ESPN's 50 greatest Cubs list

MRubio52 said:

That's right! They won 100 games that year in a shortened schedule too.

I think what makes the 69 Cubs unique, as FirstTimer said, is that they never even made the postseason with 4 HOFers that weren't in their decline phase. You can find individual seasons like that, most recently the 08 Yanks, probably, but not a stretch like the late 60's, early 70's Cubs.

Click to expand...

Pretty much. There will also be exceptions like those mid 80's Cubs teams Rory listed where you have really young players just starting out(Maddux)(or pre-roids in Palmeiro's case), mixed with some old guys well past their prime or finding their way(Eck before he resurrected a career as a closer).

You'd be hard pressed to find a "core" of HOF'ers in their prime..or all damn close to it who accomplished literally nothing the way those 60's Cubs teams did.

The sustained nothingness is the indictment...Not some "one year" deal.

I think 1969 was the first year they expanded the playoffs so before that you pretty much had to win the league to get into the World Series, but even so the Cubs were pretty bad for most of the 60s so that's not exactly an excuse.

69 was the beginning of divisional play.