it is imperative that the team have a quality farming system. Using the Atlanta Braves as a model to design a quality baseball team (when you go to the playoffs 13 years in a row, you’re doing something right), the Chicago Cubs needed to call up Mike Fontenot, Ronny Cedeño or one of their players. young players to fill that second base job. Young players in a system need to have a legitimate opportunity to play at the Major League level.

In any format of baseball, the players play the game of baseball and the coaches coach the players, and while the players are the ones who need to perform to be successful, the ultimate responsibility for the success of the teams rests with the coaches. The coaches of a team must manage it correctly for the team to be productive and successful. Again, taking the Atlanta Braves as an example, the consistency of the team’s personnel over the years has been the coaching staff, not the players.

When a player is performing poorly or is in a depression, that player must be eliminated in the order of the lineup or benched. When Corey Patterson and Neifi Perez collapsed (hitting below .200) they were allowed to hit at the top of the order. When Jeromy Burnitz, Aramis Ramirez and Derek Lee were falling, they were entrenched in order 3,4,5 in the lineup. Matt Murton, while still hitting .333, hasn’t played every day in the Chicago Cubs lineup.

During a season’s points, the lineup needs to be adjusted so that players on a hot streak can hit more often. Earlier in the Braves season, Andruw Jones was not hitting the ball well and fell to sixth in order. When he started hitting the ball out of the stadium, it was moved up to give him more at-bats. For the Chicago Cubs to be successful, they must begin to follow the example of other winning organizations.

In the end, the Chicago Cubs have the talent to be a winning Major League Baseball team, but the right decisions must be made for this team to thrive in the 21st century and beyond.