Cubs have a new manager!

Yes, they hired a high-profile manager who has brought a similar team to the World Series -- Joe Maddon.  It looks like a sensible hire.  Here's a guy with credentials who has worked with a young team full of top prospects -- which looks like what the Cubs will be next year.

We saw the start of the influx of new talent last year with Soler and Baez and Alacantra to go along with players like Castro and Castillo and Rizzo.  This year should see more of the same -- Kris Bryant and Almora and maybe others.  I know I'm forgetting some prospects, probably pitchers, but it looks like a pretty good crop already. 

What struck me about the hiring was the lack of hesitation in getting it done.  And now the hiring of Ricky Renteria, who did a very good job in my opinion but was a low-profile sort of hiring in 2014, makes more sense.  My own unfounded suspicion is that management knew all along that Maddon would be available and they'd get a fair shot at him.  So if last year's hire wasn't going to be Joe Girardi, it was bound to be a low-profile type.  Like Renteria.

Best of luck to Ricky Renteria, by the way, who as I said, I feel did a very good job of handling his young team and deserves another shot somewhere.  Under other circumstances I'd say he should have stayed here.  But under THESE circumstances -- a win-now-or-in-the-near-future situation for the Cubs, who haven't won in 105 years or something like that, the sure (or surer) thing managerial hire of Maddon makes all the sense in the world.

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