Kick the Tires

Given that I’ve ridden the same bike for fifty-plus years, getting a new one was no easy matter, but, finally, I settled on the Buick. Allow me to explain. Once upon a time, back when Schwinn ruled the world, it offered bikes much like General Motors did cars. As an eighteen-year old, I settled on a Varsity, which was pretty much a Chevy. I was a kid, what did I know? Fast forward to nearly two years ago on the Lakefront Trail. Someone marveled that I could keep up with him riding a tank. That hurt, so I decided to take the plunge on a “new” bike. It had to be a Schwinn, a real Schwinn. If you’re from these parts and happen to be of a certain age, you get what I mean. One up from the Varsity was the Continental, and one up from that the Super Sport. Think Pontiac and Oldsmobile in whatever order you want to put them. Top of the line was—and is, because they still make them in Waterford, WI—is the Paramount, as in Cadillac. I settled on a Sports Tourer, or Buick by any other name. Two years of looking, and I stumbled upon one on craigslist, Pittsburgh, that is. Great price for a bike in close to perfect shape and a whole year younger than the Varsity. It arrived Saturday, went to my Schwinn dealer yesterday and was ready for pickup today. My God. I can curl the ST with one hand. I’ve just spent the afternoon finding a Schwinn-approved rear rack and touchup paint from a Schwinn-ophile online. The hope is that the first warm day in March I can take my new-old bike out for a spin. Fingers crossed.

Nice Work, If You Can Get It

The Padres have reportedly signed third baseman Manny Machado to an eleven-year extension worth $350 million. Lucky Machado. And happy, from the sounds of it. “We’re excited to be here for the rest of our careers and have this hat go into the Hall of Fame,” Machado told a group of reporters yesterday. Apparently, nobody thought to ask Machado who “we” is or how he—or they, it’s all so confusing—knows the cap is going to Cooperstown, or why. For fun, I checked the stats for Brooks Robinson and Mike Schmidt, the two best third basemen ever in my book; both were productive at age thirty-seven. Production declined noticeably after that, though Robinson did manage to win the last of his sixteen Gold Gloves at age thirty-eight. According to baseball-reference.com, Machado most resembles Adrian Beltre through age twenty-nine, and Beltre ended up with 3166 hits. If Machado keeps up that pace, then he’s entitled to use either first-person singular or plural, whichever he wants. But if his tools start to erode midway through the extension, the Padres will have a very expensive first baseman or DH on their hands. This is part of what makes baseball so much fun—fans get to see how it all plays out. I can’t wait.

Accentuate the Positive

Gavin Sheets and Jake Burger homered, Lance Lynn pitched three nice innings, and that’s what you take away from the first game of spring training, a 6-2 White Sox loss to the Padres. Anything more is just asking for trouble. Like why Sox skipper Pedro Grifol keeps wearing sunglasses on the back of his head or why Steve Stone continues to exist in the Sox broadcast booth. All Stone could do yesterday was express his love, again and again, for the new rules put in effect for this season. Rob Manfred couldn’t have asked for a better shill. If I heard Stone correctly (and I admit to hitting the mute button most of the time he opened his mouth), fans will like the balanced schedule because that way they’ll see more of the best players in baseball. You might want to take another look at the schedule, my friend. Let’s say the Sox are two out of first place with a week to go. Two behind the Guardians? So sorry, the balanced schedule has both teams done playing one another August 6th. Two behind the Twins? Done playing them September 17th. Nothing like closing out the season with six games against the Diamondbacks and Padres. Good luck making up those two games. Right, Steve?

Rule Balk

As part of MLB’s new pitching-clock rule, a pitcher can throw over and/or step off the rubber a total of two times before getting called for a ball. Anything to speed up the game, except for commercials, of course. It seems to me that smart baserunners—I’m speaking hypothetically here—will tempt pitchers into throwing over without real fear of being picked off. Then, it’s off to the races on the next pitch. This strikes me as totally one-sided. If pitchers are going to be limited in how often they can throw over or step off, why not even things up and legalize the balk except for, say, dropping the ball? That way, the risk equalizes between runner and pitcher. It couldn’t hurt to try.

Desperation

The Lakers didn’t want 34-year old guard Patrick Beverly anymore, so they bought out his contract. The Bulls signed Beverly on Wednesday. From what I read, Beverly is bringing all sorts of energy to his new team, which also happens to be his hometown team. (As a rule, Chicago teams don’t know about Chicago players, much less sign them.) Today’s Tribune noted how, in just his first Bulls’ practice, Beverly challenged Zach LaVine to shoot more—really, that’s LaVine’s problem, not shooting the ball enough?—while offering words of advice to Ayo Dosunmu, who may be playing less with a new-old guy in town. Beverly is known for his defense and, like I said, energy; he also has a reputation for trash-talking. So, given that the Lakers are all of one game better than the Bulls, why did they let Beverly go? They have enough defense, energy and potty-mouths on hand? As for the Bulls, it’s hard to see them stealing a player from the opposition; more the other way around (see Wendell Carter Jr. and Daniel Gafford). Desperate teams do desperate things. I’d say that pretty much applies to both the Lakers and Bulls here.

Throwback

Clare called a couple of hours ago to “complain about the White Sox.” My daughter wants to know why Luis Robert is going by “Luis Robert Jr”. all of a sudden and whether Eloy Jimenez lost too much weight over the offseason (thirty pounds in four-plus months). “Thirty pounds in a year would be crazy” was how she put it. Most of all, Clare wants to know what was up with Tim Anderson. Yesterday, the Sox shortstop did an interview with Chuck Garfien in which he accused Garfien of not “pulling from the same string with everybody.” Confused? Wait, there’s more, as reported on nbcchicago.com. “I think we should be pulling from the same string and not tearing each other down and not tearing players down, or we’re gonna tear you down.” In Anderson’s view of things, players deign to talk to reporters, so reporters should say Thank You by never uttering a discouraging word. In other words, we should have throwback announcers to go with throwback uniforms. Holy Jack Brickhouse. Hey-hey!

Like I Said

WGN is doing a series of stories celebrating its seventy-five years of television broadcasting. A few weeks ago, they focused on sports’ anchor Wendell Smith, who as a sportswriter for the Pittsburgh Courier virtually took it upon himself to get Jackie Robinson into major-league baseball. This has nothing to do with that. The WGN story included a clip of Smith interviewing then-Bulls head-coach Dick Motta. Smith, Motta, a bunch of big guys running drills in the background—it could have been 1968 all over again, if just for a second. I don’t know what Smith thought of the Bulls’ teams Motta would lead, 1968-1976, but I sure loved them. Jerry Sloan and Norm Van Lier, Bob Love and Chet Walker, Tom Boerwinkle and Clifford Ray. The names still come easily to me after a half-century still. These Bulls aren’t those Bulls. Yesterday, the team announced they were shutting down guard Lonzo Ball, signed last season to run the offense. Only Ball hasn’t played since January of 2022. Two knee surgeries later, and he’s still not right. Maybe Arturas Karnisovas should have been scared off by Ball’s first surgery on his left knee back in 2018. The Bulls haven’t been the same since Ball’s injury, which happened around the same time Alex Caruso broke his right wrist; Caruso hasn’t had much of an impact since then either, by the way. So, are the Bulls snakebit? Maybe, but that can’t explain everything. Karnisovas also decided to sign Zach LaVine to a big contract, only LaVine is a one-way player, and defense ain’t his way. DeMar DeRozan is a wonderful player, a latter-day Chet Walker if you will. Only DeRozan is thirty-three and counting. As for the rest of the team, it’s like I said, a bunch of Greg Goosens. I also said something about a disaster in slow motion. At 26-33 and a six-game losing streak, things could be accelerating.

Answer Me This

Now that the White Sox have gone out and signed Elvis Andrus to play second base, GM Rick Hahn says Romy Gonzalez can be a “Ben Zobrist” type of player while manager Pedro Grifol goes more for the “Swiss Army knife” analogy. Potato, potahto. Answer me this, though—how many Swiss Zobrists can you carry? I thought that was Leury Garcia’s role. I mean, Hahn signed him for three years last offseason. Unless my math is off, that leaves two years to go. Are Hahn and Grifol trying to light a fire under Gonzalez, or Garcia given his .210 BA in 2022, or both? Unless it’s neither, which in White Sox world is entirely possible. Did I mention Jake Burger? Well, neither did Hahn and Grifol. I have a sneaking suspicion two out of three of them will be disappointed by the time camp breaks. Count on the brain trust to alienate everyone in the process.

Blowing Smoke

The White Sox were all blah-blah-blah about filling their hole at second base from internal candidates, with Romy Gonzalez topping the list followed by Leury Garcia and Lenyn Sosa. Never mind. Why? Because the Sox have reportedly signed Elvis Andrus to a one-year deal. On one level, I’m fine with it. Lord knows, Andrus plays with more energy and enthusiasm than Cesar Hernandez did. If he’s drinking from the Fountain of Youth (Andrus turns thirty-five in August) and puts up the same kind of numbers he did last year (.271 BA, nine homeruns and 28 RBIs for the Sox in forty-three games), great. Only… Andrus has played 1914 games in the field during his career, each one of them at shortstop. He may not be an old dog, but he will be learning a new position. My sense is he should be able do that without much problem. The thing that really bothers me is why the front office insists on blowing smoke to hide intent. We don’t see ourselves signing free agents this offseason, said GM Rick Hahn last November or thereabouts. Then Hahn signs Andrew Benintendi and Mike Clevinger. We’ll give Ozzie Guillen a real interview for manager. Then Hahn signs Pedro Grifol. We like what we have at second base. Then Hahn signs Andrus. Hahn must have “A Few Good Men” in heavy rotation. Because he obviously thinks Sox fans can’t handle the truth.

Stuff Old and New

I channeled my inner-NASCAR on Wednesday to do something for the first time in my life—I attended the Chicago Auto Show. Vroom, vroom. Now I understand why “football field” exists as a unit of measurement. We’re talking two or three football fields of enclosed space at the McCormick Place complex. Vehicle upon vehicle surrounding seven test tracks, where reality intrudes, if just for a second; you don’t get to drive the vehicles, just sit in them as passengers. For a test drive, you have to put up with your long-lost best friend, the salesman at the dealership. Michele and I were intent on finding a sedan, SUVs not being our thing. Then, as soon as we walked in, Michele spotted the Chevrolet Blazer EV, and suddenly SUVs didn’t seem so bad. But a lot of question, e.g., how many kilowatt hours to reach the 320-mile driving range? I may not be a gearhead, but I like crunching numbers. I track how much electricity we use on an annual basis, so I can come up with an annual average kilowatt-hour cost. I can take that number and multiply it by the number of k-hours needed for the charge to come up with an equivalent cost for filling up the tank. Do a little more math, and I can come up with a per-mile cost comparison, electric vs. gas. So, with these future computations dancing in my head, we looked at sedans. It didn’t help that I hit my head getting out of the Honda Accord, both driver’s side and passenger; I must’ve had a recent growth spurt. All of the sedans were a variation on this unpleasant theme. We were down to one possibility for a new vehicle until...we saw the Toyota RAV 4 plug-in hybrid. This would allow us to hedge our bets, fuel-wise; something about becoming totally energy dependent on Com Ed that gives me the willies. The future may be electric, but it won’t necessarily be cheap. At least it didn’t take that long to come up with possible replacements for the Ford Fusion; on the other hand, I’ve been looking for a second bike for two years now. Lo and behold, yesterday I found a 1972 Schwinn Sports Tourer in about as good a condition as you could hope for. Now, all I need to do is figure out how to ship it from Pittsburgh.

Impatient

How bad are the Bulls and Blackhawks? So bad that the White Sox and Cubs seem to be getting extra coverage in the opening days of spring training. Otherwise, I might not have seen video of new Sox manager Pedro Grifol wearing his sunglasses on the back of his head. What, the bill of his cap was busy? The Sox will start playing games next weekend, at which point we’ll see how accurate the latest PECOTA projections are, he South Siders pegged at 77.7 wins, vs. 77.1 for the Cubs. And this makes me mad. Part of it is that old South Side attitude, heavy on the Rodney Dangerfield. No respect, we don’t get no respect. Unless, of course, we don’t deserve any. How do you say Tony LaRussa and Mike Clevinger? Things will get better, or they’ll get worse. The good news is they won’t stay the same. Either Grifol challenges for AL Manager of the Year, or this whole rebuild collapses, taking Rick Hahn and the rest of the front office with him. Whichever. Just so the whole thing starts happening already. That’s all I ask.

Silly Season

The Bears now formally own the 326-site once home to Arlington International Racecourse. Let the silly season of stadium shenanigans begin. According to yesterday’s Tribune, Arlington Heights’ village manager indicated “there’s going to be a lot opportunity for public input over the next months and years as the project unfolds.” Not really. It would be more accurate to say the McCaskeys will try to shape/control/manipulate public attitudes on the stadium over the coming months and years. Once the project starts, no amount of public protest will alter any part of it. Hence, the need for shaping and manipulating. Think Stockholm Syndrome, with a stadium. The Munsters released a statement which said in part “for this effort to be financially feasible, a public-private partnership addressing predictable taxes and necessary infrastructure funding for public uses is essential.” Again, not really. The Bears don’t just want a stadium, they want a massive, mixed-use development. If they can build the stadium on their own dime, as they claim, they should pay for the rest of the development, given how they intend to control and make money from it until the cows come home. That there may be a possible public benefit to the scheme is of no concern to them. All that matters is the likelihood of the McCaskey family getting to erect their own money bin from the profits the project would generate. What kind of partnership limits one side from getting its fair share? That’s exactly what the Bears are proposing. To think otherwise would be downright silly.

At a Loss for Words

White Sox GM Rick Hahn provided his customary spin yesterday, but he couldn’t hide from the media storm created by the team’s signing of Mike Clevinger, who looks destined to give a whole new meaning to “spitter.” If I read LaMond Pope correctly in today’s Tribune, Hahn tried to sell his ignorance of the domestic abuse allegations against Clevinger as proof of an MLB policy at work. According to Hahn, “There was no way for us to be aware of this incident without someone being in violation of that policy [that investigations be confidential], and no one was, which again is part of the strength of the policy and how it operates effectively.” In other words, the Sox screwed up because nobody broke a policy rule to tip them off about Clevinger. What, Hahn didn’t want to use the dog eating his homework as an excuse? It works just as well. What the latest Sox SNAFU (think David Wells, Jeff Keppinger, Billy Koch, Adam Dunn, Adam LaRoche, Tony LaRussa) shows is this—the White Sox would rather spend $12 million on a pitcher they knew nothing about rather than sign Carlos Rodon, whom they knew everything about. Dare I say they also preferred spending $12 million on Clevinger rather than making that money part of an extension offer to either Dylan Cease or Lucas Giolito? So went day one of camp. What could possibly go wrong on day two?

This and That

Pitchers and catchers report today, and already I’m complaining about Chicago baseball on both sides of town. Allow me to vent. Let’s start with the Cubs. I read two stories today about how ex-Sox first-round draft pick Nick Madrigal is going to be given a shot to win the starting job at third base. Oh, please. Here are two reasons why Madrigal won’t—he’s hit all of fourteen homeruns between college, the minors and three injury-plagued seasons with the Sox and Cubs; and he has yet to make it through a full season as a major-leaguer, unless you think last year’s 209 at-bats qualifies as a full season. I’m not down on Madrigal because he was traded to the wrong side of town; I just don’t see him as a full-time player. Three years with the Sox and Cubs, three different sets of injuries. Until he shows otherwise, Madrigal remains the perfect college player, great every spring. But if he has to play anything more than sixty games, look out. As for my team, it looks like Mike “I Didn’t Spit on No Baby” Clevinger will be allowed to show up to camp while MLB investigates him on abuse charges. Oh, goodie, that won’t be a distraction, now will it? And, if it is, too bad. At the risk of repeating myself, any free-agent signing these days has to go through a Caesar’s-wife process. In signing Clevinger, Rick Hahn and the front office didn’t know what they needed to know; they put that egg on their collective faces. The media should be all over Clevinger, Hahn and owner Jerry Reinsdorf, if only he ever showed his face around reporters. And, while we’re at it, I’m still waiting for Andrew Benintendi to show his immunology bona fides. If he knows all about vaccines and when to take them (or not), I want to hear about it.

Vote on This

Considering that Clare called yesterday afternoon with the news, baseball seems almost shy in getting the word out. Nothing on MLB.com about the Manfred man/ghost runner rule becoming permanent. You know the one, where every half inning in extra innings starts with a runner on second and nobody out. I hate it, my daughter hates it, but what do we know? Commissioner Gump thinks it’s a good idea, and so did a management-player-umpire committee voting yesterday to make the rule permanent. If I can cite an old game show here, it’s not what you say but what you don’t say that counts. The stories I read—and remember, mum’s the word on MLB.com—said not a word on fan reaction. We’re good enough to vote for the All-Star teams but not this. Gosh, I suddenly feel disrespected by the baseball establishment. Oh, well. I mentioned to Clare about two long-ago extra-inning affairs that I remembered from the time of the dinosaurs. In 1967, The White Sox beat Cleveland at home, 1-0, in seventeen innings while losing to the Senators on the road, 6-5, in twenty-two innings. And did I mention the time the Sox beat the Brewers, 7-6, in twenty-five innings over the course of two days back in May of 1984? No? Well, it doesn’t matter anyway.

Family Affair

We got to Clare’s a little after five. I spent much of the next three hours either chasing my grandson from one end of the house to the other or having Leo chase me with an empty Diet Dr. Pepper bottle in his hand. The boy took particular delight in whacking an old man with his makeshift club. I watched the game in between the above and stopping to help myself to the mini-hot dogs in a blanket; we only eat these on Super Bowl Sunday, so I like to scarf down as many of these as possible. None of the commercials struck me as particularly memorable. As for the game, both teams sure looked like they were playing defense straight out of the Pro Bowl, circa 2015. Talk about waltzing into the endzone, drive after drive. The little man finally collapsed around 8:30. We stayed to the end of the game. My heart breaks for Eagles’ fans, not. Somewhere, W.C. Fields is smiling.

Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One Before

The Bulls were leading the Cavaliers at the end of the third quarter last night, 74-69, only to be outscored by thirteen points in the fourth. Add it up, and you come away with a third straight loss, 97-89. The twenty-two turnovers are ’62-Mets-like. Speaking of Casey Stengel, these Bulls have a lot of Greg Goosens on the roster—Coby White, Patrick Williams, Ayo Dosunmu, to name a few. These guys have a good shot at reaching age thirty, they just aren’t likely to do it in an NBA uniform. This is where I can pile on owner Jerry Reinsdorf, who doesn’t have Michael Jordan to hide behind or any good candidates to throw under the bus, but I won’t. I’m too busy ragging on the owner of the White Sox to bother.

In Our Time

Dick Butkus is Ernest Hemingway in pads and helmet. I doubt #51 has ever wasted a word in his life. Butkus has been at Super Bowl activities this week in Phoenix. He told Patrick Finley in today’s Sun-Times of walking into the offices of George Halas to tell Papa Bear he, Halas, didn’t want to win. “He got up, and I thought he was going to take a poke at me,” Butkus recalled of that incident back in 1971. And, how did the old man meet Butkus’ challenge to find a winning coach to replace the fired Jim Dooley? Why, by hiring Abe Gibron, who went a woeful 11-24 in three years at the helm. Truly, the McCaskeys did not fall far from the tree. You have to wonder if the family will be holding a seat for Butkus should the Bears build their new stadium in Arlington Heights, not after he said, “Look at the teams that are winning, and look at their organization. The ownership is the ones that hire. It starts from [and with] them, too. They shouldn’t be void of [immune from] any criticism.” Bet Virginia McCaskey and her boys loved reading that. Speaking of a new stadium, Finley also did a story on how State Farm Stadium in suburban Phoenix, home of the Cardinals and site of this year’s Super Bowl, could serve as a model for what the Bears want to do in Arlington Heights. Not a word on how the facility was financed—the public picked up a majority of the cost—but a whole lot of gushing on how an “economic ecosystem has developed around” the site. This is why you don’t let sportswriters cover stadium stories—they’re clueless. Reading Finley, you’d never know two school districts have hired lobbyists to make sure they don’t get taken to the cleaners by the Bears looking for handouts down in Springfield. And you won’t see a word about how different the Glendale and Arlington Heights sites are. The one caused development to follow it, the other is an old racetrack surrounded by development. Finley’s “economic ecosystem” looks like more of an economic parasite to me.

All You Need Is Love

My guess is that, if new White Sox manager Pedro Grifol has a favorite group, it’s the Beatles. And, if Grifol has his way, “All You Need Is Love” will get piped into the Sox clubhouse before every game. In a story posted yesterday on the team website, Grifol addressed the importance of team culture. Forget for a moment, if you can, that the Sox culture under Tony LaRussa was never a problem; nothing was a problem under LaRussa. OK, with that out of the way, here’s what Grifol said. “You have to understand, really, what culture looks like.” It has to do with a team fighting together and working hard, not that the 2021-22 Sox were ever deficient in those departments, no sirree. Grifol also believes in respect, of the game, of the uniform, of the fans. Do you know how that comes about? Well, I’m glad you asked. “It happens with respect, hard work, care, love, that kind of stuff.” Respect comes from respect? Good thing Grifol never had my wife in her English composition class. What I want to know, though, is, doesn’t Grifol sound an awful lot like ex-, ex-Sox manager Rick Renteria? And couldn’t the Sox have saved themselves a whole bunch of grief by keeping Renteria and just letting him pick his own coaching staff following the 2020 season? I ask because to me, at least, it’s pretty obvious the front office wants Justin Jirschele managing the team at some point. Just thirty-two, Jirschele has been tabbed to manage at Triple-AAA Charlotte this season. That means Jirschel will have hit for the managerial cycle, after stints at low-A Kannapolis, high-A Winston-Salem and AA Birmingham. If the Sox want to promote Jirschele to the South Side, that’s fine by me. Afterall, even a stopped clock gets the time right twice a day. I don’t mean this as a knock on Grifol; I hope he’s another instance of the right time, so to speak. But we could’ve avoided all the mess of the last two seasons by sticking with Renteria before moving on to Jirschele, not that there was ever a problem with Tony LaRussa at the helm. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

Dumb Idea

Those 3-14 Bears may stink, but not so much they can’t get politicians to do their bidding. Why don’t I have this kind of power? Yesterday, the Tribune reported on a bill sponsored by state senator Ann Gillespie of Arlington Heights that would give the Bears the power to negotiate their tax bill with public agencies that receive tax revenue from the 326-acre site and former home to Arlington Race Track. Bear with me here. Gillespie’s bill is pretty much the tax-relief/subsidy idea floated by the Munsters last month. They’re going to build their own stadium, thank you very much. They just want help for developing the rest of the property—right now, they have an option and haven’t plunked down the $197 million to buy it, this being the McCaskeys, afterall—to compete with already established businesses in the area. Are you following this? Does it make sense to you why an elected official would carry water for a business that hasn’t committed to the area and why she would place its needs over those of her constituents? Does it make the slightest bit of sense she’d do this even though she has doubts about it working? Gillespie is quoted in the Trib saying, “I’ve expressed my doubts about whether this is an approach…we really want to open the door to.” Then, why do it? This is sort of like saying I have my doubts about tobacco or fentanyl or oxycodone, but I’m still going to try it just to make sure. Any way you look at it, we’re talking dumb idea.

Random Thoughts on a Tuesday Afternoon

On a wall to my right is an autographed, 8x10 color photo of Walt Williams at Comiskey Park. Williams is taking a swing against that magnificent backdrop of outfield arches on a sunny day. To my immediate right is an 8x10 of Minnie Minoso, from a negative I bought on eBay. “Chicago” shows, barely, on Minoso’s uniform at the bottom of the photo, which could be from any of his first three tours with the Sox, 1951-57, 1960-61, 1964. This is not a smiling Minoso. Rather, he’s staring straight into the camera, a look of melancholy playing across his face, every pore and wrinkle hinting at what it took for him to be standing there. My great good fortune is to look at these photos most every day, along with others I’ve bought or taken. Check that. Michele took one, too, of me and Clare posing alongside Williams when he was managing an independent-league team in the mid-1990s. A real highpoint for me, that day. And let’s not forget the shots of Billy Austin, who lent his sweater to a seven-year old James T. Farrell (if you don’t know Farrell, you don’t know Chicago or baseball) at a Sox game in 1911; Smead Jolley; Monty Stratton; and Carlton Fisk, standing at the plate, adorned in the tools of ignorance, waiting for the next batter to irritate him. I took a lot of good pictures the season of 1990. Today, The Athletic released its results of the latest Sox fans’ survey. It appears we don’t like the owner much. Here’s the thing—the weather in Chicago changes every five minutes, Sox ownership every fifty years, or so it feels. Consider the following. Since 1900, the team has been controlled by the Comiskey family; Bill Veeck (twice); brothers John and Arthur Allyn, followed by John alone; and Jerry Reinsdorf, first with, and now without Eddie Einhorn. In that same time, the Philadelphia Phillies have had fourteen owners. Heck, the expansion Washington Senators/Texas Rangers have had ten different owners or ownership groups since their inception in 1961. All this time I thought change was good. My bad. At least I have some nice baseball photos to keep me going.

In Practice

Back when he owned the Oakland A’s, Charlie Finley wanted baseball owners wanted to make free agency an annual affair. In other words, everyone would be on a one-year contract. It never happened, in baseball. But it has, sort of, in women’s professional basketball. The Sky are a prime example. Name another sport where three starters—Candace Parker, Azura Stevens, Courtney Vandersloot—would all walk and a fourth—Allie Quigley—announce a de facto retirement. The Cubs of Baez, Bryant and Rizzo come to mind, but even there the team had longer control over their talent than appears to happen in the WNBA. Is the short-term contract a good thing? For owners, probably, or why else would Finley have pushed it? Players, on the other hand, want long-term protection against injuries and slumps. Sky fans were lucky in a way. Vandersloot stayed around for twelve seasons, Quigley for ten. But I’m pretty sure they signed a series of short-term contracts to make that happen; right now, the longest WNBA contracts are all of four years. Now the transience Finley was willing to endure to make a point (and some money) will hit Sky fans with a vengeance.

Calm Before the Storm

We’re a week away from Super Bowl Sunday. Next up are the media interviews with players; a rundown of commercials; stories on betting; and human interest pieces, all with a goofy angle. The Chicago media will be mildly dismissive because their beloved Bears aren’t there, and haven’t be in seventeen years. Then, after the last commercial has run and the final score is posted, we’ll be less than three days away from the opening of spring training, pitchers and catchers arriving first. With the White Sox, all eyes will be on free-agent signee Mike Clevinger, he of the MLB investigation. Wait, there’s more. At some point, reporters will get around to noting that Lucas Giolito is a free agent at season’s end while teammate Dylan Cease has switched over to Scott Boras for representation. In case anyone hasn’t noticed, Jerry Reinsdorf doesn’t like paying for pitching, (See: Mark Buehrle). In other words, we’re less than a month away from the first story on how bad off Sox pitching will get if the front office doesn’t want to pay to keep it. This is what the story/stories will look like—GM Rick Hahn talking in circles; Giolito and Cease will shrugging their shoulders, saying how much they like Chicago, but it’s a business; and Reinsdorf unavailable for comment. I can hardly wait. On second thought, I can.

Freedom of Contract

There was an enlightening story in today’s Sun-Times sports’ section on the recently concluded negotiations between the White Sox and announcer Jason Benetti. In case there was any doubt, Jerry Reinsdorf’s team is firmly planted in the nineteenth century, where it intends to stay. Jeff Agrest’s story noted that the team prefers to negotiate one-on-one, which is a little like me going up against Amazon or Google. Brooks Boyer, senior v.p. for revenue and marketing, noted that Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn don’t use agents. Why? Because “We’re compensating them; we have a partnership with them. There’s never been a need to have any sort of outside entity come in and negotiate these things.” Funny how this way of doing business doesn’t apply to players. Gosh, I wonder if that’s why they formed a union. Yes, unions in general and the MLB Players Association in particular can be tone deaf and selfish. But look what they’re up against. Boyer was basically quoting chapter and verse from the Robber Barons’ playbook for labor relations, circa 1890. The argument was that unions and, for that matter, any type of government regulation were a denial of the employee’s due process. Scabs and Pinkertons killing strikers, not so much. The argument lives on today in the notion of “right to work.” In practice, the right flows one way, in favor of those holding the power. If the Sox are so wedded to age-old beliefs, no matter how discredited or unfair, they should opt out of honoring Jackie Robinson come April 15th. It’s the next logical step.

Bait and Switch

It was once very fashionable to sell publicly-funded stadiums as vehicles for urban development. That’s what the White Sox and their pals in the Illinois General Assembly did back in the 1980s. More than thirty years after the ball-mall opened, the surrounding area is still needs developing, assuming the powers that be were talking about something other than paved parking lots. Now, I see the Orioles and the Camden Yards stadium authority are doing some kind of dance over a new lease agreement. If I’ve read the news reports correctly, Camden Yards and environs are in line for something like $600 million in updates. Nice money, if you can get it. Public officials are hoping the infusion of cash will facilitate, you guessed it, development around the stadium. And here I thought the very presence of Camden Yards back in 1991 was going to spur that very same development. What do I know? About as much as the people who put these deals together.

It's What You Don't See That Counts

If my daughter is anything like her old man, she should ace her presentation at work today. Once upon a time, I was known to outline class lectures on a business envelope, just to see if I could do it. Not to brag (too much), I was nominated for a university teaching award. Back to Clare. She in all likelihood burned the midnight oil (while avoiding the use of cliches, I hope), and I know she practiced the presentation while driving to work this morning. She probably didn’t have time to look at the latest White Sox news, which is just as well. A baseball team, yet again, showed the low regard it has for women. The Sox did this by releasing their player development staff for 2023. A whole bunch of names, with the ones belonging to women in areas like administration; nutrition; and therapy. Any coaches or assistant GMs? None that I could find. But Kenny Williams Jr. is listed as an assistant director for player development. It pays to know the right people, I guess, or be related to them. Clare has bumped into at least one woman who used to work in the White Sox front office; she quit for lack of opportunity. Judging from this list, I can see why. My daughter once dreamed of working for the Sox. Looking at this list, I’m glad she ended up elsewhere.