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Less than a month ago, the Cubs were playing four games against the Brewers in central NL with 21 games to go. Yada yada yada, the Brewers and Rockies, who in turn smothered the Cubs in Wrigley on Monday and Tuesday, clashed in the NLDS and Joe Maddon may find himself on the block.
Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic today wrote a hedged-to-weinous story-nonetheless, openly speculating that Maddon's time with the Cubs might be over. He noted, of course, that Maddon had led the Cubs to win their first world series victory in more than a century in 2016 and won 95 games with injury-studded training this season.
But then came the warning signs in the room. Maddon, Rosenthal wrote, is "a celebrity manager, more difficult to control than less experienced types, and perhaps less powerful than some." The wounds that led to an exhausted buller in the far right. Maddon's reading of the letter written by Addison Russell's accuser made him look playful.
But guess what: it's a safe bet that no one writes this story for the moment if the Brewers have not played 16-5 in these 21 games – including seven consecutive at the end of the season – to catch the Cubs, then shut up their strikes in a 3-1 match to break the tie division on Monday. When you hear Javy Baez talking about being too focused on "other teams", who do you think he refers to?
It may be a nightmare for FS1 and the MLB network that they have Brewers and Rockies and not the power of attraction of Cubs, but they have much more fun teams to watch and play this season with more urgency and energy. Jon Lester perfectly summarized how the Cubs recently missed out on:
To be clear, Rosenthal did not say definitively that Maddon was about to be demolished. But, presumably very soon, Maddon and Theo will meet. Theo will clarify Maddon's tone at this meeting and decide whether or not they can maintain a productive working relationship.
Maddon's potential replacements discussed by Rosenthal include Dave Roberts, Joe Girardi (with whom, uh, does not seem easy to work from outside), or a "lesser known name" such as the promotion of bench coach Brandon Hyde .
If you led the Cubs, what would you do?
Kyle Koster and I had a long discussion about this today on TBL Live, presented by Kingsford:
UPDATE: It was fun to talk about it as long as it lasted, but ESPN's Jesse Rogers reports that Maddon should return to the Cubs next season.
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