A-Rod won’t don pale hose during his lengthy baseball career; Chicago won’t get a last chance to “boo” him

It’s a trend that our very own Chicago White Sox like to take on – aging star ballplayers who wind up finishing their careers on the South Side of Chicago with such unmemorable stints that most fans quickly forget they ever played here.

 

He'll never wear White Sox pinstripes

To the degree that I often wondered if Alex Rodriguez of the New York Yankees was destined to become yet another ballplayer in this category – somebody who’d wind up finishing his career getting in a few games playing for the White Sox.

IT MAY BE the big difference in character between the Chicago White Sox and the crosstown competition, the Chicago Cubs.

For the Cubs have a history of letting young ballplayers go who later wind up with other ball clubs having careers making them worthy of the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. – pitchers Bruce Sutter and Greg Maddux, just to name a couple.

While the White Sox wind up being the aging dumping ground of guys like Ken Griffey, Jr., who when he was inducted earlier this summer into the Hall of Fame and people were going on-and-on about the highlights of his professional career, no one was thinking about the 41 games he played for the White Sox in 2008.

Then again, with a .260 batting average and only 3 home runs while wearing the black and white with pinstripes of the Sox, there wasn’t much to remember.

 

Just a few ballplayers ...

JUST LIKE STEVE Carlton or Roberto Alomar – who got into the Hall of Fame despite their lack of heroics in Chicago. Or Tom Seaver, who is a Hall of Famer whom many people barely remember as a White Sox.

It would have totally been in the ball club’s character to acquire Rodriguez, whom the Yankees have been eager to dispose of because he’s NOT of the quality any more that will make him a candidate for Hall of Fame induction.

 

... whose athletic demise and  final paycheck ...

He could be just like Jose Canseco, the aging slugger from the 1980s and early 1990s who ended his playing days in the early 21^st Century by hitting the last 16 of his 462 career home runs in Chicago.

He got to end his major league playing days by finally getting to see a Comiskey Park fireworks display in celebration of his own home runs, instead of just hearing the echoing of “boos” from fans p-oed that a Sox pitcher threw another stinker of a pitch that wound up deposited into the outfield seats.

... came while wearing "white" sox

THIS HONESTLY WAS what I always expected the end of baseball would be for Alex Rodriguez – an unceremonious attempt to stretch out his career for a few more ball games. With the confused catter-calls coming from the stands – generations of Sox fans booing and heckling him for playing for the Seattle Mariners, Texas Rangers and Yankees being muted because his hits finally benefitted the White Sox.

Although the reason it won’t happen is because Rodriguez announced Sunday he won’t play anymore following the Yankees’ ballgame Friday against the Tampa Bay Rays. He’ll get to finish out this season and next in some sort of unspecified role as a consultant.

Even Jose Canseco got a final farewell in Chicago

But his horrific play (batting only .204 this season and he didn’t even play back on July 4-6 when the Yankees made their only visit to Chicago this season) meant there weren’t many hits to be had.

As it turns out, Rodriguez’ Chicago finale turned out to be the final weekend of July 2015 when the Yankees played a three-game series at U.S. Cellular Field. The crowd reaction literally was a mess of people wanting to tell dumb steroid jokes and taunts mixed with Yankees fans still wishing to celebrate him – and one girl sitting behind me in the outfield seats making a point of wishing Rodriguez a “Happy Birthday.”

IT WILL BE intriguing how Rodriguez – the guy who lost the 2013 season to a suspension because of steroid-use allegations – gets remembered. Because with 696 home runs (as of Sunday), it makes him one of the all-time greats – ahead of Willie Mays (660) and not far behind Yankees immortal Babe Rush (714).

Not everyone heckled Rodriguez in Chicago

And certainly better than legitimate White Sox Hall of Famer Frank Thomas (521) or “is he, or isn’t he, a fraud” Cubs star Sammy Sosa (609). But some are going to be too eager to taint the Rodriguez memory with steroids, just as they have done with Sosa and many other ballplayers of recent years.

It makes me reminisce of the ballplayers of my childhood era – guys such as one-time Sox slugger Dick Allen.

 

He who took a Most Valuable Player title while representing the South Side and was critical of artificial turf by saying, “If a cow can’t eat it, I won’t play on it.” You just don’t get ballplayers like that these days.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Maybe the White Sox will wind up having Ichiro Suzuki on their roster some time in the near future. The Miami Marlins outfielder clinched his position in baseball immortality by getting his 3,000th base hit (a triple Sunday off Colorado Rockies pitcher Chris Rusin) playing in the U.S. major leagues (he has another 1,200 or so hit from playing professionally in Japan). Which means he's now an aging ballplayer whose past his prime and whose best years (with the Seattle Mariners and New York Yankees) are most definitely in the past -- perfect for a stint at 35th and Bill Veeck Drive! For what it's worth, Suzuki made his only visit to Chicago this season last week when the Marlins lost three games to the Chicago Cubs, although the White Sox will be in Miami for a weekend series beginning Friday.

EXTRA: Rodriguez can play (for now); boo-birds to unleash their lung power

It seems that Alex Rodriguez will be available to play the next few games against the Chicago White Sox.

While Major League Baseball announced a series of suspensions against a dozen ballplayers for links to the Biogenesis anti-aging clinic (to try to use performance-enhancing drugs), it seems that Rodriguez of the New York Yankees is determined to fight the allegations.

A DOZEN BALLPLAYERS on Monday were told they were being suspended for the rest of the season, and they all are accepting the penalty without a fight. No one from the White Sox or the Chicago Cubs were on that list.

Not that it matters much, with as bad as both ball clubs are playing this season.

But the belief among many baseball people is that Rodriguez not only used substances to artificially bolster his strength, but also tried to cover up his involvement.

Nothing has definitively been proved, but Rodriguez on Monday was suspended for the rest of this season, the playoffs and all of next season. For a ballplayer on the decline who’s already 38, that could be the equivalent of a lifetime ban.

SINCE IT COULD throw his routine off that he’s never able to play at a competitive level again.

But Rodriguez, who got that major contract (he is the $25-30 million-a-year man) a decade ago, with an extension that should keep him paid for another four seasons, wants his money. That’s why he wants to challenge the penalty – and why he will want to take the playing field at U.S. Cellular Field come Monday.

Which will be interesting because Rodriguez was among the many key players who have suffered injuries this season – derailing the Yankees’ own desires to win a championship this season.

Monday will be Rodriguez’ first major league game of 2013. The national attention circulating around 35^th and Shields will be intense – crews were set up at the ballpark by noon.

EVEN THOUGH BALLPLAYERS themselves hadn’t shown up yet!

So Rodriguez will be on hand, and the White Sox hecklers will vent their rage – which will make the South Side an ugly place to be through Wednesday. Moreso than the usual Yankee-hatred that crops up around the American League's cities.

Particularly since it also seems that Yankees star Derek Jeter won’t be on hand for this week’s series in Chicago. He’s another key player who has been out with injuries, and he was diagnosed this weekend with a Grade 1 strain of his right calf.

So much for seeing Jeter in Chicago. The on-field highlight may well be the return of Alfonso Soriano to the Second City.

  -30-

The Yanks are coming? Will A-Rod be with them? Or will we settle for “C.J.”

The Rodriguez fans despise

The arrival of the New York Yankees in Chicago each season is always a moment of excitement – sometimes the highlight of a baseball season.

Yet it has been just over a decade (the Yankees' first ball game after the World Trade Towers incident of 
Sept. 11, 2001 was in Chicago against the White Sox) since anyone nationally was paying attention to the activity at U.S. Cellular Field just because of the presence of the Bronx Bombers.

THE YANKEES ARE in town this week for a three-game series beginning Monday against the Chicago White Sox. Our city’s Sox are struggling to avoid 100 losses, while the Yanks are coping with severe injuries to so many key players that it’s a wonder they have a winning record these days.

The Rodriguez fans used to love

But the reason the Yankees’ arrival in town is a big deal is because of the third baseman Alex Rodriguez – who has been one of the injured. He has yet to play a single game for the Yankees this season. Although in recent days, he has been undergoing minor league therapy in Trenton, N.J., and theoretically could play his first major league game on Monday.

Which could mean the White Sox faithful (along with the Midwestern-based Yankees fans who make their one visit to “the Cell” when they come to town) will get to see Rodriguez – and heckle him unmercifully.

Do Yankees fans want to crop him out?

We could be treated to the spectacle this week (my brother, Chris, and I will be at the stadium for Tuesday’s game) of Chicago showing its contempt for Rodriguez at its most intense level.

THEN AGAIN, MAYBE we won’t.

Because Rodriguez is one of a few ballplayers who are suspected of using certain chemical substances to enhance their strength and make themselves appear to be better ballplayers than they would otherwise be.

But officials say that Rodriguez’ involvement, and efforts to cover up, may be at a higher level. Which is why the speculation is that Rodriguez will be suspended on Monday for the remainder of 2013 and the entire 2014 season.

The beginning of the big-money era

If it turns out that Rodriguez is able to play on Monday (the speculation Sunday is that he will appeal his penalty, and will be allowed to play while the appeal is pending), he’s in for a hellish experience. Although I suspect even if he’s not able to play, the fans who turn out on Monday (and to lesser levels Tuesday and Wednesday) will make their level of contempt known.

THERE’S NO WAY to shut up a sports fan who feels compelled to boo and razz someone!

I’ll be honest. When I’m at the ballgame, I’m probably going to be more focused on the level of intensity expressed against Rodriguez than I will be on the game itself.

The Yankees may be able to boost their quality of play this month and next and still qualify for a playoff spot (that’s more likely than the White Sox being able to turn 2013 into a season with a winning record). But it likely is a “lost” season for both ball clubs.

The heckling level will be more memorable than the game itself. Although considering it will be the first ballgame I’ve made it out to this season, it will still be a pleasurable experience just for being live baseball.

SO THE YANKS are coming. Oft-injured shortstop Derek Jeter is likely to be in the lineup on Monday – after having sat out a weekend series against the San Diego Padres. We’ll get to see former Chicago Cub Alfonso Soriano, who is trying to show that his Cub-like quality of play was a fluke. A victory or two this week would be the highlight of the White Sox'  season!

Coming back to the old neighborhood

Although the most memorable thing may well be center fielder Curtis “C.J.” Granderson – a Chicago-area native who plays for New York, but plans to spend some time this week with kids in suburban Lansing and Lynwood just to promote their interest in baseball as a game.

Considering how much of the contempt level felt by baseball fans for Rodriguez is because of his record-setting contract, it is nice to see at least one ballplayer who hasn’t forgotten where he comes from and is willing to give something back to his home community.

  -30-

A-Rod to the White Sox? The concept is not completely out of the question

The New York Yankees have suffered a humiliation, and somebody must pay! Will the Chicago White Sox be the alleged beneficiary?

The ballclub that finished the regular season this year with the best record in the American League managed to get swept in four straight games of the final round of playoffs by the Detroit Tigers – which, we all know, is the ballclub that only made it to the playoffs because of the White Sox’ pathetic play in September.

THIS YEAR DEFINITELY won’t be a year where the American League puts up its best ballclub against the National League champion in the World Series that starts next week.

Which has Yankees fans seriously peeved! (Actually, the word that most accurately describes them is one much too vulgar to be published here). They’re looking for a person to take their abuse out on!

And it would seem that the fans and management want to blame Yankees third-baseman Alex Rodriguez – who for the record-setting kind of contract he has is supposed to be “the man” who leads the team to championships.

Instead, he didn’t hit worth squat. In fact, his play was so bad that the final two games of the playoff round against Detroit, Rodriguez was sat on the bench.

WHICH APPARENTLY GAVE him time to engage in one of the old tricks of a ballplayer – tossing a ball at a babe in the stands, in hopes that under the guise of asking for an autograph, she’ll hand over her phone number.

Rodriguez seems to have been more interested in getting himself some blonde companionship for after the ballgame, rather than trying to focus on winning the ballgame itself.

Personally, I think it’s possible for a ballplayer to focus on winning while not completely ignoring his surroundings.

But the mood is ugly in New York these days (uglier than usual, I should say).

THERE ARE THOSE who want Rodriguez traded away. There has been speculation that he will wind up in his hometown of Miami; which makes me wonder how he would react playing for manager Ozzie Guillen.

But there also is speculation that other teams might be interested. On Friday, I saw one list of clubs that emphasized that someone of Rodriguez’ “stature” would have to play for a “big-market” ballclub. No Kansas City Royals for him.

And that list basically came down to the two Los Angeles-area teams (the Dodgers and the Angels) and our very own White Sox!

Personally, I’m inclined to think that the White Sox are the bottom team on any such list. I’m not sure I see it happening – even though current White Sox third baseman Kevin Youkilis is likely to leave soon (he was only a one-season pickup to bolster the ballclub for a potential World Series that never happened).

THERE WILL BE a vacancy at that position. There would be room for Rodriguez on-the-field. Although I suspect the Yankees would have to agree to pay virtually all of what remains of Rodriguez’ contract for the notoriously-cheap White Sox to seriously think of pursuing him.

But we also have to admit that the White Sox have a history of picking up big-name veteran ballplayers whose best years are behind them. It’s like a stint on the South Side is a part of the path toward athletic retirement.

Wear the Olde English script “Sox” before trying to figure out what to do with the rest of one’s life.

Hall of Fame ballplayers such as Tom Seaver and Steve Carlton (and likely Hall of Fame member Ken Griffey, Jr.,) all had their stints in Chicago near the end of their careers.

HECK, LET’S NOT forget of such players as one-time relief ace Sparky Lyle (a Cy Young Award winner) or slugger Jose Canseco – who also have a bottom line of statistics in agate type indicating they played for “Chi-A” as their very last employer in Major League Baseball. I'm sure Sox fans with time on their hands can name dozens of other big-name ballplayers throughout the decades who finished up here.

In that context, it would make all the sense in the world for Alex Rodriguez to have a stint with the White Sox.

But then again, Rodriguez may well be capable of playing another couple of regular seasons in the major leagues. He probably isn’t completely washed up as a professional athlete. He’s just no longer the superstar that he once was with the Seattle Mariners (and whom the Yankees thought he would be for them).

Which probably means he’ll go to Los Angeles or Miami (where he lives during the off-season) and play for a bit.

THEN, HE’LL WIND up coming to Chicago to finish up in the black-and-white pinstriped uniforms that – from a distance – sort of look like Yankees uniforms.

So let me write a premature “Welcome to Chicago, Alex Rodriguez.” He’ll be here around 2015 and will get in a few final ballgames that will be considered an embarrassment to his career – while White Sox fans will speculate about how wonderful it would have been if he could have played for the ballclub a decade or so earlier.

  -30-

Chicago’s boo-birds will join rest of nation when it comes to razzing Rodriguez

Mark the dates "July 30 through Aug. 2" on your calendar.

That four-day span over a weekend in the summer of 2009 will be memorable in Chicago for one reason – that’s when the New York Yankees make their lone trip to the Second City this season to play the White Sox.

IT WON’T MATTER just how bad the White Sox or the Yankees are playing (although personally, I think both will contend for something in their respective divisions). That weekend will be significant because it will be the time span when Chicagoans with nothing better to do with their lives than razz Alex Rodriguez will deem it worthy of their time to go to the ballpark.

Who can come up with the most “clever” (a.k.a., insipid) chant? Who will have the crudest sign implying that Rodriguez (arguably one of the best ballplayers ever, even though he’s far from being one of the best Yankees ever) is a drug abuser.

I can already see the spectacle, as certain people will feel like it is their mission in life to single out Rodriguez for even more abuse than they would have because he’s one of the top ballplayers – and because he’s a Yankee.

Now before anyone starts thinking that I’m about to go in defense of a steroid-using ballplayer (as Rodriguez now admits he was), I’m not. But I’m also not going to get all worked up over his activity, because I believe that there are physical consequences he will suffer from the use of certain drugs meant to build up strength.

IN SHORT, I think Rodriguez and all the other athletes who misuse such substances will pay a hefty price later in life (in the case of Ken Caminiti, he paid with his life at age 41). I think people who believe they need to add to the abuse of a ballplayer are just people with nothing going on in their own lives, so they have to mind someone else’s business.

Now as it has been reported in recent days, Rodriguez experimented with certain substances in an attempt to build up muscle mass so as to make him a stronger athlete who might be capable of doing better things on the ball field.

The test to which he came up “positive” was taken in 2003 when Major League Baseball was first trying to get a handle on just how much the use of certain steroids was impacting the game.

In theory, ballplayers were tested anonymously that year, and no one was supposed to know who was who when it came to who tested positive and who tested negative.

SOME MIGHT ARGUE that the real tragedy here is that Rodriguez’ anonymous cooperation with this test was unveiled. But I think of it more as the equivalent of someone who faces serious criminal charges, only to have them knocked down to a misdemeanor (if anything at all) because of prosecutorial misconduct.

Rodriguez can’t officially be punished for “passing” this particular test, even though ballplayers tested since then face a rigorous schedule of suspensions that can ultimately take away their careers (there’s no lifetime ban, but if you start losing entire seasons, it takes away from the interest ball clubs will have in all but the best athletes).

And as far as those people who want to start screaming about “asterisks” and erasing statistics and records set by ballplayers who used steroids, you can’t do that. Trying to erase history and rewrite it in a favorable way is un-American. It happened. Now baseball and its fans have to live with it.

Now I’m not naïve enough to think that steroids are limited to certain ballplayers, or even certain teams.

IT DOESN’T EVEN surprise me to know that professional athletes whose livelihood depends on being in top physical condition would mess with such substances that can – if misused – leave them weakened and susceptible to illness.

With all the supplements and other drugs that bodybuilders and other athletes take out of the belief that they’re doing their bodies some good, why wouldn’t it make sense that some are bound to think these steroids fall into the same class – or ought to, if not for some people who are just too uptight.

While I realize he now tries to back away from his past rhetoric, that was the basic attitude that one-time outfielder Jose Canseco expressed a few years ago when he helped write the book “Juiced.”

Canseco, known for being able to hit substantial numbers of home runs, claimed he thought all ballplayers ought to use steroids, along with weight training, so as to improve strength and the quality of the game.

THAT IS, IF you think the game ought to be nothing more than an exaggerated version of batting practice.

Now when I say that Rodriguez is going to get hit with abuse when he comes to Chicago, keep in mind that I don’t think he’s going to get hit here more than in any other American League city.

This is going to be a year in purgatory for Rodriguez. His every move is going to be watched, and people are going to be looking to jump on every little flub he makes all season.

In fact, he may get hit with more abuse from his “hometown” fans in New York than anywhere else. After all, there are many Yankees fans who view Rodriguez’ personal achievements on the field as less important than the fact that the Yankees haven’t won an American League championship since the year BEFORE he joined the team.

WHAT I WONDER is how intense will the disgust level become? Will Rodriguez become the new Barry Bonds (whose home run achievements are despised by many baseball fans and whom many were hoping Rodriguez would someday knock out of the record books)?

Will Rodriguez intensify the notion among many baseball fans (one that I have always thought to be ridiculous) that the Yankees are a team that deserves to be despised?

I can remember as a kid sitting in the stands at the old Comiskey Park, listening to a crowd get all bent out of shape at the thought of trying to throw Reggie Jackson’s concentration off (it never seemed to work).

Is this what we’re destined to see in future years with Rodriguez?

IT MAKES ME wonder if the day will ever come that Rodriguez will regret leaving such baseball “backwaters” as Seattle and Arlington, Texas to play in a place like New York City. I believe there are some fans who would be more willing to forgive him (in due course) if he still played for the Mariners or the Rangers.

Because “big money” + “Yankees” = (in the minds of many fans) Baseball’s “Public Enemy Number One.”

-30-

EDITOR’S NOTES: The Texas Rangers baseball club of the early 2000s are developing (http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/al/rangers/2009-02-09-rangers-players-juiced_N.htm) a reputation as a team with many ballplayers who experimented with steroid use.

Some commentators can get a tad irrational (http://www.freep.com/article/20090210/COL10/90210013/Alex+Rodriguez+should+go+to+jail) when it comes to steroid use by an athlete.

For some people, the most interesting thing Barack Obama had to say Monday night was to call (http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/yankees/2009/02/09/2009-02-09_president_obama_tags_out_arod.html) the Rodriguez steroid saga “depressing news.”