EXTRA: Will family tie be the key to White Sox success with Machado?

The Chicago White Sox had their face-to-face meeting Monday with Manny Machado, the all-star infielder who's trying to get the big-money contract that will make him potentially the highest-paid ballplayer ever.

Is Yainee Machado key to if her husband plays for Sox?

Reports are indicating that the White Sox aren't enthused about having to spend that much money (potentially some $300 million). There's also the fact that his meeting with the White Sox came first -- the New York Yankees and Philadelphia Phillies are scheduled to have their one-on-ones Wednesday and Thursday.

The newest White Sox

MEANING THE WHITE Sox are unlikely to get in the last word and chance to top anybody else's financial offer. Which really means that any serious chance of Machado coming to Chicago is going to be in the hands of Yainee.

As in Machado's wife -- who also is the sister of Yonder Alonso, who happens to be a professional ballplayer in his own right. In fact, he's a first baseman who was acquired by the White Sox from the Cleveland Indians.

Freddy Garcia once had to call 'skip' … 

Would Machado want to be on a ball club with his brother-in-law? Would Yainee be inclined to think that having her brother and husband so close be a benefit (the two actually live a couple of blocks from each other in Miami during the winter months)? Or will they decide that a little bit of space during the summer would be beneficial to maintaining family unity?

I don't actually know the answers to any of those questions. But it would be an intriguing story line if the White Sox' ability to acquire a star shortstop like Machado depends on who their reserve first baseman is.

… the man who was sort-of a father-in-law

IT COULD TURN out to be as interesting as back when the White Sox' pitching rotation included Freddy Garcia -- who was married to the niece of manager Ozzie Guillen.

For a few years, including that World Series'-winning season of 2005, White Sox baseball was truly a family affair. In fact, when the Sox later traded Garcia away to Philadelphia, one of the people most upset was Guillen's wife, Ibis, who blamed her husband for not stopping the trade from occurring.

Machado would have Hall of Famer Aparicio as goal, if he becomes a Sox

Could the saga to rebuild the White Sox into a team that doesn't think avoiding 100 losses a season is a significant accomplishment develop its own potential for a family-type soap opera angle?

And could Machado wind up following in the path of star shortstops from Latin America who established their athletic credentials while wearing the old-English script logo of the White Sox.

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SPORTING NUZ; Chicago-style: Who's bigger – Bears, or Wildcats?

I’m not much of a football fan. Yet even I can appreciate just how unique this season is for those of us Chicago-area people who take to the gridiron.

Maybe we could have a fantasy championship at Wrigley between the Bears and the Wildcats?

The Chicago Bears don’t actually suck, for a change. They’re in first place in their division, and it would take a collapse of historic proportions for them to fail to at least make it to the playoffs.

WE’RE GOING TO have people in coming weeks getting all worked up at the thought of a Super Bowl involving a Chicago team. The delusional thoughts will run rampant. They’re not going to dump the ’85 Bears (whose coach, Mike Ditka, these days is recovering from a heart attack) in Chicago’s sporting mentality. But they’ll come close.

Yet let’s be honest. They might turn out to be the second-most interesting local football tale of the year.

For we have the Wildcats of Northwestern University playing absurdly well. They are the top team in the Big Ten’s western division.

And after seeing Ohio State whomp all over Michigan, there will be those eager to see if Northwestern can actually win the conference – which would most definitely put them in line for a significant bowl game.

Wildcats to get better bowl venue than Yankee Stadium

CERTAINLY SOMETHING MORE prominent than the Pinstripe Bowl, to be played Dec. 27 at Yankee Stadium. Can the Wildcats actually manage to steal the thunder away from Da Bears? It’s possible, since a successful Bears season would be not getting totally humiliated in the playoffs, Whereas the Wildcats could actually wind up winning a bowl game.

Even though I’m sure the SEC-types who want to think the world doesn’t extend beyond Dixie will want to believe Alabama is the supreme football power – regardless of how anyone else actually plays.

Although it occurs to me there’s one way that this season tops the ’85 Bears – what if the Wildcats were to win a major bowl game, while the Bears also got into their third Super Bowl appearance ever. More likely than not, it won’t happen – but it’s something for some of us to fantasize about.

What else is notable on our city’s sporting scene these days?

Remembering their '05 victories?

HALL OF FAME FANTASIES: We’re at that time of year where the Baseball Hall of Fame is contemplating which former ballplayers deserve to be inducted amongst its newest members come 2019.

Two of the players getting their first – and most likely only – chance at induction are former Chicago White Sox pitchers Jon Garland and Freddy Garcia. Both of whom were a part of that outstanding starting rotation that enabled the Sox to win a World Series back in 2005.

The ’05 Sox technically already have one of their members in the Hall of Fame in the form of Frank Thomas (the slugger turned Nugenix pitchman), although Thomas actually spent most of that season injured and didn’t play a single game in the World Series.

Or have many forgotten by now?

Personally, I thought it an intriguing sporting happening when, in the final round of the American League playoffs that year, the White Sox beat the Los Angeles Angels – with the four Sox victories being complete game victories and Garland and Garcia ringing up two of them. They’ll most likely have to settle for the memories, rather than a bronze plaque in Cooperstown, N.Y.

MOST MEMORABLE?: Of course, one of the reasons that the two pitchers won’t get their moment of immortality is because of the way some people are determined to think that the Chicago Cubs championship of 2016 is all so significant.

Is this really Illinois history?

I couldn’t help but wretch at the thought of the recently-released results of a survey about Illinois history – asking people to pick the most-significant moments in our state’s 200-year history.

Perhaps it’s a plus that Moment No. 1 was Abraham Lincoln’s funeral proceedings – including the funeral train that took Honest Abe’s body from Washington to Springfield, Ill., while stopping in Chicago and passing through northern Illinois.

But the Cubs’ World Series title ranked No. 2 – as in we have people deluded enough to think that nothing else that has happened in the state other than the moment when the Cubs crushed the hopes of Cleveland Indians fans, who came oh so close to winning their own “first World Series” in 70-something years if only they could have held a lead in the final game.

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