You can love Davis Ross and still understand Craig Counsell is an upgrade |
The Chicago Cubs surprised the baseball world in a big way on Monday. In a shocking move, the Cubs fired manager David Ross and hired Craig Counsell from the Milwaukee Brewers AND signed him to a five-year, 40 million dollar contract — making him the highest-paid manager in the sport's history.
The move has many ramifications and layers to it. For starters, the Cubs have acquired arguably the league’s best manager and put him in the dugout on the Northside. Also, the Counsell move keeps one of the league’s best managers out of the division — stealing games and occupying playoff appearances for what many Cubs fans would argue has been a less talented team up North. Counsell’s contract with Milwaukee expired when the 2023 baseball season ended, and it has been reported that the Cubs’ first contact with Counsell was November 1st. It was a domino effect, but the Brewers — who have always acted as a small market team — were never going to be able to afford what it was reported the Mets were willing to offer Counsell. The former Brewers player is the winningest manager in their team’s history. Still, if they were going to let him go, the Cubs took their opportunity to swoop in and not only take him from the Brewers but also keep him from going to the New York Mets (a team that has proven their willingness to outbid everyone). The Cubs did both. They took him from the Brewers and outbid the Mets. What has come to the surface since is that Counsell has always had his eye on the Cubs job and that managing the Cubs was a dream job of sorts, and if he was ever going to leave Milwaukee — he wanted to go to Wrigley. The move made sense for his family logistically, as Chicago is just a stone’s throw from Milwaukee. Of course, it makes sense financially. But does it make sense for the team? The Cubs have missed the playoffs in four of the last five seasons, with the only exception being the COVID-19-shortened 2020 season. They were in line to make the playoffs and had a chance of over 90% deep into the season, but a September collapse kept them from the playoffs in a disappointing fashion. Obviously, adding a manager who you believe can contribute to wins from the top step is a great start. I have been documented as saying that the Cubs would have won the division this season if Counsell was the manager. But there is another crucial aspect — the Cubs need to get better on the field. The most significant assumption is that this is the Cub's arrival announcement. Similar to the winter that brought Joe Maddon and Jon Lester to the Northside, this seems to be the big “We’re Contenders” declaration to the league. The other side of that coin is that Jed Hoyer and company must have promised an effort to both spend and improve. You have to. You don’t spend $40 million on a manager if you don’t plan on giving him all the resources to win championships. Especially with an offseason shopping list that consists of names like Shohei Ohtani, Blake Snell, Aaron Nola, Cody Bellinger, Jeimer Candelario, Marcus Stroman, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Josh Hader, Sonny Gray, Jordan Montgomery, Jorge Soler, J.D. Martinez and Matt Chapman among other names. But there is, of course, another layer to this move. What about David Ross? The former player-turned-manager that the Cubs brass hand-picked to be the manager is out after four seasons. Ross had an admirable first season in Chicago, which resulted in a division win, an early playoff exit, and an entire season in which no player or coach tested positive for COVID-19. 2021 and 2022 both were filled with midseason selloff, and Ross was tasked with taking the bullets and manning the top step — they were rebuilding, not trying to win. In 2023, they had a glimpse of winning, but they didn’t entirely go all-in. Ross did an excellent job of taking an underachieving team and leading them to a place where the front office was comfortable with not selling at the trade deadline and instead buying — but a September collapse may stain Ross’ legendary record in Chicago. Ross was a solid manager. He was also a great staple of the 2016 World Series-winning team and will forever be remembered for his contributions to the organization. The front office never had a bad thing to say about him, and all the signs pointed to him returning for 2024 and beyond as the Cubs looked to piece together their next great team. However, Jed Hoyer and company took an opportunity to improve and jumped on it. Craig Counsell is a better manager than David Ross, meaning the Cubs are better positioned for their next great team. Perhaps it was cruel to fire Ross; he was understandably “absolutely blindsided”. “My job is to figure out how to win as many games as possible in the short term and the long term,” said Cubs President of Baseball Operations Jed Hoyer. “There was nothing about this move that I didn’t feel like met that criteria.” You can love David Ross and his contributions to this organization and also understand Craig Counsel is a better manager for now and for the future. The Cubs have a better chance of winning a World Series now than they did two days ago... Both can be true. This is an upgrade.
