Ditka tops Guillen in ranks of former Chicago sports guys turned goofs?

There are those people who like to rag on one-time Chicago White Sox shortstop and manager Ozzie Guillen as some sort of irresponsible goof – somebody who despite his significant athletic accomplishments for Chicago ball clubs is just too much of a goof to have around.

How does not seeing racial oppression ...

But after learning of one-time Chicago Bears tight end and head coach Mike Ditka’s latest railing on national television, I can’t help but think that Ozzie is nowhere near as absurd.

FOR THE RECORD, Ditka (who led the Chicago Bears to their only Super Bowl victory ever back in 1986) was on the Westwood One pregame show prior to the Monday Night Football game featuring the Bears against the Minnesota Vikings felt compelled to ignore the questions about the Bears’ ongoing struggles to find a competent quarterback.

Instead, he wanted to rant about the fact that many professional football players feel compelled to SUPPORT the protests taking place in recent weeks during the National Anthem rituals that take place prior to pro football games.

Those protests started last year with one player trying to express his concern about harassment of individuals based on race. When President Donald Trump felt compelled to get involved in this issue with his nonsense talk about “firing” football players, those players started showing solidarity with their colleague.

Ditka made a point of saying he’d “bench” anybody who dared do such things on any team he coaches. But the part that gets the national attention was Ditka’s claim that, “There has been no oppression in the last 100 years that I know of,” adding later, “I don’t see all the social injustice that some of these people see.”

... compare to 'respect' for Fidel Castro?

IT’S NOT SURPRISING to learn that a professional athlete lives his life in a cocoon that isolates himself from the daily realities of our existence. I also don’t doubt these guys think their physical skills in playing a ballgame at a high level somehow makes them worthy of living life in such isolation.

He may be the guy who doesn’t read the papers, except for the sports section so he can know which sportswriter to complain about for writing something he chooses not to agree with.

But it would be an exaggeration to say we haven’t had oppression in the past 50 years – although at least now the law is such that the people who try to pull off the most extreme instances can be prosecuted, rather than thinking the law is on their side.

These two youngsters likely never realized ...

Or maybe Ditka is just one of those types who thinks that certain people are supposed to accept the fact that they’re entitled to receive a certain level of harassment from society as a large?

I THINK THIS puts Ditka in a comparable category with Guillen, who led the White Sox to a World Series title back in 2005 – a moment that for some Chicago sports fans is more significant than that Bears Super Bowl title.

Remember all the loudmouth incidents when Ozzie played for, and managed, Chicago. Like Ditka, Guillen later got a one-year stint managing/coaching elsewhere (Miami for Ozzie, New Orleans for Ditka) and now is to the point where his only sporting value is as an occasional commentator for broadcasts.

Sports fans in Miami still haven’t forgiven Ozzie for his saying all those years ago that he actually had a certain level of respect for Fidel Castro – which I’m sure they feel is as absurd as Ditka trying to claim that no one has been oppressed in this nation. Personally, I always thought of Fidel as more of a third-rate, petty tyrant than a true world threat.

Just because many of the individuals who are oppressed belong to groups whom Ditka and people like him would prefer not to have to acknowledge. Which is the truly offensive part of all this cheap talk.

 

... the highs, and lows, they would reach

PERSONALLY, I’M MORE offended by Ditka, merely because his rant is so ridiculously simplistic – as in it’s difficult to believe anybody could think of life as being so basic. I couldn’t help but notice a report that one-time star quarterback Joe Namath responded to Ditka by saying “da coach” ought to look up the meaning of the word “oppression” to realize it has occurred.

It makes me wonder if Ditka is now material for Saturday Night Live – the show where he once was idolized in those “Super Fans” sketches. Would those same fans now ponder whether Ditka has gone goofy in his old age?

Just like some are pondering whether Guillen has lost it in his middle age, to the point where the most recent report I saw about Ozzie was speculating whether he’d be considered for the Detroit Tigers managing job that is now open.

He’s not in line for it, no more than any team would seriously want Ditka hanging around their sidelines during game time. A sad ending for two of the most intriguing ballplayers-turned-coaches to be a part of the Chicago sports scene in our lifetimes.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: One major Ditka/Guillen difference -- Ditka is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, whereas few people took seriously Guillen for the Baseball Hall of Fame the one year he was actually on the ballot. Which most likely is evidence that the baseball version in Cooperstown, N.Y., deserves more credibility than the football version in Canton, Ohio.

Celebrity candidates a unique breed. Would you vote for Ventura for Prez? What about Erika for Congress?

I’ll confess to not fully understanding the concept of “celebrity” political candidates.

Sen. Ditka? Who's kidding whom!

 
By that, I mean the type of person who has accomplished something in some field that put them in the public eye. Which makes them think they can turn that public attention into votes to get themselves elected to political office.

HECK, THE PEOPLE of Minnesota got one-time pro wrestler Jesse Ventura for four years as their governor – and he’s inspired enough by that victory that he’s now going around talking about wanting to run for president come 2016.

With broadcaster Howard Stern as his vice-presidential running mate, nonetheless. Although I’ve also heard speculation that rocker Ted Nugent also is contemplating a presidential bid to espouse his love of firearms.

I don’t see either one of them seriously being capable of holding elective office, although I’m sure there are some knuckleheads in our society who will cast ballots for them just for kicks.

Which is what it all comes down to with these types of campaigns. I’m sure some will try to claim that Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns are the same thing in that he developed celebrity status while on the campaign trail that encouraged some to vote for him – but they really aren’t.

BUT THE FACT remains that we occasionally get these types of people thinking they are somehow fit for public office. And I can’t always predict how seriously they will be taken.

Take Mike Ditka, who actually had some Republican operatives back in 2004 trying to encourage him to run for the U.S. Senate seat from Illinois after GOP nominee Jack Ryan’s campaign fizzled out (due to the actions that occurred during his marriage to celebrity actress Jeri Ryan).

Ditka didn’t take the bait – thereby sparing himself a likely defeat to the very same Obama in his pre-presidential days who had already begun to establish the aura that has persuaded many people to cast their votes for him.



The Libertarian duo?

Although I find it humorous that Ditka in recent days has felt compelled to spew rhetoric implying he should have run – because he could have somehow spared us all the concept of a “President Obama.”

DOES DITKA THINK that sucking up to the ideologues by feeding their fantasies will somehow encourage the political operatives to consider him as a candidate for office in some future election cycle?

Or was Ditka just bored enough to the point where he felt compelled to share his fantasies with all of us. My own fantasies involve a Pulitzer Prize or two, but I don’t feel compelled to write rants telling you about the stories I could have covered that might have won me that top prize!

It makes me wonder why some people feel compelled to spout nonsense. Although I realize they’re trying to appeal to the kinds of people who don’t really understand government operations and probably resent the fact that government has influence over their lives.

Dumbing it down to the level of voting for a Ventura, or contemplating a Ditka may simplify it in their own minds – even if it would do nothing for public policy.

YET THE STANDARDS of fluff fluctuate.

 

I suspect many of the same people who want to take seriously the idea of a “Sen. Mike Ditka” are the same ones who are dumping on the congressional campaign of Erika Harold.

HAROLD: Seeking a higher title

She is the Miss America from 2003 (2002’s “Miss Illinois”) who has since graduated from Harvard, worked for a time as an attorney in Chicago, and has since returned to her hometown of Urbana so that she can seriously run as a Republican for Congress.

We in Chicago would have treated her like a complete joke if she had run a GOP campaign for one of the city’s congressional districts.

THE DENIZENS OF east-central Illinois are getting all worked up over the thought that Harold would take on freshman Rep. Rodney Davis, R-Ill. The ideologues want him to be able to build up seniority instead of having Harold dump him – even though any serious reading of her own philosophical beliefs indicate she sides with them on so many issues.

Davis, of course, is one of the GOP Congress members who faces harm due to the federal government shutdown. Which makes me wonder if Harold could capitalize on this.

 

Too bad she didn't wear an Illini t-shirt

Or will it be one of the Democrats seeking that post who will manage to prevail.

Because it seems that some people are just having too much trouble taking seriously the notion of a “Miss America” in the House of Representatives. I can’t figure if it’s her racial background (she’s not lily white) or just her gender (they’d love her as a politician’s spouse).

ALTHOUGH IT PROBABLY makes as much sense (if not more, considering Harold’s actual education and work experiences) than having a one-time New Orleans Saint coach in the Senate – which would have only one possible benefit.

It is about the only way we in Illinois would ever get a “Saint” amongst any of our government officials.

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