Antsy

This is the time of year baseball fans start getting antsy, big time. Clare just texted that ex-White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson has a spring-training invite from the Angels. Comeback player of the year has to start somewhere, I suppose. And now I see Keith Law at The Athletic is weighing in on MLB rookies and the organizations that have produced them. Yeah, whatever, I guess. Still, I read through Law’s rankings of minor league systems. It’s a tossup as to the bigger surprise, that the Mariners are ranked first or that the Red Sox and Dodgers are second and third, respectively. I hope he’s right about Boston, considering we just received two of their top prospects—catcher Kyle Teel and outfielder Braden Montgomery—as part of the trade for Garrett Crochet. That, or we got taken to the cleaners, again. Law also ranked players, with Sox lefty Noah Schultz coming in at number 20. He included another four Sox in the top 100—catchers Teel and Edgar Quero; Montgomery; and starter Hagen Smith. My guess is that Schultz and Smith will have their innings capped in the minors. The other three, though, might find their way to 35th and Shields at some point if they show the slightest pulse in the minors. Or, better yet, spring training. Did I mention I’m antsy? I just checked, and Lindy’s baseball preview still exists in paper. I’ll have to track down a copy to see if they have the Sox winning 60 games.

How Rich

Give the Cubs credit. They do want to be like the Dodgers. No, not in talent on the field but the cost of watching that talent. The North Siders have just announced a new seating area in their famed outfield bleachers, to be called “The Yard.” Be still, my beating heart. The section will seat as few as four fans and up to a total of fifty. According to a news release on the team website, those lucky folks will experience a “new outdoor space complete with five new semi-private rental spaces designed to help fans enjoy the excitement of the Budweiser Bleachers as if they were in their own backyard. The Yard offers a more intimate vibe with high-top seating, fully stocked coolers and a smaller premier experience not previously available at the ballpark.” All this starting at a base price of $175 per ticket, depending on the competition. [price mentioned in Sun-Times’ story today] Funny, but I don’t remember paying anything to watch or listen to a ballgame in my backyard.

Laughs

Saturday night, Michele and I went to the Chicago Theatre for some real South Side comedy. By that I mean the performer on stage getting a rise out of sold-out venue by mentioning St. Cajetan’s. And that’s what Pat McGann did. McGann mostly aimed his comedy at “sandwich” folks, middle-aged couples raising their kids while keeping an eye on aging parents; that used to be me, until I migrated to the outside of the sandwich. Whatever, I can still remember those days. Which is why I could enjoy McGann’s take on travel sports, even though he was talking hockey. Ah, yes, an 8 AM game in Kenosha, followed by one at 9 PM “if we win” and another at 7 AM tomorrow “if we win” and on and on and… You had to be there, both ways, to fully appreciate it.

Getting Closer

The NFL AFC and NFC champions are set with the Chiefs and Eagles triumphant. I was rooting for the Bills. They used to play at War Memorial Stadium (think “The Natural”), and our one time in Buffalo, we ate at a restaurant that served a “Polish breakfast.” Let’s just say the portions were ample. Now, all I have to do is get through the next thirteen days, an orgy of football this and that. Ben Johnson, aka the Bears’ Messiah, is assembling his staff, so that merits breathless coverage. When that grows old (I mean if), there’s always mocking the media excess of pre-Super Bowl coverage. Funny how nobody did that in Chicago when the Bears played in Super Bowl XX or XLI. When the Munsters make the ultimate game, anything goes. But I digress. With the Super Bowl now pushed back to the second week of February, you know what comes next, right? Yup, spring training, when I get to see if the 2025 White Sox are more 1971 or 2024. It’s what keeps me going.

WAR, What is It Good For?

Just like a stopped clock at exactly the right time, a Cubs’ friend of mine made a good point yesterday: If CC Sabathia, why not Rick Reuschel? Reuschel, whose nineteen-year career included twelve seasons on the North Side, amassed a 214-191 record with a 3.37 ERA. If that doesn’t impress, then how to explain a baseball-reference.com WAR of 69.5? Compare that to 62.3 for Sabathia or Andy Pettitte, with 60.2. The Athletic loves both those guys. Their playing for the Yankees is just a coincidence, I’m sure.

Empty Gesture

The White Sox are going to honor pitcher Mark Buehrle with a statue at the ball mall next summer. Talk about the epitome of an empty gesture. Buehrle attended SoxFest yesterday for the announcement. During remarks to the press at the Ramova Theatre in Bridgeport, the lefthander said, “This is home. Spent most of my career here and would have loved to finish out here. But that’s business and everything that is involved with that.” You can find that and other comments by Buehrle in today’s Sun-Times. Don’t bother looking for it on the team website. Jerry Reinsdorf called Buehrle with the news last summer. Reinsdorf was thirteen years late. He could’ve called Buehrle with a fair contract offer back in 2011. The Chairman, though, prefers empty gestures.

Depair or Not?

According to sportac.com (thank you, Paul Sullivan, for mentioning the site in your Trib column today), the White Sox payroll for 2025 will be in the neighborhood of $61.3 million, which puts them some $173 million below the luxury tax threshold. Somewhere, Tom Ricketts is crying. Given how teams like the Dodgers and Yankees spend money, these figures are cause for despair among Sox fans. Outside of Andrew Benintendi and Luis Robert Jr., who between them are pulling down $32.1 million and who may both be gone by Opening Day, there’s nobody on the team with anything close to a big contract. Then again, off of 121 losses last season, how could there be? So, GM Chris Getz can be expected to tell fans at SoxFest this weekend those sad numbers mean that his team is young and hungry; let’s hope so. And he may be right. I’m old enough to remember 1971 and 1990, both exciting bounce-back years. Noah Schultz, Hagen Smith, Colson Montgomery, Bryan Ramos—a fan can dream. Let’s say a near-miracle occurs and the Sox double their win total. Then what? That’s when despair threatens to creep in again. Under Jerry Reinsdorf, the team has shown a perverse ability to develop pitching talent—Jack McDowell; Chris Sale; Dylan Cease (though he came over as a minor leaguer from the Cubs); Garrett Crochet—only to trade that talent away for one reason or another. And let’s not forget this is a team that also traded away Jake Burger and Aaron Rowand while letting the likes of Magglio Ordonez and Robin Ventura leave via free agency. Hello, despair, my old friend…

One More Thing

CC Sabathia, he of the career 62.3 WAR per baseball-reference.com, received 86.8 percent of the vote necessary for selection to the Hall of Fame, this in his first try. Mark Buehrle, he of the career 59.1 WAR (to say nothing of a perfect game and a second no-hitter), received 11.4 percent of the vote necessary in this, his fifth year on the ballot. No East Coast bias there, right?

Election Results

Well, the HOF votes are in, and pitcher CC Sabathia will be going to Cooperstown. Go figure. Sabathia was 251-161 with a 3.74 ERA over nineteen seasons. Seven of those seasons he had an ERA over four and one season over five. Yet that translates to a baseball-reference.com WAR of 62.3 and all sorts of love from the baseball establishment. In comparison, Tommy John went 288-231 with a 3.34 ERA over the course of 26 seasons. John did not have an ERA over four until he reached age 40. Sabathia pitched to age 38, John to age 46. But new-age analytics doesn’t like longevity, so John has a WAR of 61.6. The difference between the two is a mere seven-tenths of a point. You be the judge.

Priorities

How important are the Bears to Chicago? Enough that Martin Luther King Jr. and Donald Trump had to share the spotlight as the Munsters fijnhally picked a new coach yesterday. They seem to have gotten the candidate they wanted, Lions’ offensive coordinator Ben Johnson. While the local sports’ media—and news departments, too, for that matter—are doing cartwheels over the hire, it is worth noting that Johnson was available because his now ex-team laid a colossal egg against the Commanders in the NFL Divisional game, 45-31. No Super Bowl for Detroit this year, a new Bears’ coach regardless. And now we can watch the Munsters get that 24/7 coverage the NFL has engineered for its member organizations. What spring training?

Being Played

Network TV went straight for the cliché last night in Buffalo, showing Bills’ fans on the proverbial edge of their seats as the home team held on for a 27-25 win over the Ravens and a trip to KC for the AFC championship. Expect more crowd shots on Sunday. Only, it’ll be of Chiefs’ fans every time the visiting Bills threaten to score or keep Patrick Mahomes and company out of the end zone. God, is this old. Teams and TV could care less about fans, how much they pay for tickets or how they have to rearrange their plans because a game has been flexed. But make noise to drown out the opposing quarterback calling signals, stat. Meanwhile, back in Buffalo, fans must be going crazy. Really, Buffalo and Chicago should become sister cities given the heartbreak their respective sports’ teams generate. Four straight Super Bowl losses—yikes! You feel for these people, or should. And now they’re supposed to root for their team to get back to the big event, spend thousands upon thousands of dollars, even, to cheer the Bills on in Kansas City. And their reward? Why, a new, publicly subsidized stadium that will seat 10-12,000 fewer screaming Bills’ fans. Pay, cheer and obey.

Cry Me a River

Somebody stop Cubs’ Chairman Tom Ricketts from opening up his mouth again. The rich are never more irritating than when they cry poor. Ricketts was quoted in today’s Tribune about Juan Soto’s $765 million contract with the Mets. “I mean, our family paid $800 million for a perpetuity [ownership] of the Cubs. When you think about it [Soto’s contract], it’s kind of crazy.” What Ricketts forgot to say is that Forbes puts the value of his family’s purchase at $4.2 billion, a better than 500 percent increase. That’s without signing Soto or anyone else for that kind of money. At the same time, Ricketts sounded dumbfounded about how the Dodgers are throwing money around. “Nothing I can do about it,” sighed the rich man, who again forgot to note that all that crazy spending—think Shohei Ohtani, Roki Sasaki and Yoshinobu Yamamoto—hasn’t affected franchise value. Forbes puts it at $5.45 billion. The Mets come in at $3 billion. If Ricketts is looking for a fig leaf, maybe it’s that the valuations were done last March, and they’ve all gone done since, but I doubt it. Apparently, Ricketts has never heard the saying that, sometimes, to make money you have to spend money. That, or he just doesn’t believe it.

Pull the Plug, if Only

I watched, I wondered, I waited, and now I know. It’s time to pull the plug on this Bulls’ team, the sooner the better. They’re 3-6 over their last nine games, with losses to three of the worst teams in the NBA, Washington (6-33); New Orleans (11-32); and, last night, Charlotte (10-28). At 18-24, the Bulls are a team mired in mediocrity. Arturas Karnisovas is the new Rick Hahn. Anytime Karnisovas makes a move, you hold your breath for the basketball equivalent of Yasmani Grandal. If the Bulls’ front office did right by signing Alex Caruso, they’ve done wrong in dealing Caruso for Josh Giddey, a guard creative only in the ways he turns over the ball. Put Giddey on the floor with Patrick Williams, Karnisovas’ first first-round pick, and you realize how good a coach Billy Donovan is to have this team to within six games of .500. At least with the White Sox, there’s hope that kind-of new GM Chris Getz has made the right hire with new manager Will Venable. But for Jerry Reinsdorf’s other team, all I see is drift.

Money Money

Yesterday, the Chicago Plan Commission approved the first stage of the 1901 Project, a $7 billion, mixed-use development on 55 acres around the United Center. This is how the project website puts it: “A transformative $7 billion private investment on Chicago’s West Side celebrating Chicago’s unique spirit. Spearheaded by the Reinsdorf and Wirtz families, The 1901 Project will transform the West Side with a jolt of new development, bridging neighborhoods and enhancing opportunities for residents, businesses and all of Chicago.” Wow. Here's my question. If Jerry Reinsdorf and Danny Wirtz think they can round up $7 billion in private financing, why can’t Reinsdorf finance a new ballpark the same way instead of seeking a reported $1 billion in public money? I mean, what’s good for the 1901 Project should be good for any future home of the White Sox. Right?

Anybody But

MLB teams began announcing their international signings yesterday. If you believe what the White Sox front office says, they’ll be stocking the farm system with a bunch of can’t-miss prospects. Of course, 29 other teams are saying the exact same thing. What gets me is that, out of the sixteen players they signed, six are sixteen-years old. In other words, the Sox are willing to gamble on players one or two years from graduating high school, but not on any woman athlete, anywhere. Priceless.

Next in Line

Ex-Packers’ and Cowboys’ coach Mike McCarthy is the latest addition to the near-never-ending line of interviewees at Halas Hall. My guess is the McCaskeys like being the object of affection by those desperate enough to want to go work for them. McCarthy, really? He was a big thing back in 2011 when the Packers won Super Bowl XLV. Since then, he’s won a game (or two, 2016) in the postseason here, lost one there. It’s like the Bears going back to Lovie Smith. Or the White Sox Tony LaRussa.

No Bias Here

I just looked over the HOF ballots belonging to twelve voters at The Athletic. My, my, what an interesting bunch of selections. There were votes for Ichiro, of course, along with Carlos Beltran; Bobby Abreu; CC Sabathia; Andruw Jones; Andy Pettitte; Felix Hernandez; Chase Utley; and others. Voters thought enough to include David Wright and Jimmy Rollins. But not Mark Buehrle. What a surprise.

Pretty Pictures

I saw the start of two NFL wildcard games over the weekend, more for the initial camera shot than the action. I saw what I expected to see. The Baltimore skyline looked great at night; you could hardly tell this was a city in crisis. The Bills played during the day and don’t actually play in Buffalo (Orchard Park instead). But in the daylight there was no mistaking the massive new facility going up across the street from Highmark Stadium. Pretty pictures—this is what the NFL traffics in, and what the Bears want in on. It’s not enough for them to play in Soldier Field and be able show the Chicago skyline, which includes the lakefront, by the way. No, the McCaskey-Munsters want to show off a pretty new bauble of a field as well. Provided the public picks up a big part of the tab.

Say It Ain't So

This is rich, if you’ll pardon the pun and take it to heart, too. The Red Sox say they’re serious about signing Garrett Crochet to an extension, to which Crochet says, “Staying in Boston long term is something that has a lot of merit in my mind and something that I think would be awesome.” [story today on mlb.com website] Meanwhile, Crochet’s former team busies itself with one-year deals so as to have enough talent on hand to start spring training, to say nothing of the regular season. If I’m lucky, this qualifies as time in Purgatory. If I’m not…

Did I Say Tight Ends?

I saw today that the White Sox signed ex-Sox catcher Omar Narvaez to a minor league contract. If they wanted (who knows, maybe they do), the team could field an all-catcher infield. Right now, Korey Lee and Matt Thaiss are on the 40-man roster, with prospects Kyle Teel and Edgar Quero waiting in the wings. Both Teel and Quero made it to Triple A last year, so it would look like there’s going to be a logjam behind the plate at Birmingham, what with Narvaez and all. Maybe somebody will volunteer to play at a lower level in the system. Correct me if I’m wrong, but something’s got to give here, and I don’t mean bringing back Martin Maldonado.

Pick a Number

From what I can tell, the Bears are interviewing everyone short of my late mother for their head-coaching vacancy. So, why do I keep thinking tight ends? What I mean is Ed O’Bradovich and Dan Hampton talking about the pre-Cole Kmet Bears’ proclivity to collect tight ends, as in “If you’ve got seven, that means you don’t have one.” I’m supposed to be impressed with the breadth of interviews, but I’m not. The longer the list grows (pick a number between1-100, it seems), the more it looks like Ryan Poles and Kevin Warren don’t know what they want in a coach, or who. But after beating the Packers to finish the season at 5-12, they say they’re making progress on getting that new stadium built, mostly by others if primarily for their benefit. Da Bears.

Déjà vu All Over Again, or Not

The last time the White Sox suffered an epic collapse was 1970, when they lost 106 games. That led to massive changes in the front office and on the field. Some of the new players worked out to varying degrees—Mike Andrews; Jay Johnstone; Pat Kelly; Rick Reichardt. Others—Lee Maye, Bill Robinson, Ed Stroud—did little to nothing in advancing the cause. And then there was Chuck Tanner. Will Venable will be playing the role of Tanner in just over a month. Kyle Teel; Chase Meidroth; Cam Booser; Mike Tauchman; Bryse Wilson; Josh Rojas; and others will soon sort themselves out into the “keep” and “discard” piles. I sort of see Tauchman as the next Mike Hershberger. I just pray to God that Venable is the next Tanner.

Compare and Contrast

The White Sox decided this offseason they didn’t need Gavin Sheets, a pretty good lefthanded-hitting first baseman-outfielder. Arbitration and all. So, bye-bye, Gavin, and, hello, Boby Dalbec, just signed to a minor-league deal. Like Sheets, Dalbec is a power-hitting first baseman. Unlike Sheets, Dalbec bats righty and can play—as in it’s the fifteenth inning and we need somebody out there—the infield. Two of his career 333 games have been spent in right field. Maybe Dalbec will resurrect his career on the South Side, and maybe he’s a great clubhouse presence. He’s also ten months older than Sheets. And, I’m guessing, a good deal cheaper, if he even makes the team.

Posterized

Talk about surprises. The Bulls fell behind the Spurs by fifteen heading into the third quarter and thirteen to start the fourth. Then, they outscored the visitors 32-15 as Coby White sealed the deal with a dunk on Victor Wembanyama with fifteen seconds left in the game and the Bulls up by one. Did I mention that Wembanyama had eight blocked shots at that point? Bulls 114 Spurs 110. The win pulls Billy Donovan’s club to within two games of .500. The question now is, do the Bulls tank in order to protect a top-ten draft pick that would otherwise go to the Spurs? Personally, I hope not. Zach LaVine is playing as well as he can, yes, offense over defense but at least thinking about the value of defense. And I actually saw Nikola Vucevic moving his feet in an attempt to stay in front of Wembanyama. Truly, end times.

Up Close and Personal

If the Bears are going to snap a ten-game losing streak, let it be against the Packers. If they’re also going to snap an eleven-game losing streak to the Packers, let it be in Green Bay. And if they’re going to beat the Packers in Green Bay, let it be at a family gathering with lots of Packers’ fans glued to the TV. That way, when Cairo Santos nails a 51-yard field goal with time expiring for a 24-22 win, all those green cheeseheads can be embarrassed, which, as far as I could tell, they were. Nothing like going into the postseason dropping one to the Munsters at home. There is a God. Old Testament, but still.

Sweet Emotion

Go figure. Three days after losing to the worst team in the NBA Eastern Conference, the Bulls beat the second-best. Chicago 139 New York 126. My oh my. Not only does Billy Donovan show up Tom Thibodeau, Coach T’s team coughed up a nine-point lead at halftime. And the team coached by that mastermind of defense allowed 41 points in the third quarter, then another 35 in the fourth. What happened? In part, Derrick Rose, whose retirement got commemorated over the course of a 25-minute ceremony between halfs. The Spurs come to town Monday, by which time the emotional high from having Rose and Joakim Noah, Luol Deng and a host of other ex-Bulls in the building should be gone. At which point, an almot-.500 team will have to find a way to beat Victor Wembanyama.

It's Bad, You Know

Ex-Bulls’ forward Jimmy Butler appears to have gone off the deep end in Miami, where he’s just been suspended for seven games. According to the Heat’s front office, “Through his actions and statements, he [Butler] has shown he no longer wants to be part of this team.” For his part, Butler says, “I want to see me getting my joy back playing basketball.” [today’s Tribune] Isn’t this all a little weird? Butler was the Bulls’ first-round draft pick back in 2011 and spent six productive seasons in Chicago. But the Bulls are the Bulls, and part of what makes a bad organization bad is not knowing when they have it good. See Butler, Jimmy, and ever so many more. Bad, bad teams are like the Hornets and Wizards, who never seem to get it right. The Bulls are more crazy bad. In Chicago, Butler was pretty gung-ho, team-first all the time. Things soured when he started opening his mouth about the blah roster around him. I doubt his criticisms included Bobby Portis, another Bulls’ first-round pick. Butler and Portis played together for three years, 2015-2018. That, my friends, was a pretty nice foundation to build around. Instead, Butler got traded for Kris Dunn, Zach LaVine and Lauri Markkanen while Portis was basically traded away for nothing after punching Nikola Mirotic at practice. Yes, fighting is both bad and dangerous, But Portis was just like Butler, gung-ho and team-first. Mirotic? Nikola first and foremost. A dangerous mix of personalities there. So, now the Bulls are thinking about trading LaVine. For Butler? If only a time machine could be part of the deal.

Yeah, Right

Writing in The Athletic this week, Steve Buckley explains why he voted for Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia for the Hall of Fame. Heaven help us all. Keep in mind that Pedroia, whose career was cut short by injuries, managed 1805 hits, 725 RBIs and 922 runs in what basically was an eleven-year career. Did I mention that Buckley used to write a column for the Boston Herald or that he tried to buttress his case for Pedroia by invoking Tony Conigliaro, another Red Sox player with an injury-shortened career? He did. I have absolutely nothing against Pedroia as a player. In fact, I think if women ever make it as MLB players, it’ll be in the Pedroia mold, compact and powerful. But those stats just aren’t worthy of Cooperstown. Not that it will keep East Coast voters from trying their best to get him in. Pedroia had a 51.9 WAR per baseball-reference.com, by the way. Compare that to Mark Buehrle’s 59.1. I wonder if Buckley voted for Buehrle, too. I wonder if Buckley knows who Buehrle is.

The Power of Sports

Forget if you can that the Blackhawks with their 12-24 record risk entering into the big-loser zone currently occupied by the Bears and White Sox. What they did New Year’s Eve is worth repeating. No, not losing 6-2 to the Blues, but playing in Wrigley Field and having players take the “L” as a group to the game—now, that was something. And walking from the Addison Red Line station to the ballpark to the accompaniment of bagpipes. Something, again. Despite what the Bears would have you believe, an indoor stadium for them would generate just one Super Bowl. Otherwise, show me a Northern venue that’s hosted multiple times. Sorry, the four games held in and around Detroit and Minneapolis all took place at different facilities, over the course of four decades. Blame it on the ice and cold. But you can’t play hockey without ice, and ice means cold, and cold means outdoors, or making the indoors cold enough to support ice. The idea of a “winter classic” NHL game was pure genius. I mean, Wrigley Field and Fenway Park. You can’t beat the location, even in the dead of winter. Something about a line of players carrying their skates and sticks along Waveland Avenue with the bagpipes piping goes beyond the commerce of professional sports. This is what makes a city a city. More, please, starting with the Crosstown Series in May and July.

(Not) Crazy

A sane person can hold all sorts of contradictory notions at the same time, or so the saying goes. I know I do. Right now, I despise White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf and don’t think much of his puppy announcer, John Schriffen. I also absolutely hate that the Sox went 41-121 last year. So, why does reading Jim Callis on mlb.com today tick me off? Callis wrote of Sox pitching prospect Noah Schultz, “I’m slightly worried he’s going to be so impressive he’s going to ruin his candidacy by getting to the big leagues too quickly. On the other hand, his team is atrocious and they aren’t going to contend so they don’t have to rush him.” S@!$& you, buddy. A big part of baseball’s appeal is predicated on the hope next year brings; it’s what sustains fans like me rooting for teams like the Sox. Yes, I want the 21-year old Schultz to make the team out of spring training and have a breakout rookie season. But that won’t change what I think of Reinsdorf and Schriffen. I mean, I’m not crazy.