Yes. There is a purpose. And losing is part of achieving the purpose. No team almost tries to lose. Spring training games are for training - not for recognizing players names. When the regular season starts, focus on the 25 man roster.
In a sense they are, although they call it rebuilding. Point is, that there is no upside to being an 80 win team that misses the playoffs when you are rebuilding. By losing they are getting better draft picks, think Kris Bryant.
They are also spending the Cubs money on updating many things that are way outdated. Front office personal, scouting equipment, development personal, training equipment. Not many people realize how far the Cubs were behind in basic baseball office procedures.
For to long the Cubs overspent money on free agents that got them a whole not of nothing. It sucks to be a Cubs fan now, and watch them lose and lose and lose. But you need to realize they are building towards long time sustaining successes.
Even as a fan, I'd rather them lose 100 games and get the #1 or #2 pick, instead of win 80 and miss the playoffs anyhow.
They are rebuilding and have been since Epstein took over a few years ago. They have some solid young players in the organization but they're a couple of years away from making an impact at the major league level.
Epstein has a plan, so he has refrained from going for the easy fix by overpaying "name" players -- as Chubs Hendry did with Soriano, Zambrano, and Fukudome in the past -- to attract fans, and attendance was down last year because of it. Still, if the youngsters in the pipeline continue to develop and improve the Cubs should be a contender by 2016.
Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised. They have Wirgley Field, which sells out every game, so the don't need to win to make money. And the more they lose, the higher draft picks they get. So, I wouldn't be surprised if they were loosing on purpose at all.
The Cubs are "building from within," and they're doing it the right way.
That's what happens when you build a team through development of young talent and not by destroying your future by spending tons of money on big names who will be useless halfway through their contract.
No, they are building from within. If you haven't heard of many of the guys, you just don't follow baseball all that much.
Losing just happens naturally to the Cubs. There is no
explaining it.
They're in a big market and hardly have anybody I've heard of on their roster. They seem as if they're almost trying for another 90-100 loss season.
