Notes on 'The Art of Loving' by Erich Fromm

 Is Love an Art?

• Most people see the problem of love as "being loved" rather than "loving", one's capacity to love; hence the problem to them is "how to be loved", "how to be lovable"
  
  
• In pursuit of this, they follow aims of:
  1. Be successful (powerful/rich)
  2. Be attractive (cultivating body, style, dress, etc.)
  3. Be charming (Pleasant manners, interesting conversation, helpful, modest, etc.)
  
  
• Goal of these pursuits is to win friends and influence people; to be lovable
  
  
• In our culture, being lovable = being popular and having sex appeal
  
  
• Assumption here is that the problem of love is the problem of an object, not the problem of a faculty

• In a culture where marketing orientation prevails, and in which material success is the outstanding value, there is little reason to be surprised that human love relations follow the same pattern of exchange which governs the commodity and labor market.
  
  
• This commodity culture influences how we perceive objects of love.  Happiness is the thrill of looking in shop windows and buying all you can afford.  We begin to commodify individuals and look at people in a similar way; reducing them to objects.  An attractive partner is the prize we are after.
  
  
• Attractive = a combination of qualities that are sought after in the personality market.
  
  
• Falling in love thus develops only with regard to such human commodities as are within reach of one's own possibilities for exchange.  "Out for a bargain".  Object of love should be desirable from the standpoint of it's social value.
  
  
• Two persons thus fall in love when they feel they found the best object available on the market, considering the limitations of their own exchange value.
  
  
• Falling in love does not equal the permanent state of being in love.  Sudden miracle of intimacy is fleeting, wears off.  This type of love is by its very nature not lasting.

• Intensity of this infatuation, mistaken as proof of intensity of their love, may only prove the degree of their preceding loneliness.
  
  
• The prevailing attitude "nothing is easier than love" is incorrect, as evidenced by the regularity of it's failure.
  
  
• The only adequate way to overcome the failure of love is to examine the reasons for this failure, to study the meaning of love, and to learn how one could do better.

• Love is an art.  The process of learning an art can be divided into two parts: the mastery of theory and the mastery of practice.  Mastery of the art must be the ultimate concern.

• In spite of obvious failures and deep-seated craving for love, almost everything else is considered to be more important than love: Success, Prestige, Money, Power, Attractiveness - almost all of our energy is used learning to achieve these aims for the purpose of maximizing commodity value of self, and almost none to learn the art of loving.

The Theory of Love
1. Love, The Answer to the Problem of Human Existence

• Man is gifted with reason; he is life aware of itself.  Thrown out of paradise; a state of original oneness with nature - a state which he cannot return to, he is aware of himself as a separate entity.  Aware of his birth without his will, and against his will - faced with his death and the death of everyone he loves.  Aware of his helplessness and aloneness before the forces of nature, making his separate, disunited existence an unbearable prison.  Must liberate himself from this prison; unite himself in some form with other men or the outside world, lest be driven to insanity.
  
  
• Separateness is the source of all anxiety.  Cut off, without capacity to use human powers; unable to grasp the world - unite with things and people.  *** Ties to Marx's theory of alienation
  
  
• Adam & Eve, betrayal of one another in being cast out of Eden, is the awareness of separation without the reunion of love - the source of shame.  At the same time, the source of guilt and anxiety.
  
  
• Human existence is confronting the question of: How to overcome separateness, how to achieve union, how to transcend one's own individual life and find atonement.
  
  
• As humans develop from infancy and begin to emerge from primary bonds with mother and oneness with nature (pre-consciousness), the more we are separated from the natural world - the more intense becomes the need to find new way of escaping separateness. ***See 'The Origin of the Family, Private Property And The State' by Friedrich Engels for expansion on how the patriarchal nuclear family brought about the degradation of women, and a further break from primary bonds, which was unknown to pre-class society. The first domestic institution in human history was the matriarchal clan; gave women solidarity and power as head of communal households and matrilocal residence under primitive communism.
  
  
• One way of achieving this aim lies in all kinds of orgiastic states. Rituals of primitive tribes, practiced in common, provides experience of fusion with the group. Closely related to, and blended with orgiastic experience, is sexual experience...
  
  
• Sexual orgasm can produce state similar to one produced of trance, or the effects of certain drugs.  Rites of communal sexual orgies were often a part of many primitive rituals, offering brief release from the mounting tension of anxiety stemming from separateness.  As a common tribal practice, it being cultural accepted, there's no accompanying guilt or shame.
  
  
• Quite different in a culture which has left behind these common practices. Refuge in drugs and alcohol to escape separateness produce feelings of guilt and remorse because they feel all the more separate after the experience is over.  Drives recourse to this refuge with increasing frequency and intensity to escape isolation and mounting guilt and shame.
  
  
• Similar to this recourse is the sexual orgiastic solution. Assumes function not very different from alcohol and drugs.  Desperate attempt to escape anxiety engendered by separateness; results in ever-increasing sense of separateness, since the sexual act without love never bridges the gap between two human beings, except momentarily.
  
  
• All forms of orgiastic unions have three characteristics: they are intense, even violent; they occur in the total personality, mind and body (physical and non-physical in conflict?); they are transitory and periodical (short-lived and demands recurrence).  Opposite is true for forms of union based on conformity with the group; it's customs, practices, and beliefs.  Unity through communal acceptance and participation.
  
  
• Western society, through control of suggestion and propaganda rather than threat or outright terror (as a "democracy"), displays an overwhelming degree of conformity.  In the quest for union, with no other answers or examples of a better way, the union of herd conformity becomes the predominant one.  In this aim to overcome separateness, the individual self disappears to a large extent. "If I am like everybody else, if I have no feelings or thoughts which make me different, if I conform in custom, dress, ideas to the pattern of the group, I am saved; saved from the frightening experience of loneliness."
  
  
• This capitalizing off people's desire to conform, rather than forcing conformity, has the benefit of allowing folks to live under the illusion they follow their own ideas and inclinations; that they have arrived at their opinions as the result of their own thinking - and that it just happens that their ideas are the same as the majority (or within the range of acceptable variance, ie republican/democrat, pepsi/coke, etc).  The advertising slogans of "Hope & Change" vs. "Make America Great Again" displays this pathetic need for difference, when in reality there is hardly any left.
  
  
• Closely related to the elimination of difference is the concept and experience of equality. Socialist thinkers define equality as the abolition of exploitation, of the use of man by man (***See Marx on abolition of private property).  In capitalistic society, "equality" has been transformed to refer to the equality of automatons; of people who have lost their individuality.  This definition of equality strives for sameness rather than oneness.  It is the sameness of abstraction.  Men and women who work the same jobs, read the same papers, and have the same feelings and ideas.  
  
  
• These contemporary ideals of individualized "equality" forces human beings to become the same, not equals; for the purpose of making them function in mass aggregation, all obeying the same commands. Just as modern mass production requires the standardization of commodities, so the social process requires standardization of man, and this standardization is called "equality".
  
  
• This union by conformity, calm and dictated by routine, concerning mainly the mind and not the body, lacking the intensity and violence of the orgiastic solutions, is insufficient to pacify the anxiety of separateness.  It's one advantage is it's permanence, whereas the orgiastic solutions are spasmodic.  Rampant alcoholism, drug addiction, hypersexuality, and suicide in Western society are symptoms of this relative failure of herd conformity.
  
  
• Routinized and prefabricate work and pleasure in capitalist society has a deleterious effect on initiative and exploration of individuality.  
  
  
• Union can be attained through creative activity.  Through creative work, the individual is united with the material, representing the world outside of the self.  Worker and object become one, united through the process of creation.
  
  
• This only holds true for productive work for which I plan, produce, and see the result of my work.  Without this unity, the worker becomes and appendix to the machine or the bureaucratic organization.  The worker ceases to be themselves in production, hence there is no union beyond conformity.
  
  
• Love is an activity, not a passive affect.  Envy, jealousy, ambition, any kind of greed are passions; love is an action, the practice of human power, which can be practiced only in freedom and never as the result of a compulsion.  Love is primarily giving. 
  
  
• The person who's character has not developed beyond the stage of the receptive, exploitative, or hoarding orientation, experiences the act of giving as "giving up" something, being deprived of, or sacrificing.  Most individuals of this type feel giving as an impoverishment and therefore refuse to give.  
  
  
• Some make a virtue of giving in the sense of a sacrifice. The virtue of giving to them lies in the very act of the acceptance of the sacrifice; it is better to suffer deprivation than experience joy.
  
  
• For others, giving is more joyous than receiving, not because it is deprivation, but because the act of giving lies in the expression of my aliveness.  I experience my strength, my wealth, my power; this experience of heightened vitality and potency fill me with joy.
  
  
• He who gives much is rich.  The hoarder who is anxiously worried about losing something is, psychologically speaking, the poor, impoverished man, regardless of how much he has.
  
  
• Poverty is so degrading, not only because of the suffering it causes directly, but because it deprives the poor, who it is well established are more willing to give than the rich, of the joy of giving.
  
  
• People also give of themselves; their joy, their interests, their understand, their knowledge, their humor, their sadness... their life.  In thus giving his life, he enriches another person; he enhances the other's sense of aliveness by enhancing his own.
  
  
• Specifically with regard to love this means: love is a power which produces love.  Giving is receiving - provided they do not treat each other as objects, but are related to each other genuinely and productively.
  
  
• Beyond the element of giving, the active character in love becomes evident in the fact that it always implies certain basic elements, common to all forms of love: Care, Responsibility, Respect, and Knowledge
• 
  
  
  

Longshots 3/13/2019

With Carson Cistulli taking his long running 'Fringe Five' series and abandoning us all to, one can only assume, run the entire baseball ops department of the Toronto Blue Jays from a coffee shop in Maine, there's a considerable hole in the online baseball community where his style of prospect analysis used to be.  I'm neither the talented writer, nor the skilled analyst to fill that void.  What I am, however, is very bored.  In 'The Fringe Five', what Cistulli sought to provide was to "identify and/or continue monitoring the most compelling fringe prospects in all of baseball" limiting his selection to prospects who did not appear on any Top Prospect lists.  I'm going to attempt to do the same, but with a far less catchy name for my project and fewer GIFs, because I'm not getting paid for this. 

As the weeks pass, I'll keep a scoreboard accounting for how many times a player has appeared on my 'Longshots' list (3 points for being featured, 1 point for an honorable mention).  For now, though, let's get started with a list of 20 players entering 2019 on my watch list (1 point for each)...

• Yonathan Daza - OF (Colorado Rockies)
• Luis Arraez - 2B (Cincinnati Reds)
• Nicky Lopez - 2B/SS (Kansas City Royals)
• Brian Miller - OF (Miami Marlins)
• Jamie Westbrook - 2B (Arizona Diamondbacks)
• John Nogowski - 1B (St. Louis Cardinals)
• LaMonte Wade - OF (Minnesota Twins)
• Xavier Fernandez - C (Kansas City Royals)
• Marshall Kasowski - RP (Los Angeles Dodgers)
• Zac Houston - RP (Detroit Tigers)
• Kevin Ginkel - RP (Arizona Diamondbacks)
• Stephen Villines - RP (New York Mets)
• Ryan Helsley - SP (St. Louis Cardinals)
• Sam Delaplane - RP (Seattle Mariners)
• Pedro Avila - SP (San Diego Padres)
• Curtis Taylor - SP/RP (Tampa Bay Rays)
• Dean Kremer - SP (Baltimore Orioles)
• Conner Menez - SP (San Francisco Giants)
• Brock Burke - SP (Texas Rangers)
• Spencer Howard - SP (Philadelphia Phillies)

Manny Machado Helps Us Find Ourselves, Bigfoot

Everybody is looking for something.  People struggle to face their animal existence, where their sole reason for being, from the cell to the whole organism, is to proliferate, and we seek to find purpose and fulfillment wherever we can.  People join the military to give their life a purpose, to give meaning, drawn to adventurism and to be part of something greater than themselves.  Some immerse themselves in a religion and others are consumed by addiction.  Some people obsess over conspiracy theories or spend their lives looking for aliens, bigfoot, and the lochness monster.  The point is, it's all irrational, and born of a need to believe there's some grand scheme, something more powerful than ourselves, malevolent or otherwise, pulling the strings, instrumental in our successes or to blame for our failures.  It's a more comfortable existence than accepting we're mediocre people, generally motivated by selfishness, destroying one another for the right to marshal finite resources.  These things comfort us to the defeat of our will power, to the fear of suffocating in the narrow confines of our world, bringing us hope of new victories and conquests.

The Baltimore Orioles, too, are looking for something.  You could be excused for suspecting the Orioles themselves haven't a clue what that might be, as the team has stumbled through a decade of mediocrity, marred by an inability to develop a single worthwhile starting pitcher since Mike Mussina, while demonstrating a proclivity for employing a revolving door of bumbling, defensively inept sluggers in the corner outfield positions.  However, when it comes to shopping Manny Machado, the Orioles are purportedly uncompromising in their demand for not one but two Major League ready starting pitchers.  Try making that request with a straight face...

They might as well be looking for bigfoot.

A few days ago, Jesse Rogers of ESPN: Chicago, wrote an article proposing a Manny Machado for Addison Russell swap.  As far as I can tell, all the momentum for this proposal has been driven by Jesse and the Twitter shitstorm it's kicked off.  The Cubs have been interested in acquiring Machado, according to reports, but there's no evidence that negotiations have advanced past preliminary inquiries, or that Russell has been offered or even discussed, though it's presumed Machado would supplant Russell at Shortstop, making the young infielder expendable, with Kris Bryant firmly entrenched as the Cubs everyday third baseman, if the Cubs were to trade for the Baltimore star, that is.

In a vacuum, Machado would be an upgrade over Russell at shortstop and would make the Cubs a better team in 2018.  Unfortunately, the calculus isn't that simple.  Macahdo is a free-agent following the 2018 season, and is expected to receive offers in the $300 million range, whereas Russell is under team control through 2021.  With a 6.0-6.5 WAR projection, Machado, due to make about $15 million in his final season of arbitration, making him as much as a $45-$50 million asset, even as a 1-year rental.  Russell, with an average projection of 3.0 WAR over the next four years, is about to enter his first of four arbitration years, where he'll earn a total in the range of $35 million, providing a surplus value around $80 million.  While Machado is the better player, Russell is the more valuable asset.  It's more realistic than the Orioles asking price of two controllable starting pitchers (or roughly $100 million in surplus, +/- depending on the quality of pitchers), but it's still a sizable overpay. Josh Donaldson, a comparable talent, was traded in late 2014, with a remaining three years of team control, for a universally despised third baseman (who's out of professional baseball), two fringy pitching prospects (amassing a combined 3.4 ML WAR in three seasons since the trade), and a highly regarded 18-year old Shortstop prospect who's yet to debut.  As Dave Cameron of Fangraphs wrote the other day (here), a player of similar trade value, Marcell Ozuna, just a week ago returned a "back-end top 100 prospect, a lottery ticket speedster who can’t hit, a lower-level arm of some note, and a throw-in".   What's being suggested as a reasonable return for Manny Machado hasn't been reasonable at all.
Now, under some circumstances I would defend an overpay for a short-term asset.  Mainly, for a team who's competitive window is closing.  If you're going to have to begin a rebuild in a year or two, there are diminishing returns for having a good-not-great player, like Addison Russell, under control for four seasons.  The Cubs, however, are not in that situation.  They're still firmly in the middle of their competitive window, with core players like Rizzo, Bryant, Russell, Baez, Contreras, Schwarber, and Happ all under team control through 2021.  The Cubs do have a short-term surplus of infielders, and could leverage on their more valuable pieces to make an addition, but part of what makes them appealing as a contender is their quality depth.  Any potential move, whether it's Russell, Happ, or Schwarber, is guaranteed to have a chain effect around the diamond in years to come.  Moving Russell, in particular, would necessitate sliding as many as 4 players up the defensive spectrum, possibly into positions they're not fit to handle full-time, in years to come.  We can look back at the recent success of the Milwaukee Brewers as an example of what mediocrity, and perhaps better defined - avoiding disaster - across all positions translates to.  Risking depth, and potentially opening up holes on a team that's pretty well set for four more season, for a marginal one-season upgrade, is a real gamble, and I'm not convinced it's one that makes sense. As I've written about before regarding the Dodgers, remaining in a competitive cycle for multiple seasons yields higher odds of winning a World Series than maximizing odds for any individual season at a cost to subsequent opportunities.

So, let's do some more math...

The Cubs are currently projected to win 95 games in 2018, third best in MLB behind only the Dodgers and the Astros.  In 2017, a 96-win projection was worth roughly 15.5% World Series odds.  We can expect the 2018 odds to be similar, perhaps around 15%.  Now, with Manny Machado instead of Addison Russell in 2018, the Cubs would be projected about 3-wins better, to 98 wins, edging them above the Dodgers but still behind Houston.  The Dodgers, in 2017, had a 97-win projection and 16% World Series odds, so I'll assume a 0.5% jump from 97 to 98 wins, bringing the 98-win odds to 16.5%, a 1.5% improvement in 2018 World Series odds.  That's pretty good.

Now, after 2018, Russell is in Baltimore, and Machado is gone.  He's got all the money in the world and retires to his own luxury island resort somewhere in the Cayman Islands... or more likely to the New York Yankees, which is somehow more despicable.  In his wake, the Cubs are left with Javier Baez, who'd presumably take over full-time duties at shortstop.  The Cubs 2nd base options are now a 38-year old Ben Zobrist, in the final year of his 4 year/$56 million deal, or Ian Happ.  If it's Zobrist, that's a considerably worse up-the-middle combo than Russell/Baez, with even more uncertainty beyond 2019.  If it's Happ, the Cubs either have no Center Fielder, or Jason Heyward shifts to Center Field and the Cubs have no Right Fielder.  This is where people start screaming for Bryce Harper, and while that's great, remember, you now have two players playing out of position (Happ and Heyward) to accommodate Harper, and with Harper's sure to be enormous contract, possibly as much $35 million annually, that's $35 million that can't go to addressing a pitching staff that features a 35-year old Jon Lester, Jose Quintana, Kyle Hendricks, and then ???.  Any way you look at it, you're sacrificing major $ per WAR value by not having Russell in years 2-4, where payroll is already going to be projected to increase considerably as your core players move deeper into the arbitration process, and more pitching is needed.  Assuming there is a cap to what Cubs ownership is willing to spend, it's difficult to project a Cubs team without Russell to be better in years 2-4 than they would be with him.  Having calculated a 3-win upgrade as worth 1.5% in World Series odds, and assuming the Cubs won't replace Russell's 3.0 WAR/per year projection with a 0, I'll estimate the penalty in year 2 is 0.75%, or half of Russell's contribution to the team.  Without having the money to add pitching, or having not effectively replaced Russell, I'll estimate a 1% penalty for year 3, and 1.25 % for year 4.  Obviously this is all speculation, but like I reasoned, the more long-term assets the Cubs part with now, the more holes they'll have to fill by the end of their competitive window, with limited resources to fill them.  This also doesn't consider beyond 2021, and how the extra $30-35 million in surplus value Russell provides over that time span might impact the Cubs spending over the coming seasons in order to extent the competitive window beyond 2021.

4-year projection w/ Russell (no trade): 

2018: 15%
2019: 15%
2020: 15%
2021: 15%

Total Odds: 47.8%

4-year projection w/ Machado trade:

2018: 16.5%
2019: 14.25%
2020: 14%
2021: 13.75%

Total Odds: 46.9%

As you can see, adding Machado, despite improving the Cubs 2018 World Series odds would actually slightly decrease the team's odds of winning a World Series at some point over the next four years.

What this becomes is a conversation about what we're looking for out of sports.  As Cubs fans, we are, for the first time in our lives, experiencing being spoiled by success.  I think many of us have become bored with just being good.  In a constant drive for something greater, we're already looking towards sacrificing "the process", the long-term approach that got us here, for short-term rewards because it's new and exciting.  It's an adventure and gives us a new purpose.  If it's solely about maximizing odds, it's irrational to make this trade.  If what we're seeking is the experience and the adventurism, then maybe it's not wrong to go looking for bigfoot.  Much like the human experience, our fandom is largely a question of what we want our experience to be.  Is it ideal, or are we even capable of behaving completely rationally, and making the moves that are demonstrably correct, being willing to accept the outcomes, whatever they might be?  Or, do we lose ourselves in the abstract, and embrace the uncertainty, adding worlds onto our own, and perhaps, Manny Machado to "the process"?  The truth is out there.

Baseball Q&A: Part 2

Same preface as last time - My cousin, Nathan Perry (Questions 1-11), sent me this Q & A (unaltered in italics)... I received his permission to submit my response here, for all to see. From Facebook - Andy Roberts (12), Austen Hesch (13), and Dane Johnson (14) also made submissions.

Cubs 2.0
1. In your most objective and honest opinion... is Joe Maddon the man for the job with the Cubs long term success or just the guy who got them over the hump (curse)?
Well, Maddon is 63 as of about a week ago.  He's one of the older managers in baseball - trailing only Terry Collins (67), Dusty Baker (67), and Pete Mackanin (65).  Very few manage into their 70s these days, so it's reasonable to assume Maddon's career in the dugout is winding down.  That said, he's considered by many to be one the best managers in baseball.  This is still an area of the game that's poorly understood and nearly impossible to quantify.  Most often, manager of the year is either awarded to the manager of the best team by record, or the manager of the team that most outperformed expectations.  That's not necessarily because it's believed that person was the best manager, but rather nobody really knows the impact a manager has or what amount of a team's success, or failure, can/should be attributed to the manager.  I think there's some criticism that can be made of Maddon as a in-game tactician.  Most notably, perhaps, from co-author of The Book: Playing the Percentages in Baseball, Mitchel Lichtman, who was very critical Maddon's in-game decisions at several points during the season, including much of the postseason.  However, it's possible that what Maddon might lack in way making the statistically sound decision in every scenario, he may may very well make up for with his open-mindedness and ability to effectively communicate, providing a bridge of sorts between the front office and the players.  Maddon seems to be quite adept at being able to convince players to accept team-friendly roles, or adopt innovative instruction and philosophy relayed from the analytical departments.  I don't think there's any real reason to be looking to move on from Joe at this time, but I have to say, I'm really surprised Maddon's long-time bench coach, Dave Martinez, hasn't yet been given a crack at a managerial position.  I thought for sure he'd be hired away this off-season, but as far as I know, he wasn't even interviewed for a job.  It makes me wonder if he hasn't some sort of handshake agreement to be Maddon's successor, as part of an eventual exit strategy for Joe into retirement.
2. Excluding anyone selected to All-Star game in '16, along with Heyward and Schwarber, who will be the most important player to step up for Cubs in 2017?
I think that's pretty easily Willson Contreras.  He's going to be handed the bulk of the catching duties this year, including now Jon Lester.  Offensively, he's already an above-average catcher.  Now it's time for him to build on the defensive skills he displayed last season, rated above average by both FanGraphs Catcher Defense and StatCorner's Catcher Framing report.  Albert Almora could also see an increased role this year, especially if Jason Heyward struggles at the plate once again.  Almora can absolutely defend, and will certainly be late-inning replacement on days Schwarber starts in Left, but if he's going to claim a role as a regular he's going to need to make strides offensively.  

3. Outside of any playoff team last year (2016) who do you cringe to see the Cubs have to face most in 2017?

I'm going to cheat some on this question, at least for a second, because there's really no team that finished outside the playoffs last season that I fear the Cubs playing.  I really do fear the Los Angeles Dodgers, though.  In fact, before the Cubs won the World Series last season, I was very concerned that the Cubs were coming into this competitive window at the same time the Dodgers were becoming both a financial and intellectual juggernaut in the National League.  I'm less frightened now that the Cubs have at least secured that elusive first World Series in over a century, but I still think we're going to see the Cubs and Dodgers clashing in the playoffs pretty regularly over the next 5-10 years.  Now, more to the spirit of your question, the Pirates and Cardinals are obviously still both very much competitive despite missing the playoffs last season.  I don't think it should be taken for granted that the Cubs will repeat as Division Champs, although I do believe them to be the best team in the division.  The Brewers could be a real pain in the ass to play in 2017, too.  I don't expect them to be a very good team, but they have a lot of 'boom or bust' type offensive players (Domingo Santana, Keon Broxton, Eric Thames, Travis Shaw, and Lewis Brinson) to pair with some more steady performers like Braun, Villar, and their young defensive wizard at shortstop - Orlando Arcia.  I could see them being one of those frustrating teams that can get hot over a weekend and sweep a series from a much better team.  The hope is that you just catch them at the right time.

4. Who will end up being the MVP of the Cubs starters in 2017?

Jon Lester.  The Cubs have been pretty fortunate to avoid any major injuries to their pitching staff the past couple years.  Having Lester as the anchor of this staff, giving 200+ quality innings is incredibly valuable.  There's now enough depth to this pitching staff to absorb an injury or two, but the one guy I don't think can be replaced is Lester.  This team really needs his quality innings.  

5. What AL team do you see being most improved in 2017?

The Houston Astros.  They weren't a bad team last season, but they really stumbled out of the gate and never really recovered.  They won 84 games in 2016 and finished 3rd in the AL West.  In the off-season: they added Josh Reddick and Nori Aoki to the outfield, traded for Brian McCann to replace Jason Castro behind the plate, and signed Carlos Beltran to DH.  I also think Charlie Morton was a sneaky good addition to their starting rotation.  I think they have to be the favorites to win the AL West this year, and one of the early favorites, along with the Indians and Red Sox, to win the American League.  

6. What ball club will suck in 2017, but you like their chances based off their moves and acquisitions (trades, draft, etc..)?

Again, Milwaukee has really impressed me.  There are several pieces to a good rebuild.  Obviously you want to build quality organizational depth, investing in the international market, capitalizing off high draft picks, and by trading Major League assets.  But also, rebuilding affords you the freedom to provide opportunities to players with intriguing skill sets that have not been given an opportunity, have underperformed, or been incorrectly utilized elsewhere.  Just finding a couple diamonds in the rough can make all the difference between a successful rebuild and a failure.  The Brewers have done particularly well in this aspect of their rebuild.  They've added Junior Guerra, who they scooped out of the Mexican League as a 31-year old, and now appears to be a solid #3 or 4 type starter they should be able to flip at the trade deadline for a nice package of prospects.  They signed slugging first baseman Eric Thames out of the Korean League for a very team-friendly 3 years/$15.  If he winds up hitting his projections, they should be trade him for a nice return.  They gave Jonathan Villar a full-time job and he stole 62 bases and was a 3.0 WAR player.  They're entering 2017 with Domingo Sanatana and Keon Broxton penciled in for full-time roles in the outfield.  Both have issues making consistent contact, but both ranked in the Top 10 in exit velocity among MLs with at least 100 ABs in 2016.  A list that includes names like Miguel Cabrera, Nelson Cruz, Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich, and Miguel Sano.  There's a lot of talent on this roster that, even if not part of the next competitive Brewers team, could be cashed in to play a significant role in speeding up the timetable for their rebuild.

7. Who will be the MVP of the batting order for the Cubs?

Kris Bryant.  He's ridiculous.

8. What off-season move of the Cubs do you dislike most?

Not bringing back Dexter Fowler.  I understand why, but that doesn't make it hurt any less.  If Jason Heyward does bounce back, the Cubs glut of offensive talent will help hide the fact that this team doesn't really have a true full-time Center Fielder.  I think the plan is for Heyward and Almora to more or less platoon in CF, with Jon Jay around as more of an insurance policy for Heyward.  If Heyward is a disaster, I'd expect the Cubs to be far less patient with him in 2017, and he'll quickly start losing ABs to Jay/Almora in CF, and Zobrist in RF (with Baez playing regularly at 2B).  In that case, Fowler's absence would be far more glaring.  

9. Who will be the MVP of the bullpen in 2017?

If everything goes as planned, that should be the newly acquired Closer, Wade Davis, with Rondon Strop, and to a lesser extent, CJ Edwards, working in the set-up roles.  Unfortunately, all three of Davis, Rondon, and Strop had arm troubles late last season and are pretty significant injury risks entering 2017.  That means, CJ Edwards, who may be the team's future Closer beyond 2017, could be pressed into more of a high leverage role than anticipated.  

10. Two parts... (a) who do you hope does the best from the class of Cubs in '16 who have now joined other clubs? (b) who do you think will have the most success in '17 with those of whom joined other clubs?

The answer to (a) is definitely Dexter Fowler, and I think the answer to (b) is likely Fowler as well.  I'll be rooting for Dex to do well, but for the Cardinals to suck most of the year.  I guess someone like Trevor Cahill (San Diego) and Travis Wood (Kansas City) could earn roles in the starting rotation with their new teams, but there really wasn't any departure from the 2016 Cubs as large as Fowler's.

11. Assuming the Cubs are in a similar leading position prior to trade deadline in '17, What trade or who would you like to see acquired to help in making a back to back WS championship a reality? (Assuming no major injuries)

Well, answering this kind of question comes with some qualifications and you already provided one - no major injuries.  With no major injuries, the Cubs won't need to add another starting pitcher before the postseason.  If there is one, that changes completely.  The second qualification - assuming average production from Jason Heyward.  If the Cubs get average offensive production from Heyward, they probably won't look to add a Center Fielder.  If Heyward's struggle continue, they'll probably want to add a full-time CF for the stretch run.  The market is pretty thin.  Billy Hamilton could possibly be traded this season, but I kind of doubt the Reds would be eager to trade him to a division rival.  Ender Inciarte, from the Braves, would be another option, but the asking price has been rumored to be pretty steep.  If the Royals stumble early, they may look to trade Lorenzo Cain, who's a free-agent at season's end.  He may be the best available option.  The likeliest scenario is that the Cubs make another trade for a late-inning bullpen arm.  Who might be the target is really hard to predict this far out from the trade deadline.

12. Whom do you think will end up being the 5th starter? It'd be nice to keep Montgomery in the pen, I think.

Montgomery is currently listed as the team's 5th starter, but I agree, he's probably best suited as the team's premier left-handed option out of the bullpen.  I think the team would prefer to use him in that role, and if Brett Anderson can prove he's healthy this Spring, I'd expect him to break camp as the team's 5th starter.  Looking at the schedule, the Cubs shouldn't need a 5th starter until April 17, so it's possible Montgomery will start in the bullpen no matter what, and Anderson could start the season in Iowa (although he has the right to refuse the assignment) in order to stay on schedule, with a starter's workload, until mid-April.

13. Vegas over/under that I saw has the Cubs at 97.5 wins. Under's a good bet, right? Good as the Cubs are, winning that many games is damn hard.
It's a fair bet that somebody is going to win at least 98 games, but setting a mean expectation of 97.5 wins for any single team is really aggressive.  I think the Cubs and Dodgers are the two best teams entering 2017, and I think at least one of them will probably exceed 97 wins, but the under is always the smart bet for any individual team with the bar set that high.  So, yeah, I completely agree.

14. Does Seattle still have a team? Am I still a fan? Why?

I'm sorry, Dane.  I'm really, really sorry.  The Mariners, again, are right on the brink of being a playoff team.  I know it's probably difficult to find any reason to be optimistic with that projection given the team's recent lack of success with similar projections.  However, if there is a reason to be optimistic, it's that the last time the Mariners were a good team prior to this recent stretch of decent play, it was in 2009, when they were an elite defensive team that couldn't score any runs.  Recently, they've been a pretty good offensive team that couldn't field the ball.  This off-season they brought in Jarrod Dyson to play LF, and Mitch Haniger to play RF, with Leonys Martin already in CF.  That's probably the best defensive outfield in baseball.  They're average defensively in the infield, so this isn't the elite defensive team of 2009, but they're also much better offensively.  It's a nice balance.  They shouldn't be offensively inept, and the defensive upgrades should really help their pitching staff, which is pretty solid at least 1-4 in the rotation, with a decent bullpen.  Also, Edwin Diaz, their Closer, is a monster.  If they're going to be mediocre again this season, at least they'll be mediocre is a different way.  

Military Spending

Any government spending can serve as an economic stimulus.  Where the spending is directed impacts various segments of the economy differently.  The government spends to subsidize many different industries which impact the overall economy, from energy to agriculture, and social spending to military spending.  One of the more recent and largest examples is the joint Bush/Obama state intervention in the financial industry.  This sort of deregulation of markets, combined with subsidies and state intervention, has had a stark impact on the economy.  It provides investors the incentive to take risks knowing hefty returns will be privatized and losses, even to the extent of an economic collapse, will be socialized.  With the increase in spending, mostly through state intervention to save the industry, we have seen an improvement in the overall economy.  However, when pressed, even President Obama acknowledges that the overwhelming majority of the economic recovery has gone to the top half of 1%, with some minor spill over to high-level professionals.  By large, via studies from 'The State of Working America', working families are worse off today than they were in the early 90s, and even worse yet than the same class of working families in the 1970s.  They conclude, "High profitability, higher return on capital, and higher CEO pay, may be the only payoff or concrete sign of accomplishment from 16 years of transition to a more deregulated economy."  The President concedes this as if it's an unfortunate and somewhat puzzling outcome, but it's very much by design.  This example is neoliberalism in a nutshell.  By definition: a policy model that transfers control of economic factors to the private sector from the public sector.

There was a major lesson learned during WWII: Capitalism is not a viable economic system.  During the war, the US adopted a semi-command economy, state control and allocation of resources, which was extremely successful and efficient, and pulled the US out of the depression.  It was discovered there is a way to maintain something remotely like a capitalistic system, mainly with massive state subsidy, direction, and control.  That's why those often most vocally in favor of free market principles are also most in favor of subsidies to advanced industry, including via the military.  It's seemingly a contradiction, but there's an underlying theme.  The miracles of the free market must only apply to the poor.  Wealth and profit must be closely managed and protected by state intervention.

You've probably heard me say it bunch of times, but again, military spending is largely a subsidy to high tech industry.  Risk, research, and development are all socialized, then usable technology is passed to advanced industry through huge acts of privatization.  The telecommunications industry, among innumerable illustrations, is a prime example of state intervention which contributed heavily towards the creation of the industry and has sustained it with a vast transfer of public resources to private profit.  The internet, satellites, fiber optics, etc. are all straight from DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency).  The best illustration within telecommunications is the semiconductor industry, which was saved from collapse in the 1980s by massive Reaganite intervention, all while his administration was claiming a passion for the miracles of the free market, as a lesson in personal responsibility to the poor.  There's bipartisan agreement on these policies, too.  In the 90s, Bill Clinton stood in a Boeing terminal and preached "the gospel of free markets" as described by the NY Times, offering his "grand vision of a free market future" at an APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) meeting in Seattle.  He gave Boeing as the prime example of "the gospel of the free markets".  What he neglected to mention, of course, is that Boeing was the beneficiary of large scale state intervention and would not have existed without massive direct and indirect subsidy by way of crucial technology borrowed from the state sector.  Meanwhile, the Clinton administration gutted welfare spending using the "welfare queen" trope popularized by Reagan.

This isn't to say that state intervention and subsidies to high tech industry through military spending are an altogether bad thing.  In fact, these policies have given the US a commanding lead in the development of many new technologies the industry enjoys, both in hardware and software.  That's an enormous success considering it's been openly stated by the business press that high tech industry could not have survived an unsubsidized, competitive, free market enterprise economy.  The true damage occurs when this spending becomes excessive and is combined with tax cuts to the rich and drastic cuts to social spending.  At these extremes, slashing funding to everything which does not contribute directly to profit making, the use of intervention and subsidies becomes a method for direct redistribution of wealth from public resources to private profit, sharply widening inequality.  Redistribution of wealth in the other direction, as in social spending, also helps the economy, but it works to aid people in becoming consumers who's only contribution to profit-making is by providing their cheap labor, meaning the economic advantages only filter to corporations indirectly.  This type of wealth redistribution also has a democratizing effect, where people become more involved in policy discussion when they're seeing actual benefits to their contribution, which is dangerous to private power.  Military spending has none of these defects.  It's a direct gift to corporations.  That's why it's necessary to use "security" to define the purpose of military spending and not "subsidy".  You limit democratic participation when the population can't feel their contributions and aren't aware that they're largely responsible for the success of the economy, reliant on both their labor and through state intervention, otherwise they might start demanding something in return.  Like, you know, a movement towards a greater commitment to social spending.  So, instead, you create foreign devils to fear, and preach the need to direct those funds towards "defense" which is an easy sell compared to "subsidy".

To deal with the resulting overflow of the superfluous population, not contributing to profit making, who are seen as a drain on a society that refuses to aid them in any way, you just build prisons. In 1994, Clinton signed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, the largest crime bill in history, which allocated $10 billion for prison construction, expanded the death penalty, and eliminated federal funding for inmate education. The act intensified police surveillance and racial profiling, and locked up millions for nonviolent offenses, such as drug possession. It helped usher in the era of mass incarceration that devastated communities of color.  All of which was really a step up from the already severely damaging Reagan/Bush "War on Drugs" political agenda.  In a system where you're trying to limit public participation and any cost to society that isn't a direct handout to private profit, you tend to treat the public as a threat, as an enemy.  They need to be divided, atomized, or altogether gotten rid of, whether that's locked in prison, sat in front of the tv, sent as an occupying force to protect foreign investments, arguing with one another over religious objections, it doesn't matter.  As the democratic theorist Walter Lippmann wrote, "the public must be put in their place."  You need to protect profit from "the roar and trampling of the bewildered herd."

Donald Trump claiming the military is in shambles and the US needs a re-commitment to military spending is a blatant lie.  The US dwarfs the rest of the world in military spending, marking 34% of the world's total military spending, allotting more than the next 7 nations combined.  If you ask troops, and I would recommend you read Winter Soldier, Iraq and Afghanistan; it can be a nightmare for troops trying to receive the proper equipment to fight wars many of the troops don't agree with or believe in.  Once they're home, often facing both mental and physical trauma, they can't even find proper health care through the VA.  So, it's great if you support the military, and specifically the troops, but the majority of the spending isn't going to troops.  It's going to R&D for new technology and it comes at the cost of diminished social spending.  When Trump makes the claim that we need to expand our nuclear capacity, at a cost of $1 trillion over the decade, it's essentially just a call for a greater transfer of wealth from the public resources to private profit.  It's right in line with tax policy that places a greater burden for sustaining the society on the lower and middle classes by reducing tax rates for the wealthy.  He's just using the military as cover for an increased subsidy to advanced industry.  In essence, discipline for the defenseless poor, but a powerful nanny state for the rich and privileged.  Just another method of: a policy model that transfers control of economic factors to the private sector from the public sector.  Neoliberalism.

Baseball Q & A

My cousin, Nathan Perry, sent me this Q & A (unaltered in italics)... I received his permission to submit my response here, for all to see. Nathan is one of my favorite people. You may know him as a former Thanksgiving Day Football MVP, or his more recent work, playing a key supporting role in bringing a human life into this world. It's also possible you don't know Nathan, in which case, it's safe to forget about Nathan, as one picture of his young daughter Cora far surpasses the sum of Nathan's work as measured by today's currency, Faves and Likes. I figure, for those who know you, you're like our own personal Cubs expert... so, this is my feeble attempt to interview you with questions I actually want to know your opinion on:

Q: Who is the most valuable player on the Cubs team? To further clarify, if the Cubs could only keep one player who would it be? The definition of 'value' as it relates to players has been argued endlessly, most often in debating MVP candidates. There's an argument that the spirit of celebrating 'value' is in recognizing the most outstanding player. By that argument, the most valuable Cubs player is Kris Bryant. Judged on performance, as well as handsomeness, he's easily the most irreplaceable player on the roster. The other camp asserts a more literal definition of 'value' demands that salary, and in this case, the entirety of the player's contract status be considered equally in determining the player's value to the team. In this case, Anthony Rizzo is at least in the mix. Bryant and Rizzo are both under team control through 2021. Rizzo signed an extension with the Cubs in 2013 to buy out all of his years of team control, plus two team options (2020 and 2021). Bryant has not signed and extension and will enter arbitration as a Super Two qualifier (top 22% in service time for players between 2-3 years of Major League service) next off-season. Rizzo's value is easier to calculate, so we'll start there. Anthony projects to average of 4.5 WAR per season over the next 5 years, for a total of 22.5 WAR. Over that time he'll make $54.86 million. That's about $2.44 million per win. With Bryant, I'm going to have to estimate how much he'll earn through arbitration, but he appears to be a lock at this point to smash arbitration records. He'll earn around $800,000 this upcoming season, his last standard raise under team contract renewal. I'll estimate $5 million for his first year of arbitration, $12 million his second year, $18 million in his third, and $23 million in his final year of arbitration. That's a total of $58.8 million over five years. Bryant projects better than Rizzo, with a 5.9 WAR average, or a total of 29.5 WAR. That's $1.99 million per win. The average amount paid per win in free agency is around $8 million. So, in the next five years, Rizzo's net value to the Cubs is about $125,000,000. Bryant's net value is even greater, at around $177,000,000. So, the answer is Bryant, by both measures, but both are tremendously valuable. Easily both in the top 10 of most valuable players.

Q: Although they are important in different ways, Who would be the greater loss to the Cubs: Joe Maddon or Theo Epstein? What a manager provides is not as easily quantifiable as a GM or, in Theo's case, President of Baseball Operations. My simple answer is Theo. I believe Maddon is one the better managers in baseball. Unfortunately, I can't really back that up with much data. I think he's around average as an in-game tactician, though seemingly both creative and flexible. From all accounts, he's among the best at managing a clubhouse. It's impossible to prove it's true or how much that's worth, but I tend to believe it, nonetheless. Where Theo excels, there's data to back up his performance. He's one of the best handful of baseball executives, and just received a pay raise to reflect that. In fact, even at $10 million per year over five years, I think he's underpaid. I'm not convinced baseball is correctly valuing it's executives. Surely an elite front office executive provides more value than say, Ian Kennedy, a back of the rotation starting pitcher who signed last off-season with the Royals for $70 million over 5 years. Kennedy might provide the Royals 10 WAR over those five years. Just one good trade, signing, or draft pick by an elite GM can be worth that to an organization, valued on the open market by Kansas City as worth $70 million. I think it's fair to estimate that Theo's been worth hundreds of million of dollars to the Cubs, and baseball owners seem to be sluggish to recognize that an investment in the baseball operations department likely has several times more value per dollar than a free-agent signing at this point. The argument against Epstein is, perhaps everything that he has to offer as an executive was put in place over the course of his first contract, and even if he were to leave, there'd be enough of a residual effect from his presence that any drop off in front performance would be minimal. To me, it's worth $10 million per year to keep him around. Ten million dollars is nothing to a Major League organization. If the price were to double, though, I think it would be worth considering letting him go, as he's worth less to you at that point, having already established a top-to-bottom process that can be replicated without his leadership, than he is to another organization looking to rebuild it's front office.

Q: Inevitably, Cubs will lose players like Fowler to Free Agency, choose not to extend offers to guys like Hammel and some will retire such as Ross. Who are some players in the next two, three, five, etc years that will be heartbreaking for the Cubs to cut ties with, but it will eventually be inevitable to do so? The Cubs are in a pretty great situation right now. They're really not at risk to lose anyone they can't replace, and don't want to let go. Their core of position players are all under contract through at least 2021. I imagine they'll probably lock up most of those guys to extensions in the coming years. Bryant is likely to be the most expensive, and most difficult to sign, as he's represented by super-agent Scott Boras who regularly advises his clients to test the open market. In the short-term, Jake Arrieta is the one guy they're going to have to make a tough decision on. He's a free agent next off-season and he's likely to get a large contract. I really can't say with any confidence one way or another if the Cubs will re-sign him. Personally, I'd be hesitant to go beyond 5 years and $120 million with Arrieta. This could all certainly change between now and the end of next season, but at this point, there's very little chance Arrieta will get less than 5 years and $120 million.

Q: Which NL teams are not being talked about that should be feared? The Colorado Rockies would head that list for me. I think they're ready to take a step forward in 2017 and compete. Their outfield is strong and deep (Blackmon, CarGo, David Dahl, Gerardo Parra, and Raimel Tapia). I think their best bet is to trade either Carlos Gonzalez or Charlie Blackmon, and play Tapia, the best defender of the group, in Center Field. Dahl and whoever is left of Cargo/Blackmon would play in the corners. Arenado is an MVP candidate at Third Base. Trevor Story, Shortstop, and D.J. LeMahieu, Second Base, are both above average starters. They could use some help at Catcher and First Base. They have solid depth at Cather, with three legitimate options, though none of them are better than average. Given the Rockies limited resources, I'd imagine they'll just stick with what the have there and invest in First Base. As of today, the Rockies listed First Baseman is Gerardo Parra. They can't open the season with that. They could either try to get a First Baseman in trade, or dip into free agency and try to sign one of Mike Napoli, Mitch Moreland, or Adam Lind. None of those three strike me as very exciting, but all are better than Gerardo Parra. Even as is, Colorado has one of the better sets of position players in the NL. That alone could carry them to 80+ wins. Jon Gray is their Ace, and he's really good, but behind him there's still some unanswered questions. With Chad Bettis, Tyler Chatwood, Tyler Anderson, and Jeff Hoffman, there's better back-end depth than past Rockies rotations, but they still lack middle of the rotation depth. I don't expect the Rockies to make a major splash in free agency, so if they're going to compete next year, they're either going to have to gamble on low-cost, medium upside free agent, add pitching via trade (likely Blackmon or CarGo), or just hope that someone takes a major step forward in development. The bullpen is a bit soft too, but that's an easier fix. That can be patched together. Another dark horse would be the Phillies. They have a good pitching staff, but lack the offensive punch of Colorado.

Q: Cubs have now had their glory, which AL team and which NL team do you want to see pull home World Series Titles other than your obvious preference of the Cubs? I actually have a few. In the AL, I want to see Cleveland get one, and I think they're in the best position of the teams I'm going to mention. I've been partial to the Indians for a couple years. I think Cleveland is a very well run organization, I have a good friend living in the city, and after this past season's heartbreaking finish, I'd be happy to see them get one. Honorable mention to the Houston Astros, Tampa Bay Rays, and Oakland A's. In the NL, I'd have to say Pittsburgh. Again, like all the AL teams I mentioned, they're a very efficiently run small market team that hasn't seen a World Series Champion in over 25 years. That seems to be my criteria.

Q: How much more (if any) does winning a World Series allow Ownership to spend on players/ coaches? Well, this is difficult to answer as there aren't exactly figures for this, but there are several years of estimates. First off, all playoff revenue is divided between the Commissioner's office, the teams, and a player pool. The Cubs organization likely collected between $20-30 million in revenue. The Cubs players receive 36% of the player pool, likely in the $25-30 million range, to divide among themselves, projected in the $350,000 - $450,000 range for per share. I couldn't find anything on what the coaching staff receives, but I assume most coaches probably have a bonus system attached to their contracts to account for postseason and World Series appearances and victories. Forbes has estimated that the Cubs World Series victory has added $300 million to the overall value of the franchise. It's impossible to say how much of that will be re-invested directly into the team. It's certainly a larger boost to smaller market teams than Chicago, but with the Ricketts and minority investors funding all of the renovations, probably nearing a billion dollars, both in and around Wrigley Field, any additional value to the franchise could be applied to help covering the cost of the renovations. Without going off on a tangent, I just want to add that in this age of billionaire sports franchise owners using strong arm tactics to hold a city's beloved team hostage in demanding the local populations approve tax-payer funded stadium deals, the Cubs ownership should be commended for funding their own renovations.

Q: There are the obvious big name Free Agents such as Bautista, Encarnacion, Chapman, Jansen, etc... but who are the free agents that people are not talking about who could be a big game changer for the teams who pick them up at good market value? It's a weak free agent class, especially for position players. I'm not sure anyone is going to hit any home-runs without shelling out some cash, but here's a few guys to keep and eye on. PITCHERS Mark Melancon, Relief Pitcher, has been just as good at run prevention over the past four years as Chapman and Jansen but will only command probably half the overall cost. I liked Charlie Morton as a cheap back-end rotation piece, but he already signed with Houston for 2 years and $14 million. I love Rich Hill, and I think he'll come at a bit of a discount because of his age and injury risk. I'd be pretty happy if the Cubs signed him for 3 years, let Arrieta walk at the end of next year, and worked on adding depth pieces between now and then. Ivan Nova is another pretty interesting back-end of the rotation guy. He only walked 1.56 batters per 9-innings last season in 162 innings, with a 3.70 xFIP. That has a lot of value, but he hasn't proven he can do it consistently, so he may only get a 2 or 3-year deal in the $10-12 million per year range. One season like he had last year is worth about $20 million, so there's room for him to exceed the value of the contract. HITTERS Justin Turner, Third Base, is the real prize in my eyes. He's only 3 years removed from being considered a light-hitting, platoon-only, reserve infielder. I think the market is going to lag behind considering him a legitimate 3.5 WAR player. I like Carlos Gomez, too. He's had a couple rough seasons, battling injuries, but I still think he's a major league average starter when he's on the field. He's probably not going to get more than 1 or 2 years and $10 million per year. He can be a really sneaky good addition for a team like Cleveland, Seattle, or Toronto that expects to compete and needs an outfielder. Q: Last question. It's game seven of the NLCS at Wrigley field and the Cubs are playing their division rivals the St. Louis Cardinals. Chapman did not get resigned with the Cubs. It's the bottom of the 9th inning with the Cubs up 1-0. Unfortunately, the bases are loaded, but there are 2 outs. Cardinals have a red hot, Matt Carpenter up to bat with an equally on fire Piscotty available to pinch-hit if a Lefty is brought in relief. You can only choose one RELIEVER from the Cubs staff (current or someone you believe the Cubs may truly sign). Who do you send in?

Off this team's current roster, given today's information projected out to next October in a hypothetical NLCS game, I'd send in Hector Rondon. Neither Rondon or Strop finished the year strong, and there's some question how effective they'll be come 2017, but I'd still project Rondon to be the best out of the returning group. Carl Edwards Jr. isn't far behind those two, and could leap frog one or both Rondon and Strop between now and late next season. I think the Cubs will likely add a late-inning bullpen arm this off-season, either through trade or free agency. For the price, I like Melancon, as I stated above. I'd use him over anyone on the current roster.

This is it (World Series Champs)

It's been asked by a fair number of sports media types, would it not actually be better if the Cubs never won?  I've always immediately rejected the idea.  I'm starting to think I never gave the idea as much consideration as it perhaps deserved.

Now, let me start by clearly stating that I don't think there's any universal experience.  I don't, or at least should not, expect a great number of people to feel the same way I do about this, or really anything else.  That being understood, I'll always err on the side of victory over defeat; fleeting joy over prolonged suffering.  I'm glad the Cubs won the World Series.

When I've heard it questioned, whether we should want the Cubs to finally win, it's always been presented as a case of shared identity.  Is the stigma of lovable losers ingrained?  We, as Cubs fans, can immediately relate to one another, even through multiple generations, with this shared experience of mediocrity and suffering that's remained remarkably constant for several decades.  If we lose that bond, that one thing that connects us all, will we also lose the intimacy that makes Cubs fandom so special?

I've been very fortunate to experience live at Wrigley Field a number of memorable moments and games.   I've also been there to experience many of the lows, when the team has been so shitty the atmosphere resembles a bar for 20-something trust fund Big-10 grads.  Where a baseball game just happens to be part of the background.  To me, there's nothing like the experience of an excited Wrigley Field.  The shared love of this one thing, a thing that I can fundamentally understand, loosens my anxieties.  Even as a cynic you can't help but be moved by 40,000 people singing together, sharing pure joy.  I've hugged complete strangers.  In the last week we've witnessed thousands of people writing the names of deceased loved ones, who never experienced this in their lifetime, in chalk on the brick walls outside Wrigley.  Five million people crowded the city to celebrate together, carrying with them the memories of mothers and fathers, and their mothers and fathers too, who all shared a love of the Chicago Cubs.  There will be no problem transitioning to a shared identity of success: a new experience of being winners.  It will be different, but I'm confident nothing will be lost.

For me, though, the effect has been one I never anticipated.  The Cubs have always played such a huge part in my life.  I was genuinely moved by their victory in the NLCS and expected even greater emotion if they were to win the whole thing.  The Cubs have been part of my personal identity, with the team's struggles and frustrations often mirroring my own.  To me, the World Series represented some futuristic end-point: a resolution through redemption.  I spent 20 years imagining the feeling of this team winning a World Series.  I've cried at the end of baseball movies like "Major League" just imagining the emotion of this one day being the Cubs.  The emotion of this one day being my reality.  I never went so far as imagining what exactly in the world I expected would be different if the Cubs finally did win.  I mostly just allowed myself to be swept away in the dreams of a post-World Series utopia.

Well, the morning after the Cubs won the series felt a lot like every other morning.  Despite the team's achievement, every other prospective struggle remained.  In the midst of the greatest victory in my sports world, I almost felt an even heavier weight of loss.  As if an offer of hope had been exhausted.  There was absolutely a surface joy but it felt in many ways performative; there to meet an expectation as much as the genuine feeling.  This was something I wanted so deeply that I had allowed myself to subconsciously build it into an event of personal salvation.  Some time back, I joked with a close friend that I check my email multiple times per day, despite never expecting any particular message of significance.  I suggested to him the email I'm really awaiting is the one that reads, "You can stop worrying, Ryan.  Everything is taken care of, forever until the end."  I had built the Cubs reaching the pinnacle of baseball success into embodying the relief of that email.  It could never deliver on that promise.

I have enjoyed watching other people experience this and share their elation.  The pictures and the stories have been wonderful.  Personally, it's been strange, though.  At times I've felt like I was experiencing all of this behind a glass wall.  With baseball being something that's helped me feel a greater connection with people, I'd imagined this being the ultimate case.  Instead, it's almost had the opposite effect.  The combination of my own personal feelings with the physical distance between myself and many of the people I had always imagined sharing this moment with highlighted a feeling of isolation.  Where baseball had often helped make feel part of a community, in these past few days, it's left me feeling very alone.

To be clear; I wouldn't trade this World Series for anything.  These are my issues.  They may not be completely unique, but I recognize they're abnormal and shouldn't curb the celebration in any way.

 To see the amount of happiness it's brought to so many people has been really incredible.  At a time where there's so much dissension, to see anything bring tens of millions of people from all different backgrounds together is truly special.  The thought of making small talk with strangers normally makes my brain melt, but these couple weeks, seeing people light up upon recognizing the Cubs hat and shirts I've worn basically every day for decades, and asking me about the team has actually been a lot of fun despite my awkwardness.  Having people I love, who I know wouldn't otherwise give a shit about a baseball game, watch these games and share this experience with me, because they know it's something I love, has meant more to me than they'll ever know.  That's what I'm choosing to take from this.  A reminder there are people who love me, and were swept up in this more because of how they felt about me than how they felt about a baseball team.  I know I've felt the same thinking about friends and family and what this meant to them.  I know every one of the five million people who showed up to celebrate this historic moment had someone who felt that way about them and they've felt the same towards others.  That's what all of this represents.