Tom Verducci's "The Cubs Way": Achieving Excellence in Baseball Through Teamwork and Zen Principles

Amazon Customer: Great insight to a champion team winning for the first time in over a century.

Australia on Aug 18, 2023

Chuckles: So much info its hard to digest, this is not helped by the frequency the author bounces around in time.
You’d think Epstein went to Harvard Business School or a top Management School, so strong does he appear in business management ideas; emotional intelligenge, in particular using empathy focused intra-relationships in the organizarion. From coach-player, to staffer-player, to player-player and on and on. Also impressive is the stong emphasis he placed on character. I was unknowingly aware of it, in so much I recall how much I personally liked all of the Cubs players in the 2016 era. They played the game, rather than performed. I thought of this as a reflection of their mostly young age (the exception being Ross, who is young at heart) but reading this showed me how Epstein made character one of his core pillars in how they evaluated potential players. Sure, many teams consider character but I think usally it is done in a cost/benefit formula; “sure this guy is a scumbag, but he’s a huge hitter/pitcher and the negative publicity we me incur or negative clubhouse atmosphere he might bring will be overcome by his value” type of attitude. Epstein’s focus on evaluatong...

United States on Oct 08, 2022

James Lee: very well constructed book on how the Cubs were finally constructed to win the World Series. Unfortunately they aren’t the Red Sox

Canada on May 02, 2021

Christopher Lok: I enjoyed this book a lot. It gave a great breakdown on what the Cubs did to end their drought, especially the role Epstein and Maddon had. It talks a little bit about sabremetrics and the analytics side of things, which is of course the trend in the sport nowadays, but interestingly enough it also stresses the human part of things. Some may consider the human side (e.g., drafting players of good character rather than just good stats) intagible or non-diagnostic and thus irrelevant, but the book makes a compelling case that this does matter, especially in a team sport. Great book overall.

Canada on Jul 16, 2019

Ferran Pons: I thought it would be a kind of self-helping book, but it is a very engaging novel. The book mix each world series game with stories of players and staff in a very good way. The explains how and why the Cubs aquire the players and managers.
As I red the book, I re-lived the World Series, it was exciting.
It is one of this books thay you don’t want never to end.

Spain on Jul 06, 2019

John W. Pearson: Last night at Major League Baseball’s All-Star game, Chicago Cubs Manager Joe Maddon led the National League’s elites to a narrow loss, 2 to 1, in an extra-inning pitchers battle. (You think your job is challenging? Imagine trying to coalesce big egos and big bats into one harmonious team in less than 24 hours.)

According to author/sports writer Tom Verducci, Maddon is “the Johnny Appleseed of aphorisms.” On the first day of the Chicago Cubs’ 2016 spring training camp, Maddon delivered his first of three “annual meetings” speeches to the players—and his pithy observations were boiled down to six points (#1: “Embrace the target.”), two key words—Expectations and Pressure—and then six more one-liners, including “Do simple better” and “The process simplifies the task.”

Time-out! Wait-a-minute! Is this a baseball book—or a management book? Yes…and it’s already on my Top-10 list for 2017, and just might be my Book-of-the-Year pick. It’s amazing—and I’ve already shipped copies to two friends.

"The Cubs Way: The Zen of Building the Best Team in Baseball and Breaking the Curse," by Tom Verducci, senior baseball writer for...

United States on Jul 12, 2017

Kenneth C. Mahieu: "The Cubs Way" by Tom Verducci is an excellent baseball book, a must for baseball fans, not just for Cubs fans. I have read a number of baseball books, and I have found many of them to be rather boring and poorly written. This book is exceptional, even before you get to the title page. Upon opening the book, you see in full color a copy of the lineup card that Joe Maddon kept in his hand for the Game 7. There are stats all over the place, scratchings, old sayings, initials, even a mild obscenity. To interpret all this for the reader, there is a key on the facing page which explains it all. Well, not quite all. Here's Verducci's opening to a paragraph on the Matrix, a number assigned to each batter: "The proprietary number Maddon assigns to each batter to capture how well the batter matches up against the starting pitcher." I hadn't read one word of the text yet, and already I was loving this book.

There are three major elements to this 363 page book - how key players were acquired, how some of the innards of baseball applied to the 2016 Cubs, and how each of the seven games of the World Series played out. By innards I mean all those components that impacted on players'...

United States on May 01, 2017

Cubbie: Thanks for the memories
I admit, I am a Cub fan for more than 25 years. Living in Europe, I follow the Cubs most recently mainly via the internet, the MLB At Bat app and some printed media. My last trip to Wrigley dates back to 2007.
It goes without saying that I followed the development of the Cubs very close. And I remember, that when Theo Epstein took over, hope for the break of the curse started for me as well.
The book is a grand slam for sure. It give such a good insight how the Cubs were built and what happened in particular in the last two seasons with Joe Maddon in charge. Thanks to all the people who shared their thoughts and views with Tom Verducci and thanks to him for writing this book.
Game 7. I woke up in the early morning hours of November 3rd, grabbed my IPAD and opened At bat and tuned in to the radio broadcast.
8th inning, Cubs lead – this cant be true I thought.
Then Chapman could not hold the lead for us. Well, we are the Cubs, aren’t we?
Then the rain delay – what else could go wrong ?
10th inning – suddenly the guys take the lead again, Almora Jr. with one of the greatest baserunning efforts in Cubs history.
Bottom of the...

Germany on Apr 13, 2017