2011 MLB Team Preview: Chicago Cubs
Hard to believe, as many of us watch the snow fall outside, that the Boys of Summer are almost back. But it’s true; teams have started reporting to 2011 Major League Baseball training camps and it’s time to start our team-by-team baseball gambling previews for the year.
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Cubs Calender
FEB. 1-18, 2011 – Salary arbitration hearings
FEB. 14, 2011 – Voluntary Spring Training reporting date for pitchers, catchers and injured players
FEB. 19, 2011 – Voluntary Spring Training reporting date for non-pitchers and catchers
FEB. 26, 2011 – Mandatory Spring Training reporting date for all players
After challenging for – and winning – the National League Central several times and threatening to break their World Series curse after 100-plus years, the Chicago Cubs have slipped into mediocrity.
A 97-win season in 2008 gave way to 83 wins in 2009 and 75 wins in 2010. But now that the Cubbies snatched a few pieces of Tampa Bay’s AL East-winning puzzle – Carlos Pena and Matt Garza – this offseason, are they ready to climb back up? Or this team doomed for the foreseeable future?
CHICAGO CUBS
World Series odds: +3000
So is there reason to get excited when we look at the Cubs’ lineup? Meh. It certainly isn’t horrible but it doesn’t strike fear into my heart, either. Alfonso Soriano? Old. Aramis Ramirez? Talented but injury prone and inconsistent. Same goes for Geovany Soto behind the plate. Marlon Byrd is an underrated guy but not a game breaker. Kosuke Fukudome epitomizes overratedness. Shortstop Starlin Castro showed promise as a rookie but I wonder if his value is inflated just because he plays in a baseball-crazy market.
So does Carlos Pena make this lineup better? We’ll see. I think he’s just more of what the Cubs already had: a talented guy with power but a maddeningly inconsistent player. Pena has huge pop, knows how to take a walk and plays plus defense. But his batting averages over the last four years are.282, .247, .227 and .196. That’s a frightening decline, especially when he’s struck out at least 140 times in each of those seasons. Switching leagues usually doesn’t favor hitters, so what if Pena continues the trend and hits .175 this year? 
Garza is a solid addition to Chicago’s rotation. I still haven’t given up on him becoming a No. 1. The guy always saves his best efforts for “big” games. Factoring in the reliable Ryan Dempster and Carlos Zambrano, who is still talented despite being quite insane, the Cubbies have an above-average top three. Randy Wells and Carlos Silva aren’t horrible as their fourth and fifth starters, either.
The Cubs’ pen is in pretty good hands. Carlos Marmol is wild but nobody misses bats like he does. He struck out a ridiculous 138 guys in 77.2 innings last season en route to 38 saves. His 15.99 strikeouts per nine innings set a new big-league record for pitcher with 50-plus innings in a season. Opponents hit .147 off him. He allowed one homer. But Marmol walked a hideous 52 batters over his 77.2 innings. In other words, the only guy who beats Carlos Marmol is Carlos Marmol.
2011 OUTLOOK
To me, the Cubs have a reasonably high floor and a fairly low ceiling, too. I don’t see this team winning fewer than, say, 75 or 80 games. Its pitching is too good for that not to happen and the Cubbies have enough power to string wins together when their erratic swingers get hot. But I can’t see Chicago topping 85 wins this season, either. The lineup has too many question marks, too many injury risks, too many holes. At best, the Cubbies could leapfrog St. Louis for third. And I don’t see them finishing any worse than fourth.
Prediction: 4th, National League Central
