Our Winter of Discontent

Two years ago, the off-season was spent obsessing over Brian Roberts.  Last year, the topic of obsession was Jake Peavy.  This season, the laser-sharp focus of the Cubs fan base has lost its accuracy more than Carlos Marmol.

This season, we are all over the place in off-season trade rumor mongering and debate.  With less than three weeks before pitchers and catchers finally report to Mesa, we have discussed the following players at varying length:  Rick Ankiel, Rocco Baldelli, Heath Bell, Eric Byrnes, Kiko Calero, Mike Cameron, Jose Contreras, Jermaine Dye, Jonny Gomes, Curtis Granderson, Reed Johnson, Adam Kennedy, Mark Mulder, Chan Ho Park, Joel Piniero, Scott Podsednik, Ben Sheets, Ryan Spilborghs, Oscar Villarreal, and many, many more that were dismissed as quickly as they were brought up.

The actual acquisitions of Marlon Byrd, Xavier Nady, and Carlos Silva are not much more worthy of our discussions either.  So we are left sitting here talking about Andre Dawson's hat and jersey number or whether the Cubs would be better off training in a swamp or a desert for six weeks per year.

We try to find other ways of distracting ourselves, but the Hawks taking off their shirts, the decline and fall of Favre and the Vikings, and Derrick Rose growing up before our eyes can only do so much as we stare at the clock and count down until pitchers and catchers report.

Even Lovie, Jerry, and Ted bludgeoning a legendary football franchise into a bloody unrecognizable pulp is barely enough to make the time go any faster.

I'm not sure which is worse, the monotony of a singular topic dominating an off-season or nothing worth talking about until we are blue in the face.  What I do know is this has been one excruciatingly long off-season.