Montero's blast gives Chicago Cubs another reason to celebrate
For one brief moment amid the madness that was the Chicago Cubs locker room on Friday, everybody got quiet.
Glasses were raised.
And players bent an ear to listen to what owner Tom Ricketts had to say after a 5-4 victory over Milwaukee.
"It's all about you," he told the players, who were celebrating a division title that was clinched the night before when St. Louis lost to San Francisco. "All I did was buy some time with the fans. And the fact is we used that time with Theo (Epstein) and Jed (Hoyer) and everybody else to build the best team in all of baseball."
It's tough to argue with that.
This star-filled powerhouse stands before you because of Epstein's shrewd drafting and willingness to make trade after trade after trade year after year after year.
And it has resulted in this: a 94-53 squad that clinched its division with 16 games left on the schedule.
"We just won one of the toughest divisions in all of baseball and we did it by a landslide," said a beer- and champagne-soaked Anthony Rizzo. "This is a huge steppingstone to where we want to be and we're going to celebrate every way along the way."
The celebrations began early Friday with Epstein sitting in the left-field bleachers, attempting to disguise himself with a fake mustache. It hardly worked, though, as astute fans began tweeting pictures about an hour after the first pitch.
Fans then erupted in the top of the seventh as Ricketts made his way down the bleacher steps to join Epstein, Hoyer and scouting director Jason McLeod.
"It was great for them to get out there and relax," Ricketts said.
Celebrating a win over Milwaukee certainly wasn't necessary to make the day special, but the Cubs went out and did that anyway. They stormed back from a 4-2 deficit in the ninth thanks to RBI singles by Chris Coghlan and pinch-hitter Addison Russell.
Aroldis Chapman struck out the side in the 10th on 11 pitches, and Miguel Montero then blasted the Cubs to victory with his seventh home run of the season.
"A walk-off win and come in here and celebrate?" said Kris Bryant. "It doesn't get any better than that."
Wrigley was rocking at that point, with some front-row fans wearing goggles in case a champagne shower came their way. The players celebrated for a bit on the field then retreated to the locker room and unloaded gallons of alcohol on each other while dancing to music that could make your eardrums bleed.
"There's still some baseball to be played before the real fun starts, but we're definitely going to enjoy it right now and live in the moment," Bryant said. "Not often do get to win a division, so this is awesome."
Clinching a playoff spot so early can present some challenges, most notably how to keep players sharp with three weeks to go before Game 1 of the NLDS.
The next carrot to go after is clinching home-field advantage throughout the NL playoffs. Washington is 6 games back of the Cubs and the only team with a chance of chasing down manager Joe Maddon's squad.
Maddon also believes the fact that so many Cubs are chasing individual awards like the Cy Young or MVP will keep his stars from getting rusty.
"They're gonna be primed," Maddon said. "They're not going to turn down that dimmer switch."
Maddon did give most of his regulars the day off Friday and said he plans to sit down with coaches Saturday "to make some intelligent decisions while we're playing the same game, with the same kind of intensity."
The kind of intensity that will be needed come playoff time. Because if there's one thing veteran Jon Lester knows, this should be just the beginning.
"Everybody keeps talking about what we've already accomplished, but we haven't accomplished anything yet," he said. "We've got … a lot more games to play and hopefully a whole nother month, month-and-a-half to go.
"At the end, then we can talk about how special this group is."