The better team won.
After all the talk of curses and droughts, and all the angst about which manager shouldn't have used which pitcher at which point, it came down to simple baseball logic. The Chicago Cubs had more dependable starting pitchers and more productive stars.
They have the World Series title they deserve, and they have a more-than-memorable Game 7 to talk about for the next 108 years.
And here at Bleacher Report, we have World Series awards I started working on Sunday, when the Cleveland Indians had a 3-1 series lead. As you might imagine, it looked a little different then.
It ...
The postseason of the bullpens ran into an everlasting truth in the first two games of the World Series.
The team with the better starting pitcher still wins most games. And the team with more good starting pitchers has an edge over the team that doesn't have enough.
Officially, this World Series is tied at a win apiece after Wednesday night's 5-1 Chicago Cubs victory in Game 2. Realistically, the Cubs have a significant edge over the Cleveland Indians for the same reason they had a big edge in Game 2.
Overall, their starting pitchers are better.
Maybe you didn't see it in Game 1, because ...
I went looking to see how Bleacher Report covered things the last time the Chicago Cubs went to the World Series. No luck.
I couldn't find any of our stories about the last Cleveland Indians' World Series title, either.
We weren't around in 1945 (the last time the Cubs made it) or in 1948 (the last time the Indians won it) or even in 1997 (the last time the Indians played in it).
So yeah, you're going to be watching history when the 2016 World Series opens Tuesday night at Progressive Field. Cubs vs. Indians: Two teams that have been around forever; two ...
It looked like a heck of a party at Wrigley Field, and why not? It's not every day the Chicago Cubs can spray some champagne.
Hey, Chicago hadn't clinched a playoff spot in about 12 months, and that's a long time to go without a party. The Cubs hadn't celebrated a division title in eight years, and that can feel like a lifetime.
Seriously, there's nothing wrong with a celebration, especially for a team that has had as perfect a season as the Cubs have had (and a perfect clinching day with a walk-off home run). The Cubs spent the spring listening ...
Twenty years ago, there was a team with two young stars batting in the middle of the lineup. The way Baseball-Reference.com calculates wins above replacement, Ken Griffey Jr. and Alex Rodriguez of the 1996 Seattle Mariners finished first and second in the American League, and nobody else was close.
Either one of them could have been the AL's Most Valuable Player that year. Neither of them won it.
Rodriguez finished second. Griffey finished fourth.
Nothing against Juan Gonzalez, the Texas Rangers outfielder who won the MVP that year, but it's easy to believe some voters picked between Griffey and Rodriguez and ended up ...
The Rookie of the Year is about performance, not potential.
Geovany Soto can finish ahead of Joey Votto, and Chris Coghlan can win in a year when Andrew McCutchen was also eligible. It happens.
But here's what is happening a lot more often in recent years: The kid who wins the Rookie of the Year jumps on the fast track to winning a Most Valuable Player Award.
Buster Posey (2010 ROY, 2012 MVP) did it, and so did Mike Trout (2012 ROY, 2014 MVP). Ryan Howard (2006) and Dustin Pedroia (2008) won the MVP the year after winning the Rookie of the Year. ...
When the Chicago Cubs hired Joe Maddon last winter, Theo Epstein called it a "unique opportunity" the team just couldn't pass up. When they signed Jon Lester six weeks later, Maddon said they'd "won the baseball lottery."
Now it's time to do it again.
The ace-heavy free-agent market presents the Cubs with another unique opportunity, another chance to win a lottery. And a chance to take everything they accomplished last winter and this past season and push it a huge step further.
All they have to do is sign Zack Greinke.
OK, so signing Greinke isn't all the Cubs would need to do this ...
