Recent job cuts at Marquee Sports Network led to widescale panic from Chicago Cubs fans only days before the MLB winter meetings are set to convene in Orlando, Fla.
According to various blogs and websites, by laying off the Marquee general manager and the content creators at the website, the Cubs were signaling another offseason of cost-cutting, which obviously would affect their spending on free agency.
Memories of 2020, when Cubs President Jed Hoyer nontendered Kyle Schwarber, were still fresh in many fans’ minds. “Is this going to be another winter of our discontent?”
We won’t really know until the Cubs begin making some significant moves, assuming they will do something once the market heats up next week in Florida. The signing of reliever Phil Maton to a two-year, $14.5 million deal with an option was fine, but only one small step in creating a new back end of the bullpen.
Another starter is also necessary, but with Shota Imanaga back in the fold after shockingly accepting the team’s $22 million qualifying offer, the Cubs have their four main starters returning, plus swingman Colin Rea. Rehabbing Justin Steele should be back at some point as well.
I can’t say what the Cubs will do. Hoyer likes to surprise people, as he did last year in acquiring Kyle Tucker. But I’m guessing the Marquee Sports cost-cutting moves won’t significantly affect Hoyer’s ability to spend this winter. It will save the Cubs money, obviously, but the combined salaries of the employees laid off probably would be a fragment of what’s needed to sign a midlevel reliever to a one-year deal.
A Cubs source on Wednesday confirmed a Sun-Times report that Marquee reporter Andy Martinez and content director Tony Andracki were let go, along with GM Diane Penny. But the source said it was not going to affect the station’s primary goal, which of course is broadcasting Cubs games.
“Fans are going to see the same talent next year,” the source said, adding the decision are just a renewed “focus on the live broadcast.”
So the broadcast team of Jon “Boog” Sciambi, Jim Deshaies and Taylor McGregor will all be back, along with Elise Menaker and Cubs insider Bruce Levine.
It appears likely the Marquee website eventually will be void of written content since they got rid of their two main writers, both of whom did a good job under difficult circumstances. Writing about a team that owns the network you work for can’t be easy.
Cubs President Jed Hoyer walks near the field before Game 5 of the NL Division Series against the Brewers on Oct. 11, 2025, at American Family Field in Milwaukee. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)
There was no reason given for the decision to go without written Cubs content, and the timing was curious since the winter meetings are a prime outlet for information gathering, which is what Cubs fans crave in the offseason. The Hot Stove League always draws interest because fans want to know whether to be optimistic for the coming season.
No decision has been made on whether the website will continue in 2026. It currently emphasizes Bears content. That decision will be made by a committee that includes the Cubs business operations department and Sinclair, which co-owns the station.
Cubs senior vice president of sales and marketing Colin Faulkner will take on the Marquee general manager duties for the time being, which includes “programming and production.” Faulkner, the husband of Blackhawks executive Jaime Faulkner, declined to comment.
Concerns that the Cubs basically would be eliminating the firewall between the business operations side and the actual broadcast should be alleviated since there was no real firewall to begin with.
The Cubs would not allow something on Marquee that the owners didn’t approve of, as evidenced by the orchestrated return of Sammy Sosa in 2025. Marquee studiously avoided any mention of his alleged use of performance-enhancing drugs. The line is also blurred any time president of business operations Crane Kenney steps foot in the TV booth during games and starts providing his expertise.
So Faulkner can’t really do anything that would add to the perception that the network is just another arm of Cubs management, unless he brings back the panel discussion show “The Reporters,” which once stopped the taping of an episode during which Hoyer was mildly criticized by reporters. The reporters then were told to avoid the subject when they started taping again, and the original segment was edited out. That’s state-run media, baseball-style.
There obviously aren’t any Cubs games to produce until spring training, so Marquee has some time to bring in someone with experience in broadcasting baseball games. If not, Faulkner’s broadcasts will be highly scrutinized.
Less than two years ago, Penny was named to replace veteran Mike McCarthy, a hands-on GM frequently seen at the ballpark until he resigned because of health issues. Penny, who was seldom seen at Wrigley Field, was more involved in the digital side, which is now being downsized. McCarthy returned to CHSN, where he’s currently the GM in charge of White Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks broadcasts.
Marquee Sports will be entering its seventh season of televising Cubs games in ’26, and fans have varying opinions on the broadcasts and the broadcast team. Some love Sciambi, while others pine for the return of Len Kasper, who left Marquee for the White Sox radio booth. No baseball announcer is universally loved, though Harry Caray came close during his White Sox days when he and Jimmy Piersall teamed up.
Local broadcasts invariably emphasize the positive, and fortunately for Marquee there were many more positives than negatives in ‘25. Still, the broadcasts were extremely touchy-feely with manager Craig Counsell, whose decision-making often rankled fans but was seldom questioned by anyone on Marquee, with the exception of studio analyst Cliff Floyd.
Perhaps the biggest disappointment for Cubs fans, however, is that Marquee’s arrival in 2020 did not lead to the kind of massive revenues they hoped would be put back into the team’s payroll.
“The new TV deal, at least for the first few years, basically means the exact same thing for us as the old deal,” then-President Theo Epstein warned at the end of 2019. “The first few years will basically replicate the old deal, and then with potential for real growth.”
After six seasons, Marquee is still working on that real growth, and some employees paid the price with the loss of their jobs.