Despite dealing Darvish, Cubs vow to compete
Jed Hoyer insists this time won’t be like 2011 for the Chicago Cubs.
The team’s new president of baseball operations said Wednesday that Chicago plans to retool rather than bring out the wrecking ball the way it did nine years ago.
Still, this one will leave a mark.
In his first major deal since replacing friend Theo Epstein, Hoyer sent NL Cy Young Award runner-up Yu Darvish and catcher Victor Caratini to the San Diego Padres for pitcher Zach Davies and four young minor leaguers. On deck:
Willson Contreras? Maybe
Kris Bryant, Javier Baez or Anthony Rizzo?
Nothing is off the table, though Hoyer was adamant: The Cubs aren’t following the 2011 plan. That was the year they hired Epstein and Hoyer, and the pair set the long-suffering franchise on a championship course by overhauling the farm system and revamping the front office. Along the way, Cubs fans endured a painful rebuild that included a
101-loss 2012 season.
“I’m not going to run the same playbook that we ran in 2011 and 2012,” said Hoyer, who was promoted from general manager when Epstein resigned in November. “I think that would be foolish. That playbook’s been copied so many times, it doesn’t work anymore.”
He said he’s trying to
keep “one eye on the future” while remaining competitive in the NL Central. The Cubs won the World Series in 2016, ending a drought that dated to 1908, but they haven’t advanced in the postseason since the 2017 team lost in the NL Championship Series.
Still led by the 2016 core of Rizzo, Bryant, Baez and others, Chicago won the division in a pandemicshortened 2020 season but was swept by Miami in the first round of the playoffs.
“We know that we’re coming to the end of this group of players — a wildly successful, franchise-changing run with this group of players,” Hoyer said. “As we come to the end of that, it’s really important to think about the future.”
ETC.
●College
basketball:
MaCio Teague had 18 points to lead six players scoring in double figures as host No. 2 Baylor (8-0) routed winless Alcorn State (0-5) 105-76.
●NHL: Longtime Boston Bruins captain Zdeno Chara signed with the Washington Capitals, a stunning move less than a week before most NHL teams open training camp. Chara agreed to terms on a one-year contract worth $795,000. The 43-year-old defenseman posted on Instagram that the Bruins have decided to move forward with younger players. He had been Boston’s captain since 2006 and was the second European captain to win the Stanley Cup. ... The Arizona Coyotes signed veteran forward Derick Brassard to a one-year contract. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The 33-year-old Brassard had 10 goals and 22 assists in 66 games with the New York Islanders in 2019-20.
●Soccer: The Premier League made it clear it doesn’t intend to suspend the competition despite being forced to call off a second game this week amid concerns across England about a fast-spreading new variant of the coronavirus. Fulham’s game at Tottenham had to be postponed, while the government’s tightening of coronavirus restrictions meant no Premier League stadiums will be allowed to have fans going forward. ... Luis Suarez led Atletico Madrid to a 1-0 victory over Getafe in the 500th game for coach Diego Simeone, extending its Spanish league lead after Real Madrid drew 1-1 at Elche.
●Downhill skiing: Matthias Mayer ended Austria’s wait for its first victory of the Alpine skiing World Cup season by winning the classic downhill on the Stelvio at Bormio, Italy, in the last event of 2020. Mayer edged teammate Vincent Kriechmayr by four-hundredths of a second for an Austrian 1-2 finish.
●Tennis: American Sam Querrey was handed a suspended $20,000 fine by the ATP tour for breaching coronavirus protocols at the St. Petersburg Open in October. Querrey left Russia on a private plane after testing positive for COVID-19, despite having been placed in isolation by local authorities.