Extreme Cubness

 What they call Silly Season in NASCAR arrived this week in Major League Baseball, and the simoleons are flyin' like confetti. 

The Dodgers are about to send money and a pile of prospects to Washington for Max Scherzer and Trea Turner. The Red Sox just raided the Nationals for Kyle Schwarber. And the Cubs ...

Ah, geez. The Cubs.

Let me say this s-l-o-w-l-y, ya bunch of peawits: You ... do not ... trade ... Anthony Rizzo ... to the Yankees.

The Yankees, for God's sake!

The hell are you thinkin'?

And, yes, OK, so it was inevitable Rizzo and the northside were eventually going to part company. But the Yankees? The Yankees are the antithesis of everything Cubs.

 The Cubs are a sun-scrubbed afternoon in wonderful, decrepit old Wrigley, pounding Old Styles and watching the ivy grow. They break your heart and make you smile at the same time. They're Ryne Sandberg and Ernie Banks and Kerry Woods' 20 Ks, and that stupid idiot Bartman, blameless though he may be. 

The Yankees?

The Yankees are some jamoke stealing a baseball from a kid and throwing it at the Red Sox player who gave it to the kid.

The Yankees are a corporate monolith, as gray and soulless as their pinstripes.

The Yankees are the annoyingly perfect Derek Jeter and the annoyingly perfect Mariano Rivera and Alex Rodriguez, who is not perfect but still annoying.

Anthony Rizzo, on the other hand, is the soul of all Cubness. So you send him to the Yankees, baseball's version of TPS reports?

Sure, the Cubs got some juicy prospects in return, but, come on, send him anywhere but there. Send him to Cleveland or San Diego or Tampa, or maybe the Mets. Send him to Philly, where he can commune with the Phanatic. Send him to Boston, even, aka the New Yankees.

Or, hey: What about Pittsburgh? Sure, send him to my Cruds.

On second thought, no. That would be cruel.