Ex-Cub Zambrano at home now in Miami
MIAMI — Carlos Zambrano looked as relaxed Tuesday as he has in some time, at least to the eyes of Chicago observers.
The former ace of the Cubs’ pitching staff is now a member of the Florida Marlins, having been traded in January by the new Cubs regime after a second suspension by the old Cubs regime.
No doubt it was best for all sides to have moved on, but Zambrano said that in his heart of hearts he believed something could have been worked out to keep him a Cub. Zambrano met over the winter with new team Cubs Theo Epstein, but Epstein decided to trade Zambrano to the Marlins for pitcher Chris Volstad, with the Cubs eating most of Zambrano’s remaining salary of $18 million.
“I believe so,” he said. “I had hope. That’s why I went to Chicago in the off-season in December. I was playing winter ball, and I stopped winter ball for three days to see Theo, to meet with him, because I had hopes.
“Obviously, like I always say and people know, this is a business, and businesses are like that. Sometimes they need somebody who will fit better than me. People in Miami need me here, and that’s why they made the trade.
“I’m ready to do my job. That’s the most important thing.”
Zambrano will not face his old teammates in this series. In 2 starts, he is 0-0 with a 3.75 ERA. He has given up 8 hits and 5 runs in 12 innings while walking eight and striking out 10.
Volstad also will not face his former team. With the Cubs, he is 0-1 with a 4.91 ERA, having given up 11 hits and 7 runs (6 earned) in 11 innings while walking two and striking out 10.
Zambrano could have blocked any trade, and he said it was “a family” decision to decide to move on. That said, he insisted he came away with a positive impression of Epstein.
“Yes,” he said. “Really, I think what he’s doing … people have criticized this and that about him and about the team, but that team is good.”
Zambrano’s old boss, former GM Jim Hendry, suspended Zambrano in 2010 and 2011 for conduct Hendry believed detrimental to the team. Zambrano, who turns 31 in June, and Hendry go way back to Zambrano’s teenage years when Zambrano signed out of Venezuela in 1997.
Hendry, who was fired by the Cubs last summer, now is a special assistant to New York Yankees GM Brian Cashman.
“I’m OK with him,” Zambrano said. “I saw him. I didn’t have a chance to say hi to him when the Yankees came here.
“But no hard feelings. I know that I made a mistake in Chicago. I made a lot of mistakes. But I give a lot of good memories and good things to the Cubs.
“And I accept it. I accept my mistake. I am responsible. I don’t make excuses. I am responsible for things that happened in Chicago, nobody else. It wasn’t Jim Hendry. It wasn’t the team. It was me, Carlos Zambrano.”