Just sayin'

No noteworthy baseball will be played anywhere in America until the Cubs play the O's on Friday. This hiatus is a chance for the world champions to catch their collective breath and for all of us to remember that Theo knows best, that Jed is on the phone, that the Goat is dead, and that these are not your fathers (or grandfathers', or great-grandfathers') Cubs.

The pitching is tired after two consecutive deep postseason runs and some of our starting pitchers need to actually be replaced. The position players are tired, too, and are just not beginning to hit their stride with their bats (nice especially to have Schwarber back and in his usual form after clearing his head down here in luxurious and serene vacation mecca of Des Moines for a bit). The bats, I'm really not worried about, there is going to be at least one and probably more than one major trade for pitching before the end of July, and I am very far from giving up.

Of course, it helps to be in a division in which you can be as pathetic as the Cubs have been so far this year and still be only four games out of first at the All-Star break.

We may or may not come back in the second half. But whether we do or not the best days of the Epstein era are ahead of us, and we shall prevail. And prevail. And prevail. And woe be unto anything alcoholic or red-feathered or otherwise obnoxious that gets in our way.

So do not despair, fellow citizens of Cub Nation. Tomorrow still belongs to us.

Well, maybe to us and the Astros.