DENVER — There are only so many chances to win. Ian Happ’s career so far has been bracketed by the legendary group from the 2016 World Series team that forever raised the expectations for the Chicago Cubs to, if it’s not yet “Wait Until Next Year,” it’s getting very, very close.
Happ debuted with the defending champs in 2017 and capitalized on consistent playing time after the sell-off at the 2021 trade deadline. He signed a three-year, $61 million contract extension shortly after Opening Day 2023, pushing for a no-trade clause because he prioritized winning in Chicago.
To make the playoffs as the National League’s last wild card, the Cubs (75-72) might have to come close to running the table. They certainly can’t afford many more losses in their final 15 games. To put this stretch run in perspective, The Athletic caught up with Happ before Friday night’s 9-5 loss to the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field.
Why this season didn’t go totally sideways
There are no parades down Michigan Avenue for trying hard. The expectations should be much higher than not being mathematically eliminated from the playoffs in the middle of September. This team also woke up with a record that was nine games under .500 on the Fourth of July. Digging out from that showed some of the front office’s problem-solving skills, Craig Counsell’s management style and the clubhouse’s professionalism.
“The guys in the room have experience,” Happ said. “It’s having seen it done a lot of different ways and understanding that it is a 162-game season. There’s a lot of guys that have posted and played long enough to understand that it’s not always linear. Everybody’s going to go out and give their best effort, regardless of what’s happened in the last week, month or five months.
“The goal is still to go out and win division titles and run away with it. But when the year shapes up the way it did for the first few months, you understand that when you’re in Game 100, there’s still two months of baseball and a lot can happen.”
Still waiting on the Next Great Cubs Team
Anthony Rizzo and Javier Báez absolutely deserved their standing ovations, but they recently returned to Wrigley Field as diminished players. Kris Bryant has spent most of his three seasons with the Rockies on the injured list. It’s a young man’s game, as Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer would say. The window certainly hasn’t closed, but it’s narrowing for Happ, who turned 30 last month and is now basically a 4-WAR player on a team with a 4 percent chance of playing in October.
“I believe in what our front office is doing,” Happ said. “I believe in the guys in the room, the guys who are going to be here for the next two years after this. I believe in the young talent that’s come up. I believe in what we’ve put together. We had a month and a half, two months of bad performance as a group this year that has put us in the position where we’re (six) games out and looking up at it. It’s not for a lack of effort. I think you’ve seen what the group is capable of in the last two months. We’ll see where it ends up. But I have a lot of belief in the direction of the organization.”
Wrigley Field is playing different this year
The Cubs will put up numbers this weekend because they’re playing at Coors Field, but the season-long trend has shown an offense that produces at a much higher rate on the road. With Happ’s 1,799 career plate appearances at the Friendly Confines, two Gold Gloves as a left fielder and an analytical approach to his game, no one on the roster has a better perspective on the current hitting conditions in Wrigleyville.
“Every year, the wind dynamics are different. Unfortunately, sometimes you’re out of town for the ones that are blowing out, and you’re in town for the ones that are blowing in. That’s what it’s felt like all year,” he said. “The ballpark metrics have it as the second-worst homer park in the league and the second-worst doubles park in the league.
“The one thing about Wrigley, when the wind’s blowing in, is it’s a small outfield. There’s not a lot of surface area. So when outfielders can’t get beat over their heads, and they’re playing a little bit shallow, there’s nowhere to hit doubles. Doubles hang up, they get caught. The gaps get really, really small. The only place for slug is down the line.
“Mentally, that’s a challenging place to be where the best ball you can hit is an out. You hit your perfect swing — and get it off and hit what would be a home run in every other park — and it’s an out at Wrigley Field. We just played the Yankees. Fifteen at-bats in a weekend and the ball’s coming back at you for all 15. That was a three-game series with the Yankees not hitting any home runs with those guys in that group.
“We’ve had good years and bad years. I think ’22 was pretty average or maybe a below-average year. The ’21 summer was great, ’17 was great and ’19 was great. You see some of these years as the wind switches and changes. Unfortunately, it’s just been a really challenging year, and the ballpark factor backs that up.”
A game of failure
Though Happ has evened out some of the highs and lows that once marked him as a streaky hitter, it’s impossible to avoid slumps. His detached view and unemotional assessments are reflective of modern baseball and this Cubs team. It works for him. In each of his eight seasons in the majors, he’s produced double-digit home runs and an OPS+ above 100.
“It’s constant, constant failure,” Happ said. “When you’re in those tough stretches, it’s understanding that the numbers are going to come back to you at some point. It was just a few weeks ago that I had a career-low BABIP — it was .270 on batted balls in play. The luck of that — to have hit that many balls hard and that many balls in the air as consistently as I have for the last four months — (means) not getting a lot of help from the baseball gods.
“Then I had a stretch where that reverted back. I’ve struck out more than I wanted to this year, but I’ve still walked and hit for power. There’s a lot of things that have been good. It’s continuing to use past experiences to understand that it is a process. That’s the best way to get through the tough stretches.”
(Photo: Nuccio DiNuzzo / Getty Images)
