Can We Be Sure the Chicago Cubs Will Win the Central?

The Chicago Cubs will win the NL Central, right?

They dominated last year and return, more or less, the same team. What's more, the competition is lacking.

CC Sabathia and Ben Sheets departing to Free Agency leaves the top of the Brewers rotation vacant. The Astros have no real identity or compelling reason for anybody to call them challengers.

The Cardinals continue to field shit around Pujols. The Reds have some talent, but are probably not ready to challenge. And I probably am wasting space by mentioning the Pirates here.

Just looking at those facts, one could conclude that the Cubs will take the Central with ease next season. And believe me, I sure as hell hope they do.

However, I cannot escape feeling a sense of looming dread about the forthcoming season. Maybe it's just an extended hangover from the disaster last October. But I really do have a bad feel about the season to come.

Maybe it's the inner cynic any Cubs fan must harbor, saying the Cubs cannot continue to do well over the course of many seasons.

Maybe it's the sense that GM Jim Hendry has had no direction this offseason and has appeared to weaken the team, even if only slightly—unless of course he swings the Jake Peavy deal.

But there may be some credence to my sentiment.

Derrek Lee is an above-average first baseman if you forget his one magical season, so he won't patch any holes should the ship begin to sink.

Anybody who remembers 2006 can remember that Aramis Ramirez does not carry a team when it matters. Anybody who has ever watched a playoff game knows that he and Alfonso Soriano disappear when their presence is needed most. As good as these guys can be, I do not trust them to save our season, should it ever go south.

Elsewhere, we lost Mark DeRosa—arguably our most valuable player last year due to his versatility—and we replaced him with Aaron Miles (I need say no more) and the finicky Milton Bradley, who worries me to no end.

It appears Kosuke Fukudome takes over center, which is a problem if he so much as begins to emulate last year's second half, which was as precipitous a fall from grace as I have ever seen.

Catcher Geovany Soto is promising, but the threat of a sophomore slump lingers in the shadows.

The point is, while this team is solid across the board, there are also questions and uncertainties nearly across the board.

I haven't even mentioned the pitching staff, where Rich Harden and Carlos Zambrano are injury risks and Ryan Dempster is due for a regression. The bullpen looks good, yet is minus Kerry Wood.

Perhaps most or all of the questions will be answered, the team's overall solid depth will overcome any one player's downfalls, and we will cruise to a division title.

However, the glue and cohesion that existed on last year's team may not be there, and a collection of injuries, regressions, and chemistry problems could conspire to set the Cubs back and, even though admittedly unlikely, out of the playoffs.

It is this that I fear.

Of course, one might contend that no other team could reasonably challenge the Cubs, but the Brewers still have their young offensive core, the Astros, while uninspiring, do have the pieces to possibly make a run, and who knows, maybe the Reds will make their jump this year.

Let me put it this way.

If I were held at gunpoint and forced to bet, I would bet on the Cubs. But I would not bet on this Cubs team of my own volition, because something about them, which is hard to pinpoint, bothers me.