The Cost of Doing Business

The Cubs did something yesterday I’d never thought an MLB team would consider—the North Siders decided to eat the last year of Jason Heyward’s eight-year, $184 million contract. Heyward hasn’t played since June 24th and wasn’t expected to come back from a knee injury this season, so you can basically add $11 million to the $22 million Heyward is owed next year. Back in 2016, I thought this was a bad deal for a player who’d never managed more than eighty-two RBIs in a season (and would never tally more than sixty-two for the Cubs). But, hey, not my money, not my team, and Heyward is credited with rallying his teammates during a rain delay during Game Seven of the 2016 World Series. By all accounts, Heyward is generous with his earnings in a socially-conscious way, so his contract has a benefit beyond baseball. To me, the Cubs had enough talent to win without Heyward or Ben Zobrist, his fellow free-agent signee by the Cubs that year (four years, $56 million). Theo Epstein overpaid for those two players because he wanted to win, now, and he did. Then, he couldn’t win anymore because his employers didn’t want to turn into the National League version of the Steinbrenners, full speed ahead damn’ the bad deals. So, Epstein’s gone, Zobrist’s gone, and now Heyward, too. Rather than emulating the Yankees or Dodgers, the Ricketts seem more inclined to act like Jerry Reinsdorf and pretend they own a small-market team. They don’t; he doesn’t; and why don’t Chicago front offices make smarter deals? Cutting Heyward is making the best of a bad situation. Why give playing time away to a veteran with declining skills and a year left on his contract? This is what the White Sox should’ve done back in 2014 with Adam Dunn. For all but one month of a four-year deal from hell, Reinsdorf and Kenny Williams pretended they were getting full value for the $56 million they were paying Dunn. Finally, with one month left on the contract, they moved Dunn to Oakland. What a waste. Long story short, be smart in handing out free-agent deals. If you can’t do that, then be willing to cut your losses like the Cubs did yesterday.