Let’s get one thing straight about Cubs first baseman Anthony Rizzo.
He is not the leader of this team. Or his captain.
At least not the way you probably think.
Not in the Mark Messier, intense-and-in-your-face way. Not the Kirby Puckett “Go on, I’m driving the bus” in Game 6 mode. Not even the Derek Jeter business, team spokesman, New York state-of-mind way.
But Rizzo’s style as frontman has been the perfect fit for this team so far, during a CO-stress-COVID-19 the Cubs sprint to the three-week mark with a 13-3 record.
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“What is the definition of a leader for you?” Rizzo said during a lengthy conversation this spring about his role and expectations this year. “My style of leadership is my style.”
That question, as it relates to Rizzo, has been the subject of nearly as much local sports talk so far this season as the Cubs’ closer situation.
The answer over the years has been mostly about playing 153 games a year with a career.886 OPS, fearless approaches loading bats and placing the record, and at least one dramatic comeback of a “season -ein “ankle injury during a pennant match after homer against the Cardinals.
But no season that the Cubs have played with Rizzo is ever more built for what he brings to a clubhouse, between a poignant sense of humor and grinning and what he calls a communication style, based less on teammates’ plowing than sending a message “in the right way, in the loving way.”
After a three-month shutdown and long-awaited return to the field under strict test protocols and fanless circumstances, no one has stopped the humor, and no one seemed to like the moment more than the ringleader of the team of all that dugout “energy” speaks the manager and the players over.
‘I think everyone is [raising his leadership efforts], but it starts with Rizz, for sure, ”said teammate Kyle Hendricks. “He’s really taken a lot, an unbelievable teammate, the energy he brings every day, it’s definitely on a different level.”
From the hand sanitizer in the back to the first runner to reach first base this season, to the “Tony 2 Chainz” bling for Wednesday night’s big night on the record in Cleveland – that part of Rizzo’s nature that’s about laughing and trying to lighten the mood for everyone else has never held value again.
“I don’t know if it’s the circumstance of the year or just a change in his approach,” said first-year manager David Ross, a teammate in 2015-16. ‘I actually feel like he’s just trying to have the best he can there on a nightly basis on the baseball field. He wants to succeed. He wants to contribute. ”
And it’s no coincidence.
After a rapid decline from the playoffs in 2018 and missing the playoffs last year, Rizzo faced not only the chance that the core of the Cubs’ championships were in danger of breaking into trades, but also a long look in the mirror on how much he was willing to change to become the kind of leader and influence in the clubhouse he wanted to become.
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He was already a leading figure for the franchise, a strong off-the-field representative and popular personality in the clubhouse – if not the classic, first-to-the-park, last-on-leaving, kick-ass leader.
He can never be the last few things. He said in the spring training that he had no intention of changing who he is: ‘I will not appear at 10 o’clock [a.m.] if I normally show up around 2 or 3. That’s useless to me unless we have something. “
But he said Thursday that he had “dialogue” he had with the front office, former manager Joe Maddon and others since the end of last season.
And a season heavy on less-is-more, with restrictions on how much time players can spend on the ballpark and undertaking battles and video work, plays the strengths of his personality and character.
“I say the whole time we’re creating our own weather,” Rizzo said of all the noise and “cheerleading” in the dugout that is not necessarily new to this team – but new needed without fans. “Whether it’s 30 degrees or 100 degrees, it’s how we look at it.”
As Rizzo was earlier than in his career as a follower, he has clearly shown a shift in more recent seasons, none more so than this one, with his real-world background and her rewarding sense of time for the core.
“Anthony Rizzo has matured a lot since we played together in a great way,” Ross said. ‘Not that he was previously unnatural. But he continues to grow and wants to become the leader he knows he is. And he has those characteristics. ”
Teammates say they themselves have noticed small differences in Rizzo since last year, in the willingness to approach a teammate with something he has noticed or even take the lead for a drill that is not being done well.
Rizzo said that only works “when boys know it’s coming from the right place and coming from the heart,” he said, noting the change in club cultures right since his San Diego debut in 2011. ‘ It’s not, ‘Call someone in front of the whole team’ anymore. My first few years it was more of that.
“You’re just learning more and more now, it’s not really the way to do it that much more, because guys are crawling a little more into a hole and losing your confidence.”
When he turns 31 in a ‘leadership’ role, it’s more a natural order of things, Rizzo suggested, more the core players’ turn to follow the likes of former veterans John Lackey, Dexter Fowler, Miguel Montero or even Ross rode out of the clubhouse as players.
But don’t confuse Rizzo with Jason Heyward as a man who will suddenly call the next meeting for rain delay that inspires a clubhouse to change baseball history. That’s still not necessarily Rizzo’s way.
It’s not that he needs someone to ‘hit a‘ C ’on his chest’, as some of our favorite, amped-up broadcasters like to shout.
“It’s just mindful,” Rizzo said. ‘Do not run from the leader, the quote-unquote face of the franchise, however you want to say it. Embrace it and make sure everyone is OK in all aspects, whether it’s our bullpen, or whether it’s boys who do not play every day – just pick up boys and feel good. And back then, it’s the same thing guys do for me. ”
It’s also the chains on Wednesday. And the trouser pocket of the hand sanitizer in the opener. And whatever he has in store tomorrow.
“He does a great job of leadership,” Ross said, “and is the example of having fun.”
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