Beisbol a reminder this week’s weather isn’t permanent, but Sox/Cubs fan distaste for each other not fade away

On this wintry Wednesday when the arctic chill is taking a Midwestern vacation and giving us the potential of wind chills making it feel like it’s 50 degrees below zero, I’m taking my relief from thoughts of how it isn’t that far off before we have the return of springtime and baseball.

Upcoming reminders of baseball … 

Seriously.

I TOOK PLEASURE in the fact that officials were able to reschedule the Caribbean Series, with only a minimal delay. Real live championship-level baseball will be played beginning Monday.

… and the return of springtime

For those of you to whom the thought of championship ballclubs from Latin America is just a little too alien to contemplate, consider that both of our city’s professional ballclubs have held their winter fan conventions – and both managed to spew rhetoric instigating their fan bases into distaste for each other.

From Chicago Cubs infielder Kris Bryant calling St. Louis “boring” (as in the most boring city he visits during the season), to Chicago White Sox outfielder Nicky Delmonico responding to a question about the “most annoying fans” in baseball by saying, “Cubs fans.”

Nicky (left) already knows truth of Cub fandom

These are moments not quite as intense as that 2006 slugfest on the field between catchers A.J. Pierzynski and Mike Barrett. But in terms of getting the fans all worked up, they rank up there somewhere near all the cheap shots one-time White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen took at Wrigley Field (“rat infested museum” may be the nicest thing he ever said).

BRYANT: Thinks St. Louis is boring?

AND THE FACT that Bryant and Delmonico felt compelled to keep the rhetoric flowing is merely evidence that the hostile feelings the teams have toward each other are not only ongoing, but they’re on their way back.

By early April, the two ball clubs will be again playing games that count – with spring training set to begin in just a matter of a couple of weeks down in the deserts of Arizona.

I'd argue Cincinnati choice make it lamer

Literally, right after the Caribbean Series – which is the annual championship played by the top teams of the professional leagues in the Dominican Republic, Mexico, Puerto Rico and Venezuela, along with Cuba and Panama. Venezuela was supposed to be host, but officials wound up moving it.

TO PANAMA CITY, where games will be played at the Estadio Rod Carew. When combined with long-time New York Yankees pitcher Mariano Rivera (a Panama native) getting inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame this year, it would seem 2019 will be a memorable year for fanaticos de beisbol in Panama.

Yes, I’ll actually be making a point to try to watch the games. The sight of real, live baseball being played during winter is something I get a kick out of. These games beginning Monday and running through the week will be a sporting kick to help tide me over until the resumption of play.

Stadium will host baseball next week

Although for some people, it’s going to be the ongoing verbal sparring between the Chicago fans as they accept the fact that the Bears are through for the year, and both the Bulls and Blackhawks are too pitiful to waste much time on.

So is St. Louis really “boring,” as Bryant puts it? Or are the Cardinals fans (the ones who openly boast they're the 'best fans in baseball,') correct when they say Bryant and other ballplayers who engage in cheap shots are “losers.”

PERSONALLY, I’D THINK Cincinnati would be a more depressing place to have to visit – largely on account of the local fan base wishing to forevermore think Pete Rose is heroic in nature. And not just a guy with a gambling problem who can’t quite acknowledge that reality.

Panama's other reason to celebrate

As for Delmonico’s thoughts, I’m not surprised that Cubs fans would be bothered – largely because they go through life thinking that everybody the world over comprehends their absurd support for a team that for so many years was pathetic on the field.

Which isn’t different than them trying to diminish St. Louis as being “boring,” almost as though they think the world of baseball is all about themselves and no one else.

When it’s really so much bigger than the activity of Clark and Addison. Such as the games running from Monday through Feb. 10 that will produce a Latin American champion – with the first spring training exhibitions scheduled for just two weeks later!

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Baseball taught me about differences between people’s skills, character

We’re at the point now where it seems we get nearly a daily addition to the list of people in prominent posts who think that women are supposed to swoon over the very thought of their sexuality.

Ultimate gap between skills, character?

Personally, I’ve lost track of who’s actually on the list – and tend to notice many people go out of their way to highlight those individuals whose politically partisan leanings are counter to their own.

AS THOUGH PEOPLE who agree with them on other issues can get caught up in what some have dubbed “perv-gate” and be forgiven.

But for those whom their real hang-up is something unrelated – a professional death to them, and perhaps a fantasy vision of castration as well.

We’re at the point where I’m giving up on trying to keep track as to who got a little too handsy with a female colleague, or who felt it absolutely essential to expose their genitalia out of some delusion that the lady would think of the sight as the highlight of her life.

And, in fact, I’m starting to think that it’s a good thing I’m a big fan of professional baseball.

BECAUSE IT HAS exposed me to the reality that these ballplayers who use their physical skills to play a boy’s game often have mental hang-ups that make it seem as though their emotional development was arrested at about age 13.

Still some humor in old Franken bits

I remember the way I behaved back when I was that age, and in retrospect I wonder how those fellow-13-year-old females managed to put up with us overly-horny (but mostly incapable of doing anything about it) slobs.

Although it’s not necessarily limited to sexual thought.

My point is that I realized a long time ago that the guys who were more than capable of making a diving stop of a hard-hit ground ball to prevent it from getting through the infield for a base hit often were equally unskilled at the subtleties of life itself.

PERHAPS THE ULTIMATE example of this is Pete Rose, the one-time Cincinnati Reds star from their championship days of the 1970s who was an addicted gambler and whose habit got to the point where he was taking in so much money; while not reporting the extent of his winnings to the Internal Revenue Service.

Perhaps a Curry/Lauer confrontation justified?

He’s a convicted tax cheat, so to speak, who did a few months in prison. He continues to be denied admission to Baseball’s Hall of Fame – usually the ultimate recognition of athletic greatness. And for that matter, I remember the stories from when he was a ballplayer about the adulterous behavior on his part.

Then again, a lot of ballplayers I have heard of play around on “the road.” As in they’re young men traveling about from city to city, and fill the void of loneliness with whichever young lady happens to be available (and often willing).

The ability to hit .333 or smack 40 or so home runs on a regular basis doesn’t automatically make one a quality human being. Keep that in mind, and it makes it possible to keep following baseball.

IT MAKES ME wonder if a similar attitude ought to be applied to other people. Comedian-turned-Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., has his humorous moments (although I’ll admit to always finding his “Stuart Smiley” character annoying). I can’t really think less of his performing because he gets handsy with women.

Judicial robes add layer of creepiness to Moore instances

I actually think it is an issue where the women who were offended by someone else’s character toward them ought to deal with the issue themselves. I semi-seriously say they would have been justified in administering a knee-to-the-groin at the time of the incident.

I’d say that also applies to the work of now-former Today Show host Matt Lauer, or even that of Lake Wobegon creator Garrison Keillor. Why should we have ever thought of them as superior at anything – other than their work? And as for our president’s boorish behavior with women throughout the years, we all know he’s deficient as a human being. It didn’t stop him from winning an election!

We’ve all got our strengths and all got our flaws. Unless we cross over the line into criminality (which is potentially what U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of Alabama did with those underage girls all those decades ago). But that’s a different issue.

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Netting at the ol' ball game? Why not!

Do you want to provoke a serious argument with a fan of professional baseball?

This netting the last time I went to a ballgame in Gary, Ind., didn't stop me from seeing on-field action. Photographs by Gregory Tejeda

If so, bring up whether Pete Rose belongs in the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. Or whether baseball ought to get realistic and adopt the designated hitter in both of the major leagues.

IF YOU HAVEN’T aggravated enough people with those lines of inquiry, then bring up the idea of whether baseball stadiums ought to extend the screens that now exist behind home plate to stretch all the way around the playing field.

Should fans have to have some sort of netting between them and the playing field to offer some sort of protection from balls hit into the stands? Is the act of watching a baseball game so potentially hazardous that teams ought to offer their fans some form of protection?

The issue, which has cropped up in baseball fan debate sporadically in recent years, was raised to a higher level last week when a fan at Yankee Stadium in New York got hit by a ball hit into the stands. The statistical desire to show how far and how hard all home runs were hit was used to show that this particular foul ball was traveling at 105 miles an hour at the time the fan was hit.

Does anybody pay attention to signs like this?

It’s no wonder she had to be taken to an area hospital for some medical treatment.

THIS ISN’T EVEN a lone incident. For it seems that on Friday, a fan attending a Chicago White Sox game at Guaranteed Rate Field got hit in the mouth by a foul ball hit by Brandon Moss of the Kansas City Royals.

Do ball clubs think this sign is adequate protection?

White Sox officials were quick to point out that the fan did not have to be taken to an area hospital. Although the Associated Press reported that the fan was seen publicly for some time holding a napkin to her face at the spot where she got hit by the ball.

Now a Royal, his foul hit fan in mouth

This particular fan was seated about 30 feet behind the first base dugout being used by the Kansas City Royals. Which is a prime seat, but also provides just enough distance that some people could be naively conned into thinking they are far enough from the playing field to avoid being hit.

Now as things are now at Guaranteed Rate Field, there is a netting that stretches a few dozen feet high right behind home plate. But once you move down the foul lines, you’re exposed. A lot of foul balls can come whizzing your way, if you’re not paying attention.

WHICH MAY BE the real problem. Too many people go to ballgames, but really don’t pay attention to what’s happening on the field. Meaning a line drive could turn foul and whiz right by their head – and they wouldn’t notice until it’s too late.

The first designated hitter

Now I know some baseball fans who insist the reason they don’t sit in seats right behind home plate (aside from the fact they’re cheap and don’t want to pay the prime prices for such tickets) is because they don’t like the obstruction of their view of the game that the netting supposedly causes.

I don’t buy it. That netting usually tends to fade out of one’s view quickly enough, and perhaps those fans down the foul lines need to be protected from their own vacuousness. Because the courts have previously ruled that line of small type ball clubs used to print on the back of tickets implying that people who attend games assume all risks of being injured doesn’t mean a thing.

Oh, Hell no!!!

I also know there are those who go to ballgames (usually on tickets provided by someone else, so they didn’t really pay the absurdly high prices of major league ball these days) who don’t pay attention. I’ve encountered too many of these knuckleheads who try to mock those people who DO pay attention to the playing field.

AS FOR THE idea of netting being unsightly, I recall when I attended ballgames at the old Vonachen Stadium in Peoria, Ill. Netting extended from one end of the grandstand to the other. All seats had

Maybe someday in Cooperstown?

something offering protection – although admittedly, the minor league grandstand only stretched from first base to third base and did not go all the way down to the foul lines.

This is something that ball clubs are going to have to take on just to avoid the perception that going to a ballgame is a hazard to one’s health. The reality is that modern-day stadiums with all their gadgets and attractions offer too many distractions. Perhaps netting from foul pole to foul pole is the price we pay.

Which I’m sure is a concept so radical for some people – perhaps even more upsetting to their concept of how things should be than my suggestions that it’s time the National League get off its high horse and realize the designated hitter has arrived and is part of the modern-day game.

And as for Pete Rose in the Baseball Hall of Fame? I’d sooner see Sammy Sosa there!!!

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How eager are national political people to jump on Chicago Cubs’ bandwagon?

So is the key to Donald Trump actually prevailing in Tuesday’s presidential election the notion that all those Chicago Cubs fans drunk with the glory of their favorite ball club actually winning something for once now turn around and vote for him?
 

Will Cubs fans back fellow fan Hillary?

That they’d pick Trump for president over Democrat Hillary Clinton – who’s actually a Cubs fan.

JUST A THOUGHT put into my head when I learned that Trump spokeswoman Kellyanne Conway was spreading thoughts about, letting people learn of the story that the FiveThirtyEight.com had published during the weekend headlined “The Cubs Have A Smaller Chance of Winning Than Trump Does.”

The website that likes to reduce everything that happens in our society down to mathematics wrote its piece back when the Cubs were one game away from losing the World Series. Who’d have figured Cleveland could be unable to win one more game in three tries?

Now that the Cubs have that World Series championship, Conway would like for us to think that Trump can overcome all the obstacles that various polls have shown stand in between Trump and the presidency.

Such as all those groups of voters that Trump has gone out of his way to demonize so that he could gain the political support of conservative ideologues and other crackpots in our society!

WHAT’S FUNNY IS that earlier this year, Trump tried putting some distance between himself and the Ricketts family, the wealthy people who own the Chicago Cubs and were once among the Republican types who publicly were denouncing Donald.

 

Or will they go with owner's fave Trump?

But the two sides have clearly made nice – what with the Ricketts family elder making sizable contributions to political action committees that are trying to get Republicans to overcome the contempt they may feel personally for Trump.

Although one of those political action committees is a group trying to get Latinos to take seriously the notion that they should cast ballots for Trump – even though Latinos have been amongst the groups that Trump has most vehemently demonized to try to get himself nativist votes.

 

Can soon-to-be former Prez get Cubs love?

Although the Latino Decisions group based in Miami recently came out with its own study saying that Trump likely was going to take about 18 percent of Latino votes come Tuesday – which will make him the weakest GOP presidential candidate ever when it comes to that segment of the electorate!

SO WHAT’S THE deal? The Ricketts family is now willing to blow the good will they’d gain from a Chicago Cubs victory by getting in bed with Trump?

Or could it be that the Ricketts family doesn’t realize the potential good will that could come from having their ball club be the preferential choice of the occupant of the Oval Office.

The Chicago White Sox certainly managed to gain some national attention from the fact that Barack Obama always vocally referred to himself as a fan – to the point where he ticked off Major League Baseball when he insisted on wearing his White Sox warm-up jacket when appearing publicly at an All-Star Game rather than a more-neutral jacket touting the game itself.

Do they not want a “President Hillary Clinton” who would think nothing of donning the baby blue of the Cubbies in public and talking up her own childhood memories of following the ball club?

Emanuel to get his moment on Friday

OR DOES TRUMP, whose own baseball loyalties seem to be tied to being seen sitting next to New York Yankees former owner George Steinbrenner at Yankee Stadium, have some dirt that he really can use on the Ricketts family – as he hinted way back in March?

Speaking of Obama, I did find it intriguing that he issued his own statement acknowledging his Sox ties but also congratulating the Cubs and offering to have their White House visit take place before he leaves office in mid-January.

Which would be odd, since the official visit of World Series winners usually takes place the following spring, which would let presidents Clinton or Trump be the one who gets to look dorky while trying to leech public attention off the ballplayers.

Does Obama want to steal this moment from Hillary? Would it wind up being a joint Obama/Clinton appearance with the Cubs? Or is Barack trying to ensure that it won’t be a President Trump that gets a moment of glory being seen in public with the baby Bruins?

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EDITOR'S NOTE: The fact that one-time baseball star Pete Rose signed that particular ball for Donald Trump is probably enough reason not to vote for him to be president. Particularly since it makes me wonder how much Rose charged Trump for his autograph, which may well be his most reliable source of income -- unless you really thought much of Rose's performance as a sports commentator during World Series broadcasts!

Political spin can rival a roller-coaster when it comes to making one ill

I couldn’t help but be amused by Bernie Sanders, whose presidential campaign put out a statement regarding his Sunday campaign rally at Ohio State University.

Putting his own spin on Trump dealings

“Boisterous, but peaceful,” was the way the Sanders people described the crowd of 7,500 who gathered to “feel the Bern,” so to speak. Also meant as a direct contrast to the crowds of nincompoops who have felt compelled to be at Republican Donald Trump’s campaign rallies.

ONE DAY AFTER the event that Trump wants to describe as Chicago “thugs” getting out of hand at the University of Illinois at Chicago, someone tried to rush the stage at an event in Dayton, Ohio.

That led to a public decision to cancel the event meant for Sunday in Cincinnati. Although it appears that the event wound up taking place anyway, the security was stepped up to the point where Trump was physically surrounded by local police and the Secret Service detail that has been assigned to his campaign.

Trump, it seems, already wants to behave as though he’s the head of a police state prepared to flex its muscle at anyone who dares to speak out against The Donald!

Trump, meanwhile, is keeping up the cheap talk about how the need for this overkill in security is because of the people being instigated by Bernie Sanders himself.

FOR IT SEEMS that Trump is one of those people who just can’t function in life if he isn’t the perpetual victim – some “meanie” is constantly out to get him. He’s being picked on so much that it’s the very fault of the people Trump singles out for abuse that he criticizes them.

And if by chance, Trump’s critics respond in kind – he claims HE’S the one being hurt!!!

Who has bigger victim complex; Donald ...

Bernie Sanders’ campaign appearance Sunday had its touch of self-serving silliness – what with contrasting how well behaved his crowd was compared to the Trump crowd.

But Trump’s victim complex is becoming so overbearing as to the point of being ridiculous. To the point where it is a miracle anyone can take seriously his presidential aspirations. And we have to seriously question the mental competence of anyone willing to publicly say they’d vote for the man.

... or Charley Hustle?

WHICH IS WHY it may be all too appropriate that Trump on Sunday got the endorsement of Pete Rose – the one-time Cincinnati Reds hitter and manager who himself has a victim complex at work. It would be like if Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs were to give a presidential candidate his political blessing

Rose is determined to believe he’s wrongly being denied his place in baseball’s Hall of Fame just as I’m sure Trump will take his eventual electoral loss as evidence of what is allegedly wrong with our society.

Even though I’d argue it will be the moment of clarity in a campaign cycle that has exposed just how delusional some of us in our society can be.

It also is the moment when the campaign cycle that resembles an amusement park roller-coaster ride will come to an end, and we’ll all feel a bit queasy at the memory of what we will endure in coming months.

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Would it change a thing if ‘Shoeless Joe’ were reinstated to baseball?

It has been 95 years since Joe Jackson played his last ballgame for the Chicago White Sox, and 63 years since he was even alive.

Still a baseball persona non-grata

Yet some people are determined to try to reinstate the man who got bounced from baseball following the 1919 World Series – which the White Sox lost to the Cincinnati Reds and for which Jackson was one of eight ballplayers later indicted on criminal conspiracy charges claiming he took money to lose ballgames.

OF COURSE, PEOPLE argue that Jackson was acquitted of those charges by a jury in Cook County, while others will claim that jury was so biased that their verdict was arguably more ridiculous than some people believe the “not guilty” verdict was for O.J. Simpson.

The problem becomes that whatever happened with the World Series that year and whether Jackson, or any, of the ballplayers took money from gamblers to lose happened so long ago that just about anybody who knew anything is dead.

This becomes a “paper trail” investigation that already came up with a result.

Which is why it would seem baseball officials aren’t about to do anything. Giving us such non-news headlines on Tuesday as “MLB won’t reinstate Shoeless Joe Jackson.”

THE SHOELESS JOE Jackson Museum that operates out of Jackson’s one-time home in Greenville, S.C., released a letter it received from baseball Commissioner Robert Manfred saying they don’t intend to do anything to change Jackson’s status.

The White Sox' all-time duo ...

“The results of this work demonstrate to me that it is not possible now, over 95 years since those events took place,… to be certain enough of the truth to overturn Commissioner (Kennesaw M.) Landis’ determinations,” which were that Jackson knew of efforts to throw a World Series and didn’t do anything to stop it.

Some claim that Jackson took $5,000 from gambling interests, but somehow managed to play well – coming up with numbers that indicate he didn’t stink (a high batting average, and the only home run of that World Series).

While others say this proves statistics don’t tell the full story, and in fact can be deceptive.

... won't become a trio anytime soon

ADMITTEDLY, THE JACKSON Museum has an interest – they’d like it if the guy they promote were to become an official part of baseball again. Rather than someone whom baseball would prefer to forget. Just like Pete Rose – who also has a lifetime ban from baseball for gambling (and a criminal conviction with six-month prison sentence for tax evasion).

Then again, I’m sure the White Sox would also like it if they could go back to publicly acknowledging that one of the greatest ballplayers ever wore their uniform – and that he could join Luke Appling and Frank Thomas as being among the greatest White Sox ever.

But aside from their marketing efforts, would it really change much. Would Jackson gain any points to his .356 lifetime batting average (second only to Ty Cobb’s .362)?

Would the White Sox gain any more wins to their lifetime career? It’s not like we’d get to change the 1919 World Series result and claim a victory over Cincinnati?

THERE WOULDN’T BE any one less person sneering or snickering at the White Sox for being the only team caught throwing a World Series (even though there have been rumors from other World Series and ballgames in general of that era having suspicious results).

Is Jackson plight more about backing Rose?

Or anyone thinking any less of Jackson from amongst those people who want to believe that Shoeless Joe would have been in the Baseball Hall of Fame decades ago – if only he hadn’t had that World Series stain on his record.

So I’m sure some people are going to be miffed at baseball officials for not being willing to resurrect this issue all these years later.

But barring the discovery of evidence that we can’t even conceive of at this point, it may be that baseball officials have the right idea in mind to just go forward. Rehashing the past never changes anything!

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