Stealing (from) home

 Milwaukee Brewers owner Mark Attanasio put the best face on it he could. I mean, when a division rival swoops in and makes off with your successful manager, what are you gonna do? Bitch and moan and whine about it?

Well ... maybe a little.

"We're all here today because we've lost Craig," he told the assembled media after the news came down that Craig Counsell, who'd been with the Brew Crew for 17 seasons as a player, manager and executive, had been money-whipped away by -- wait, what? -- the freaking Chicago Cubs. 

"But I've reflected on this -- Craig has lost us, and he's lost our community, too," Attanosio went on.

Altogether now: Ooo-OOO-ooh.

Because I'm sure Chicago has nothing to offer that Milwaukee doesn't, aside from that $40 million over five years the Cubs just handed Counsell. Milwaukee, after all, has Laverne and Shirley, beer and a baseball owner who tried to strong-arm the city into updating its ballpark. All  Chicago ever had was Wrigley Field and Soldier Field and  Ditka and Sweetness and Royko and Mayor Daley, and weird taste in hotdogs.

Oh, and the Cubs. Always the Cubs.

Who won the World Series, finally, in 2016, and then made the leader in the clubhouse, David Ross, the manager of the team. Everyone in Chicago loved David Ross. He wasn't exactly the Old Man And The Sea in the World Series, but he was the Old Man Putting One In The Seats just when the Cubs needed it.

So it was with obvious reluctance that ownership abruptly pink-slipped Ross this week, even  though his team chased the Brewers all the way to the end this past season. The boardroom boys knew what the franchise owed Ross, after all. But they also figured he'd taken them as far as he could take them.

Which, if you're a Cubs fan, is a good thing.

Think about it: What poaching Counsell proves, if nothing else, is the Cubs have an ownership group that clearly wants more than just a nice showing, and they're willing to go after it in a very un-Cub-like manner. David Ross and the debt the franchise owed him aside, when Counsell's deal came up for renewal and Attananosio's finger twitched on the trigger, the Cubs didn't hesitate. They swooped in and bogarted him right from under the noses of their division rival.

It was not so much stealing home, in that sense, as stealing from home. 

It's also the kind of ruthlessness you want to see from your ballclub, because ruthlessness wins in this man's game. It's a money game, and the Cubs have shown a particular willingness to pay when it made sense -- most notably by pumping money into a farm system that had been allowed to languish.

So, welcome to Wrigleyville, Craig Counsell. And to Milwaukee?

Nyah-nyah nyah nyah-nyah.