Why was Joe Maddon jettisoned by Cubs? Theo Epstein spells out some clues

A died-and-went-to-heaven clubhouse at Wrigley Field.

The finest spring-training facilities, too.

A masseuse, a yoga instructor, a mental-skills guru — each available to Cubs players pretty much all the time.

Is there a creature comfort the North Siders don’t have? No. Playing for the Cubs means being provided with, as team president Theo Epstein said Monday, ‘‘everything they want.’’

Epstein wouldn’t have it any other way.

But it’s no excuse for players going soft, lacking hunger, losing their edge. If you want to play for the Cubs from this point forward, you had better be more accountable than that. You had better be prepared to push yourself harder than ever.

And, no, driving these things home to the players isn’t the job of the front office.

Why did Epstein decide to jettison manager Joe Maddon? After his annual end-of-season news conference at Wrigley, there wasn’t much guessing left to do.

It’s the manager’s responsibility to keep the players’ — and his own — eyes on the prize at all times. It’s clear that, in Epstein’s estimation, Maddon dropped the ball in that regard.

‘‘Should the front office be the one in charge of that type of motivation on a day-to-day basis — or even with some of the things that happened last offseason?’’ Epstein said. ‘‘I thought then and I think now: No, it should not.

‘‘We need to create a culture in the clubhouse with guys in uniform where they push themselves to be the very best versions of themselves.’’

Epstein focused on several themes in his answers, one being a culture of accountability. Rather than having so many individualized routines, Cubs players should work together more — and work harder.

It’s also time to stop living in the past. The 2016 World Series is a distant memory. Putting the pedal to the metal in September didn’t work in 2018 or 2019.

And a whole that equals more than the sum of its parts is far preferable to a whole that equals less. Pretty obvious, right?

Without saying it directly, Epstein put a lot of the breakdowns in those areas on Maddon — especially during a reference to the exit interviews with players that happened earlier in the day.

‘‘We all feel that we could put a little bit more emphasis on work, especially working together as a team, on pushing limits to be the very best versions of themselves and getting away from some of the routines that have proven successful individually,’’ he said. ‘‘Because there’s another level that we can all get to.’’

Epstein also referred to young players, not by name, who have underperformed without an appropriate crackdown. Playing for the Cubs is a privilege, after all, not a right.

‘‘If there’s not performance, that privilege goes away,’’ he said. ‘‘That’s sort of the bottom line. I think we’ve, in certain instances, done a good job of that. In other instances, we haven’t communicated it effectively enough or in time.’’

‘‘We’’ being, presumably, a he: Maddon.