the 2016 Cubs seem less like the start of a dynasty than an aberration, one year where everything landed just right. Looking back at it now, seeing how the Cubs aged, seeing how certain players never did quite turn into the Hall of Famers we all thought they’d be. In 2018, they didn’t even make it out of the Wild Card Game, in 2019 they missed the playoffs entirely, and in 2020 they were swept in a special new playoff round by the Marlins. But it didn’t really turn out that way, did it? They were good again in 2017, but still almost lost to the Nationals in the National League Division Series and, more to the point, were beaten in the NL Championship Series by a Dodgers team that clearly had passed them as the NL’s next dominant force. This wasn’t a one-year project it was a dynasty. 29, after Cleveland’s 9-2 Game 4 win over the Cubs, giving them a 3-1 Series lead, the general fan vibe was sadness, but also positivity: After all, the Cubs were young, and they’d be just as good next year. The 2016 NBA Finals had an impressive viewership norm of 20. The Cavs-Warriors finale posted an 18.9 overnight rating and was watched by 30.8 million viewers more than 9 million shy of Cubs-Indians. Louis? (Alternately: Imagine how different Cardinals history the last five years would be if they never sign Fowler.) Do they go big on top free-agent catcher Matt Wieters? Do they explore even bigger trades? It’s difficult to imagine a team being more aggressive than the Cubs would have been had they come that close and fallen just short.ħ. The Game 7 rating also crushed the numbers for another phenomenal Game 7 the Cavs title-clinching victory over the Golden State Warriors on June 19. Imagine those three on the same team right now.) But if they had fallen that short in 2016, can you imagine how aggressive they would have been? They still probably would have let free agent Chapman go - what with the walk-off homer he gave up to lose the World Series - but are they less likely to allow, say, Fowler to walk if they hadn’t won in 2016? Maddon’s famous phrase about Fowler was “You go, we go,” and if the Cubs had lost in 2016, would the Cubs really let him go to St. (A year after trading away Gleyber Torres. They actually brought in reinforcements, trading away Eloy Jiménez and Jorge Soler for José Quintana and Wade Davis, respectively. To their credit, after the Cubs won the World Series in 2016, they did not sit on their laurels.
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