Tom Ricketts heard the plan and he understood the plan.

And he came forth and spoke to the people, and he said, “The plan is good. The plan is real. The plan is life.”

OK, it wasn’t quite so biblical, but the Cubs owner did buy in to Theo Epstein’s rebuild and never lost faith, even when some took Ricketts and Epstein apart.

“I never really paid much attention to the criticism,” Ricketts said. “I’d walk through the upper deck and talk to people and the fans were always aboard. One of 20 would be really upset, but 19 out of 20 would be like, ‘Hey, man, I’m glad you have a plan.’ ”

Yes, the plan, a full rebuild from scratch that would produce not one shot at the playoffs based on overspending, backloaded contracts or the moving of prospects for rentals, followed by a decade of misery, but instead a team of young players built to compete for many, many years.

The screeching from the naysayers did not make Ricketts rethink the project.

“I think I’m most proud of being able to put together an organization and tell the story in a way that nobody panicked,” Ricketts said. “Everyone stayed in the boat. Everyone hung with us.

“There were some tough years when the fans could have quit. They could have gone home. They could have stopped coming to Wrigley. They could have lost faith in me. They could have lost faith in the organization.

“But they gave us a chance and we pulled through.”

And while Epstein, Jed Hoyer and Jason McLeod were up to their necks in mud, Ricketts says he never had second thoughts.

“Theo laughs about the days when I was too patient, and thinks I should have been yelling at him more,” Ricketts said with a big smile. “Once you see the plan, and once you understand what you have to do to build the organization, you know it takes time and you know if you take a shortcut, it’ll be a dead end.

“And you know if you rush it, you’ll screw it up.”

Epstein’s vision was simple, but the execution extremely complicated, and even he had moments when he wondered how quickly they would be able to pull this off.

“We never doubted, but there were times when it seemed like it was a long way away,” Epstein said. “We would stare at the board and wonder where the impact players were going to come from, and how would we acquire enough talent to make this happen.

“Slowly but surely, it came together. Great support from ownership. Awesome job by our player development guys. Next thing you know you look up and 4 more wins until we’re world champions. It’s pretty special.

“It’s good to be part of this organization. It’s a special place. I’m just honored to be here. It’s pretty cool when people want to be a part of something like this. We have a lot of veterans who signed here and took less (money) because they wanted to be a part of something historic.”

It’s easy to imagine Epstein not with the Cubs. And it’s easy to think of where they would be, with bloated payrolls, chubby players, fat ERAs and thin records.

Instead, the Cubs finally got the break of the century when Epstein fell into their laps.

“That was obviously very, very lucky,” Ricketts said. “There was a window of opportunity there and we got lucky and then took advantage of it. Same with Joe (Maddon). The window opened for us.”

So now the Cubs are 4 wins from what was so long considered unthinkable. And guess what? Tom Ricketts won’t think about it.

“Not really. Won’t do it. Not getting ahead. Have not thought about it,” Ricketts said. “Honestly, I had people calling me about tickets in Cleveland last week, and I was like, ‘Don’t even go there. I’m not interested in talking about it.’

“I take it day by day. I take my cues from the players. That’s how they go about their business. I’m just happy we got through Los Angeles, but this is not over.”

Maybe not over, but all going according to plan.

brozner@dailyherald.com

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