Chicago Cubs: Experience should always trump youth

As the Chicago Cubs look to regain their identity from a season ago, they should lean more heavily on their past experiences. Even more so, than on their youth.

This year’s Chicago Cubs are barely recognizable from the team that won the World Series in impressive fashion, just seven months ago. They are, up to this point, a .500 ball-club. They are not even leading their weak division heading into July.

Last season’s year-long success feels like ancient history. At least for many Cubs fans. But that doesn’t mean the players, nor the coaching staff, should feel that way as well.

As evident in baseball, a new season brings forth a fresh start for all 30 major-league teams. Everything that happened the prior season gets tossed out the window, as a result. To be played over in some entirely new, yet unpredictable fashion.

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The Chicago Cubs are finding this out the hard way. The most difficult way, in fact. As a team, they’ve dealt with a surplus of injuries to key players in 2017. Furthermore, their most reliable veterans from 2016 are now shadows of themselves, this season. Look no further than the up-and-down pitching staff to date.

Cubs’ skipper Joe Maddon can lay out all the excuses he wants about why his team is struggling thus far to find their footing. After all, how many times has he pulled out the youthful card on us fans, following another disappointing, head-scratching loss?

Speaking with reporters, courtesy of ESPN, following Friday night’s 5-0, shutout loss against the Cincinnati Reds, Maddon once again pulled out that youth card from his back pocket, as an excuse for the Cubs’ latest struggles.

"“It’s a young group,” [Maddon] said. “There’s no getting around it. That’s actually a great thing, not a bad thing. It’s a great thing that we have this many young players that are major league caliber.”"

Credit Maddon for displaying some optimism about his young group of players. Even amidst their ongoing struggles. Still, the team doesn’t need to be reminded about their youth from their manager every time they lose a game.

What their manager needs to remind his team instead is that experience ultimately trumps youth. The Cubs are in a rare position of being both youthful, yet also experienced.

Winning the World Series a season ago proved that. Pretty much everyone on the Cubs’ roster, young or older, experienced that hard-fought journey to the very end. All those ups and downs included.

So, while it is an entirely new season for the Cubs. One already filled with more ups and downs than expected. There’s no reason to lean too heavily on the youth card now.

Because doing so only serves as another distraction. And the Cubs could use less of those, from here on out.

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