Priorities

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, the saying goes, or failing newspapers, for that matter. Just look at the Tribune. Check that, look at social media first. White Sox fans may be—are—weighing in on the chances of Justin Ishbia buying the team. The Sun-Times may be—is—mentioning it today, but not the Tribune, where “it’s all the [sports] news that fit to print,” as long as it fits onto one of six pages. Which wasn’t the case today. And the Trib online didn’t have anything on Ishbia, either. More likely than not, the Sunday sports’ section was dummied late Friday or early Saturday, with space left for spring training and Bulls’ games. Oh, and a half-page color photo of Bears’ GM Ryan Poles with new hire Ben Johnson, along with a big story on how the Munsters could approach free agency. What matters more, looking into rumors of a new owner for one of the more storied franchises in sports or a think-piece on how a 5-12 football team will navigate free agency? With the Chicago Tribune, you don’t even have to ask.

Billionaire Swap?

I have to hand it to my daughter. Despite caring for two kids, 3-1/2 and five months, Clare can still provide breaking White Sox news, as in a possible new owner for the team. Ladies and gentlemen, meet plutocrat Justin Ishbia. According to a story by Jon Greenberg in yesterday’s The Athletic, the 47-year old, Chicago-area head of a private-equity investment firm is intent on buying up shares from Sox minority investors, with the idea of then buying out owner Jerry Reinsdorf. The mind boggles, for both Twins’ and Sox fans. First off, Ishbia was negotiating with the Pohlad family to buy the Twins, and all was going well until this story broke. Why would Ishbia turn from an easy situation—the Pohlads want out, and the fans want them out, too—for one where he has to deal with Reinsdorf, a person who has to come out on top of every activity from owning things to flushing toilets? Maybe the soon-to-be 89-year old is finally ready to move on. Compared to the Twins, Ishbia would have a shorter commute to the South Side. And, if he could turn the Sox around, the payoff would be ever so much greater than in the Twin Cities. Chicago’s a bigger market, which means nice earnings, plus the Sox offer Ishbia the chance to show either Coast what the Midwest can pull off. It’s the kind of challenge to stoke a billionaire’s ego. The good news for Sox fans is that Ishbia is local-ish. On the other hand, his plans to build a mega-estate in Winnetka on the tony North Shore leave something to be desired. In true plutocrat fashion, Ishbia wanted the village park district to give him property on the lakefront in exchange for land elsewhere so he could have himself have a nice “little” compound without free of public land encroaching on it. A lawsuit settled last month put a stop to the attempted land swap. So, Ishbia is the kind of guy not afraid to push people around to get his way, a trait that Reinsdorf has always held dear. But maybe there’s more here. Maybe the devil we don’t know has virtues sorely lacking in the devil we’ve known for way too long. And maybe we’ll find out before long.

America's Team No More

Who says bad people and the teams they own don’t get what they deserve? Just look at Jerry Jones and his Dallas Cowboys. America’s Team? I doubt it. First off, Dallas hasn’t won a Super Bowl since 1995-96. Since then, they’ve gone 5-13 in the postseason. Oh, and they just hired Mickey Eberflus to be their defensive coordinator. Mickey hasn’t missed a beat. Talking to Dallas reporters on Tuesday, Eberflus offered up this gem: “You want to learn and grow from every experience and impart that wisdom onto the next crew, and that’s what we’re going to do here. You learn a bunch of things that are different and things that you grow from, and that’s important to do.” [quote from Wednesday’s Sun-Times] Some croutons on that word salad?

Rich

What better way for the Bears to put the death of team matriarch Virginia McCaskey behind them than by raising season-ticket prices by an average of 10 percent? Here’s what team president and CEO Kevin Warren wrote in a letter to season-ticket holders: “While we did not reach our goals during the 2024 season, we are making clear, intentional [as opposed to unintentional?] and strategic decisions to ensure our 2025 season meets the expectations of both our organization and our fans.” And for that a 5-12 team gets to jack up prices? How rich. Warren also pointed to “market dynamics, industry trends and a strong home schedule.” [all auotes from story in today’s Tribune] Industry trends in a hard-salary-cap business? And higher prices because the home schedule is full of visiting teams likely to beat the point spread? I can’t wait to see Warren lower prices for when the Munsters have a weak home schedule. And here I thought there was no one in Chicago sports who could make Jerry Reinsdorf look good. I stand corrected.

Next in Line?

Every baseball franchise has historic strengths and weaknesses. With the White Sox, you never spend more than a couple of minutes talking about great left fielders or catchers. It’s all pitching and centerfield—plus shortstop. Consider that the White Sox had four shortstops—Luke Appling, Chico Carrasquel, Luis Aparicio and Ron Hansen—from 1931 to 1971. Two of them, Appling and Aparicio, are in the Hall of Fame. Some of the guys who came later—like Bucky Dent, Jose Valentin and Ozzie Guillen—weren’t too shabby, either. Which brings us to the next presumptive standout, Colson Montgomery. Never has a 22-year old talent raised so much anxiety. Why? Only decent with the glove, Montgomery is going to have to prove himself hitting, which he hasn’t done a whole lot of since he left high-A. The pride of Jasper, Indiana, hit .244 at Double-A Charlotte in half a season in 2023. Last year, Montgomery moved up to Triple-A Charlotte, where he showed some pop with 18 homeruns and 63 RBIs. But the .214 BA and 164 strikeouts—yikes. But I’m not supposed to worry because Montgomery hit .264 with 13 RBIs over 19 games in September and then followed that up with .313 and 11 RBIs in 11 games in the Arizona Fall League. Let’s see if this keeps up starting Saturday. Otherwise, shortstop is going to turn into another catcher or third base for the Sox.

More Moves

So many ex-White Sox players, so many moves to either coast. I forgot to mention Nick Madrigal signing a minor-league deal with the Mets and Eloy Jimenez with the Rays. Well, the trainers will have a busy spring. The two names that really caught me by surprise, though, were Yolmer Sanchez and Trayce Thompson. Yolmer is hoping to land a spot with the Angels (for an Anderson/Moncada/Sanchez reunion, no less) while Thompson is trying his luck with the Red Sox. Like, wow. If Thompson, 34 on the Ides of March, were to make the Red Sox, that would be his sixth major-league team. The right-hand hitting outfielder and brother of NBA star Klay Thompson has had three separate go-arounds with the Sox and two with the Dodgers. Thompson has also played fourteen seasons in the minors. I can’t even begin to count the different teams. As for Yolmer, he’s a tad younger at 32 with a birthday in June. He’s played for three major-league teams and has spent twelve seasons in the minors plus six seasons of winter ball in Venezuela. Again, I can’t begin to count the seasons. At the end of Ball Four, Jim Bouton wrote, “You see, you spend a good piece of your life gripping a baseball and in the end it turns out that it was the other way around all the time.” What holds for pitchers holds for position players. Good luck, guys.

No. No. No

I read an op-ed in the Sun-Times yesterday written by a Chicken Little of a lawyer who fears the end of professional baseball is upon us. Why? No hard salary cap. Chicken Little sees billion-dollar ballplayers on the horizon if something isn’t done. And, as Robert Preston used to warn in “The Music Man,” that spells trouble in River City because inflated payrolls “may not be supported by ticket sales, sponsors and television deals.” Wait, there’s more. “If baseball does not intervene with a real [as in hard] cap, small-market teams like the Twins, Reds, Guardians and others may falter.” So, the solution is to prevent hundreds of players from a shot at getting filthy rich—Chicken Little seems to be particularly upset with Juan Soto’s $765 million contract—by ensuring that a handful of owners get to earn obscene profits at the time of sale of their teams? No, no, no. No hard salary cap without a hard windfall profits’ tax. Failing that, let the magic of supply and demand work itself here. If costs go ever higher until fans and broadcasters balk at covering them, the market will adjust. If the contracts for Soto and Alex Bregman bring us one step closer, so be it.

Premonitions

This week, the White Sox signed 31-year old Joey Gallo (career .194 BA, hasn’t broken .200 since 2019) and 33-year old Michael A. Taylor (career .235 BA, .220 and .193 the last two seasons). What gives? My suspicion is that both moves are evidence of trades likely to happen before Opening Day, as in Andrew Vaughn and Luis Robert Jr. gone, to be replaced by the likes of Gallo and Taylor. And let’s not forget Andrew Benintendi. You think GM Chris Getz wouldn’t love to move him and start Mike Tauchman in his place? I also think the Sox “brain trust” is in no rush to promote any of its top prospects this season, especially not starting pitchers Noah Schultz and Hagen Smith. Check that. They might go with Colson Montgomery at short, assuming he can hit the ball better in Arizona than he did last year. Nothing says (Non) Rookie of the Year than a .214 BA at Triple-A Charlotte. Other than that, I’m really excited about the upcoming season on the South Side.

Like I Said

Well, that didn’t take long. Paul Sullivan of the Tribune went after the Cubs today for failing to sign Alex Bregman. Getting his digs in by having “Cubs fans” doing the talking, Sullivan said the ostensible big-market team “once again was outbid for a prominent free agent,” proof that “it’s back to the Cubs being the Cubs.” Excuse me, but shouldn’t the real story here be a player reaching the threshold of $40 million a season? And, given how Bregman’s deal has opt-outs after each of the first two seasons, that figure go very well go higher. Call me a shill for ownership, but I just don’t see how that kind of salary comes without consequences. Like what? The All-Star game and World Series as pay-per-view events. How’s that for openers?

None of My Business, But…

Here’s what’s going to happen—all the armchair GMs and owners out there are going to bellyache how the Cubs passed on free-agent third baseman Alex Bregman, who reportedly is going to the Red Sox on a three-year deal for $120 million. Give me a break. If I were a metrics’ guy, I could show how Bregman, age 31 by Opening Day, is slipping. Instead, all I can do is point out that the last time he cracked 100 RBIs was 2019 and he hasn’t hit over .262 his last three seasons. He does have a Gold Glove for 2024. The Cubs’ top prospect just so happens to be a third baseman, Matt Shaw, rated number 14 by Keith Law in The Athletic and number 19 by Sam Dykstra for mlb.com. What I’d like to ask the armchair experts is what they would do with the 23-year old Shaw if Bregman had gone to the North Side? Convert him to another position? Trade him? For this expert, the template for any organization should be to develop top talent; sign top talent to extensions; trade other young talent for youngish talent; and finish, rather than start, with free agents. Constructing a playoff-caliber roster around free agents is a fool’s task. Nobody wants to point out the emperor isn’t wearing anything or that the Yankees aren’t winning anything with this, then that, free agent signing. The Dodgers are winning by spending real big bucks, but I wonder. Their starting lineup could feature eight players 30-years old or more, and their pitching is a combination of young, old and untested. I like what the Orioles have done instead, except for the part where they don’t seem interested in extending all their young talent or finding the right free agent(s) to get them deep into the postseason. The Cubs have the money to build a first-rate minor-league system. Will they? I don’t know. But signing Bregman sure wouldn’t put them in the same class as the Dodgers, or Orioles, for that matter.

What They Said

I figure Bulls’ head coach Billy Donovan will be gone sometime within the next twelve months, then or whenever Arturas Karnisovas is shown the door. Karnisovas is so clueless someone will have to walk him through. Donovan, a good soldier and a smart man, will be able to manage that on his own. Karnisovas has assembled a roster full of guards who can’t guard anyone to go with a center who does a spot-on impression of a statue. For proof, consider last night’s 132-92 humiliation to the visiting Pistons. “I’m not going to sit up here and make excuses, ‘It was one game of 82’ or ‘It was one of those nights.’ No,” Donovan told reporters after the game. Instead, “We have to own it all the way through. Myself, the players, the coaches, everybody.” [Donovan quoted in story in today’s Sun-Times] A couple of White Sox tie-ins here. “Flushing” is just what ex-Sox manager Mickey Mouse would say, and scoring all of 29 points in the first half—as the Bulls did last night, eleven in the second quarter—is definitely reminiscent of the 2024 Sox, they of the 41-121 record. Speaking of which, their GM addressed reporters at spring training in Arizona yesterday. Weasels worldwide would’ve been embarrassed by the quality of weasel-words used. “You look at our record last year, we want to win more games this year,” Chris Getz, a better-looking version of Homer Simpson, offered from spring training. “What exactly is that amount [of wins in 2025]? Time will tell.” [Getz quoted in today’s Tribune] No kidding.

Pick a Coast

Usually, Clare is the one to call me with White Sox news. But I beat her to the phone this morning—Gavin Sheets signed a minor-league deal with the Padres that includes a spring-training invite. That reunites Sheets with Dylan Cease, at least for a while. And then you have Yoan Moncada signing a one-year deal with the Angels, who’ve also invited Tim Anderson to spring training. Wouldn’t those two make for an interesting double-play combination? And let’s not forget Garrett Crochet, Lucas Giolito and Liam Hendriiks pitching for the Red Sox over on the other coast. Atlanta is about 250 miles from the Atlantic, so you might throw in Chris Sale with the Braves, too. Let’s see how all this coastal ex-Sox talent does in the months ahead.

Words of Wisdom

All I want on Super Bowl Sunday are one or two good commercials and maybe, just maybe, a decent game. So, yesterday was one-for-two—Matt Damon and Aubrey Plaza made me smile while the 40-22 score signaled a game only an Eagles’ fan (and Chiefs’ hater) could love. Lucky I heard a few things that really made my day. Like Chiefs’ quarterback Patrick Mahomes in his postgame comments, taking “ownership” for the loss and saying, “We didn’t start how we wanted to. I take all the blame for that. The early turnovers swung the momentum of the game. That’s fourteen points I kind of gave them.” [from USA story today] All 29-year olds should be so mature. With luck, Mahomes will live long enough to show both the wisdom and humility of 91-year old Hubie Brown, who retired after a 53-year career as a pro basketball coach and announcer. In his farewell remarks, Brown revealed the secret to his success, “We never underestimate the IQ of the audience” while explaining the difference between the weak side and the strong side. By “we” I think Brown was including his partner, play-by-play announcer Mike Breen, who showed some class in making sure the spotlight stayed on Brown. Three examples of how adults should act, no matter the circumstances.

It Doesn't Add Up

By my count, after trading Zach LaVine, the Bulls now have eight guards and three centers on their fifteen-player roster. The question is, do they have three real guards and two centers? Off of last night’s 132-111 loss to the visiting Warriors, the answer is a definite No. Not when you give up a fourteen-point halftime lead and allow the opposition to outscore you 77-42 in the second half. And Arturas Karnisovas wants these guys to make a playoff push? Not likely.

My Super Bowl Prediction

Tomorrow at Clare’s will be dicey—a bunch of Bears’ and Packers’ fans watching two other teams play in the Super Bowl. My grandson is upset his mother is rooting for a different team than he is. I won’t predict the final score, though I will join my daughter in rooting, faintly, for the Eagles. What I am willing to bet on is a moment of silence for Virginia McCaskey, late owner of the team and daughter of George Halas. After that, Ryan Poles will still be the GM; his team will still have an awful offensive line; and ownership will continue to push for public money to help them build a mega mall/stadium on the Chicago lakefront. There are some things in these parts that death won’t change.

Not to Speak Ill

Bears’ owner Virginia McCaskey died yesterday at the age of 102. She had been on this earth for all but 36 of the games the Bears have ever played. It’s safe to say she loved her father George Halas and all that he accomplished. But she was wrong to think the public should help build a stadium for the team her father started.

Half-a**

The Bulls traded star guard Zach LaVine on Monday to signal the start of yet another rebuild. It’s a Jerry Reinsdorf thing. Then they signed Lonzo Ball to a two-year extension. Then…they did nothing at all. I watched Nikola Vucevic play defense against the Timberwolves last night, a 127-108 loss where the Bulls were outrebounded 68-42. It was sort of like what David Letterman said at the end of his interview with Joaquin Phoenix, “I’m sorry you couldn’t be here tonight.” If your center isn’t going to play defense or can’t, what good is he? Why hang onto him? Who’s going to want him in the last year of his contract next season? If this isn’t half-a**, what is?

On a Winter's Day

You can tell it’s winter in Chicago by the cold and the color, which is always gray. The never-ending warnings of an ice storm are icing on the cake, if not the streets. So, I did a quick read-through of the grocery flyers that come in the paper on Wednesdays—buy two diet whatevers, get three free. That meant a trip to Jewel before the rain started. Plus a hunt for Lindys, “The Baseball Preview For Smart Fans.” Well, if that isn’t me, then who is it? As far as I know, Lindy’s is the last of its kind, a dinosaur and an institution rolled into one. I used to buy: Athlon; Street and Smith; Lindy’s; Baseball Register; Who’s Who in Baseball. All but Lindy’s gone. And how nice of Jewel to mark the shrinking of an industry by doing the same to its magazine rack, now half of what it was a month ago. A brave, new world, indeed. Now, allow me to open the section on the White Sox...Oh, that bad, huh? Oh, well. Something to read as the ice coats.

Smoke

Did I mention the NBA is dealing, again, with gambling allegations involving one of its players? Oh, right, I did. What about baseball, this time with an umpire involved? Yesterday, MLB fired umpire Pat Hoberg for placing bets through a professional gambler and then covering it up. Umpires are allowed to bet on their own, which seems plenty dangerous to me, as long as it’s not on baseball. Hoberg got in trouble for letting someone else do it. Wait, there’s more. Basically, Hoberg used an intermediary who did bet on baseball, 141 times between 2021 and 2023. Not only that, the gambler made eight bets on five games where Hoberg was either part of the umpiring crew on the field or handling replay reviews. [information from mlb.com story of 2-3-2025]. Oh, and Hoberg admits that he never told the guy to avoid baseball bets. What we have here, my friends, is a failure to communicate, as the late Strother Martin put it in “Cool Hand Luke.” To say the least. What we also have is a growing temptation that someone somewhere in professional sports will give into, with bigtime consequences. It’s just a matter of when.

The Man Who Would Be Commissioner

Fay Vincent died yesterday at the age of 86. He served as commissioner of baseball from 1989 to 1992. It was an interesting time. Vincent admitted to owners’ collusion in trying to suppress free-agent salaries; banned the Yankees’ George Steinbrenner from day-to-day control of the Yankees; and forced an end to the spring-training lockout in 1990. The former movie CEO and lawyer made the mistake of thinking the commissioner was independent of the owners. Bud Selig and Jerry Reinsdorf taught Vincent otherwise. The Sun-Times ran the AP obituary, mentioning Selig and Reinsdorf’s involvement in Vincent’s ouster. The obit on mlb.com skipped that bit of information.

How Much You Wanna Bet?

Talk about perfect timing, not. The NBA is dealing with betting rumors connected to guard Terry Rozier back in 2023 while the Great Day, the Holy Day, the Day of Bets Big and Small is just a week away. That’s right, Super Bowl LIX. And how fitting that for its big Sunday sports’ pullout, the Sun-Times ran this page-one headline: “Prop Till You Drop/Super Bowl provides wildest set of one-day prop bets on sports landscape, and we try to break it all down.” With a story on gambling addiction to follow, no doubt.

Ball of Confusion

With the calendar finally turned to February, I read on the MLB website today that White Sox outfielder Luis Robert Jr. David Adler’s pick as “dark horse candidate to be the best player in” the AL Central. From Adler’s lips to God’s ears. A day before in The Athletic, Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon wrote that the Sox and Reds were sort-of close to a deal for Robert, who appeared to be worth in the neighborhood of one prospect who’d missed 2024 after labrum surgery. Hence, my confusion. Read one guy, and Robert just might produce on a level with Bobby Witt Jr. Read another source, and Robert may be worth little more than a rehabbing minor leaguer. Knowing the Sox, they’ll hold out for two rehabbing players.