The conventional wisdom on the Cubs have changed over the past two weeks. The Cubs inability and/or unwillingness to trade even tradable guys (Sean Marshall, Marlon Byrd, Carlos Pena) has certainly flipped a switch amongst even the most forgiving of fans and media types (save Gordon Wittenmyer).

Tonight, Cubs Insider on ChicagoNow (HT: Dave Kaplan) talks about was the inaction due to Jim Hendry's hands being tied? Cubs Insider quotes Bruce Levine, mouthpiece for Jim Hendry:

(T)he Cubs need some direction from above Jim Hendry. Either make a commitment Jim or move on to next management group and let them come up with game plan. Right now Hendry and Co. are in the in-between mode, and you're not going to accomplish very much that way.

I would not necessarily agree on Carlos Pena and Ramirez. I think again ownership has to identify a direction. If Hendry is coming back for last yer of his contract, he should be extended or let go. It's not fair to him or the organization to hold a team in limbo.

Since Levine has a direct line to Hendry, this could mean two things. First, Hendry is making up a story as to why he didn't make a move. "It's the owners who won't let me do anything!"

This fits with Hendry's operating methods from the past. Just look at how he's defended himself from the Alfonso Soriano signing. "It's not me, it was all that John McDonough guy that did that! Don't blame me!"

Another possibility is that this is true and Tom Ricketts can't decide what to do. Unfortunately, the level of Tom Ricketts management skills is largely unknown. We know that he graduated late from college. We know that his company, Incapital, wasn't terribly successful for a long time.

Google also turns up this bit of info from Forbes back in 2002:

Tom Ricketts has a great idea for selling bonds to individual investors. So how come he waited so long to sign up clients?

Thomas Ricketts is a potent argument against sitting on your hands. The onetime marketmaker in options came up with the idea of using the Internet to aggregate supply and demand for a security most retail investors wouldn't think to buy--corporate bonds. (Only 12% of the $3.7 trillion in corporate bonds is in the hands of individuals.) He helped launch the system in 1996 as a vice president at ABN-Amro. It took him three years get up the gumption to quit and start his own company, Incapital LLC.

Ricketts rounded up companies eager to borrow and brought them to brokers, who then sold bonds in blocks as small as $1,000 to investors. Besides tapping new investors, corporations benefited by shaving a point or two off the usual underwriting spread and by offering slightly lower yields than they would have offered on identical issues sold to institutions. Investors liked the system because the bonds were sold at par and at yields that changed daily--and because they could eventually sell them back to brokers at yields comparable to market prices.

All good in theory. Trouble was, Ricketts wasted nine precious months during 2000, haggling over a $1 million-plus grubstake from Bank of America Technology Investments for an undisclosed minority share of the company. And while his backers delayed, his old employer played: ABN-Amro's LaSalle Broker Dealer Services was selling $2 billion in bonds on the Net. "To watch the product go on without you as you're getting ready to come back into the market, it's not a comfortable feeling," he says. "There was an opportunity cost there; I just wouldn't be able to quantify it."

Try $1 billion worth of business--or more.

This is a guy that has a hard time making decisions.

There's a reason why this blog supported Don Levin first, then Mark Cuban after Levin got outbid for the new owner of the Cubs. They know what they are doing when it comes to managing a sports franchise.

:::UPDATE:::
WSCR's Dan Bernstein chimes on on the same article.