Cubs exposed as being the Cubs

Only the cruel would refer to the 2007 Cubs as a fraud.

But in the end, to paraphrase Dennis Green, a former head coach of another Arizona team, "They were what we should have known they were."

In other words, the Cubs weren't very good. They were a flawed team that barely survived a more flawed division. Call them fool's gold that only desperately foolish Cubs fans could believe in.

Their devotion ended early Saturday night during the Diamondbacks' 5-1 victory, which swept the Cubs out of their NL division series.

The Wrigley Field crowd booed Alfonso Soriano in the second inning. They booed Aramis Ramirez in the third. And they booed the Cubs intermittently right through the final out in the ninth.

Finally, these disgruntled fans realized that a good team doesn't lose three straight in the playoffs, not this way, not without displaying the slightest pulse.

"Our team tried," Cubs manager Lou Piniella insisted. "We just didn't get it done."

The Cubs didn't come close to getting it done. The Diamondbacks exposed them as a mediocre team that couldn't beat a good one.

Hopes were so high for the Cubs a mere 72 hours earlier. The Diamondbacks, of all teams, dashed them a mere 72 hours later.

"This is just a start, fellas," Piniella said. "We're going to get better at this."

Well, that sounds good. That always sounds good when the Cubs veer into the future.

Others like Leo Durocher, Dallas Green and Tribune Company made similar promises. Yet now this franchise has gone 99 seasons without winning a World Series and 63 without even qualifying for one.

That's what people like Piniella and Green and Durocher and all the rest don't understand.

Every season to them is just one in a context of three or four or 10. To Cubs fans, it's one in the context of that "bad century" the late broadcaster Jack Brickhouse referred to.

So here's something for Piniella to consider.

Five managers have taken the Cubs to the playoffs since 1984. Three of them - Jim Frey, Dusty Baker and now Piniella - did it during his first season in Chicago.

Frey was a victory from the World Series in 1984 with three chances to record it. Baker was five outs from the World Series in 2003. Neither closed the deal or reached the playoffs again before being fired.

Each of the disappointments was followed with the normal refrain - "Wait 'til next year" - but next year never arrived.

It's almost as if a manager has to win something significant right away, before the burden of "the Cub thing" can wrap its cursed, jinxed, hexed clutches around him.

I know, I know, a headline in a Chicago newspaper last week proclaimed, "Players, Piniella tired of 'curses.'"

If they're tired of them today, imagine how they'll feel in February. You know, now that they squandered a year in which the NL was so vulnerable and they became just another chapter in the Cubs' futile history.

Anyway, when Piniella said, "We'll reconvene next spring and take this further," it's only natural for any veteran of this stuff to be skeptical.

The Cubs are expected to have new ownership next season. They'll have new players and renewed hope.

But why should that make a difference when nothing else has for nearly a century?

mimrem@dailyherald.com