January 1, 2020: Clean Slate

Let’s open the 2020 book on Chicago Sports. I’m going to try my best to start this year with a clean slate, if not in the team’s records who are mid-season, in my mind set. As of right now, all Chicago sports teams are undefeated in 2020! Yeah, that’s me, the eternal optimist; hate me if you’d like. But ask not what our teams cannot do, but instead, ask what they CAN do. Let’s go.

Baseball is the only season that is played entirely within a calendar year. The Cubs and the White Sox begin every new year with a clean slate. And although it’s been pretty obvious who has won the offseason here in Chicago, heck, the Sox may have won the entire MLB offseason, there hasn’t been one game played yet. And we all know how things on paper can turn out not so great… But this isn’t about that. This is about sky is the limit time. Yeah, the Sox are making the World Series this year. After a decade of futility, the 15 year old rebuild will end with a World Series appearance in 2020. The only problem with this storybook ending for the Sox is that they will play the Cubs, and they will lose. Yeah, the Cubs will bounce back with essentially the same roster and end up getting back into the postseason. The Cubs will be lead by maybe the single most person talked about being traded in Kris Bryant. The Cubs and Sox will battle it out in a grueling 7 game series, with KB hitting a walk off home run in the bottom of the 9th at Wrigley. Stay with me here…

The Bears technically have a clean slate as well, but per the season ending press conference, will be lead by the same QB next year. You knew Mitch wasn’t going anywhere. I’m fine with that. Just don’t give him his big money deal if he really doesn’t deserve it… aka if he doesn’t come back next year and lead us into the postseason.. legit, Mitch playing well, leading us to the postseason, then adios Trubisky. The only issue I have with that right now is that we need a legit backup plan. A backup QB that if Trubisky falters early in 2020, Nagy can pull the trigger for the backup. I was even thinking this guy that we bring in should be starting, and Mitch can start the season as backup; maybe he needs a bit more seasoning??? I’m trying to be optimistic here. The Bears sign Alex Smith (Phillip Rivers?) to a 1 year deal; he becomes the starter mid-season, and leads the Bears to the Super Bowl, which technically wouldn’t be played until 2021… so let’s leave that dream there.

The teams who don’t have a clean slate are the Bulls and Blackhawks. Yet, this time of year can serve as a nice reset button for both. Although the bottom of the East sucks, the Bulls will have to be better than the winning percentage that comes with 13-21 the rest of the way out. If they can do it, they can make the playoffs; I’m not going to go further than that with them. As far as the Blackhawks, same story goes. At one game over 500 at the exact halfway point of the season, they’ll need to play better than that from here on out to get back into the postseason after 2 years away. They WILL do it, and as you know in hockey, just making the playoffs is huge, because the postseason is an entirely different beast… more than other leagues. The Blackhawks with their 1-2 punch at goaltender will be carried by superhuman efforts, ending up with the first time in history a co-MVP award will be issues to 2 goaltenders as the Blackhawks will start the 2020s the same way they started the 2010s raising a Stanley Cup!

OK, that’s my 2020 Chicago Sports prediction; time to head to the dispensary to get something to pair with my bottles of wine in an attempt to keep this fantasy going… Happy New Year!