Will U.S. ballplayers resemble the peloteros of the Mexican League?

It’s always a bit of a jolt whenever I stumble across the baseball played in the Mexican League or any of the other professional leagues of Latin America – the ballplayers themselves are walking billboards.

No, they're NOT all named 'Coca-Cola'

Heck, in some cases the spot on a uniform jersey where we would expect to see a ballplayer’s name winds up being the brand-name of some company instead.

UNLESS YOU HAPPENED to believe that everybody playing for the team representing the Dominican Republic in the Caribbean Series was named “Orange.” Which, in actuality, is a company that provides wireless services and also sells the SIM cards that are often used by people in Latin American countries to make international telephone calls.

My point being that there already is a portion of baseball that views the uniforms their ballplayers wear as yet another place where advertising can be placed – thereby generating even more revenue for the respective ball clubs.

That trend is coming to the United States.

For it seems that Major League Baseball officials are calling it “inevitable” that the uniforms of the Cubs and White Sox – and all the teams they play against – will have advertising patches placed upon them.

Diablos Rojos de Mexico? Or Banamex?

IT’S NOT KNOWN whether they’d be on the shoulder or across the chest, or if there’d be an effort to make them subtle or incredibly garish so that they are the predominant image. Reducing the Old English “Sox” logo or the interlocking “NY” of the Yankees to an afterthought.

It seems like this can’t happen before 2022 because the players’ association would have to give their approval to having their million-dollar ballplayers be reduced to serving as walking, running and throwing billboards for whichever corporate interest pays the teams the most money.

The Elgin watch 'clock' atop Comiskey, … 

Now I know some people are insisting the idea of advertising across the chest of Mike Trout is somehow blasphemous. Would we have ever dreamed of Babe Ruth becoming a pitch for a product?

… or the Budweiser 'rooftop'' outside of Wrigley?

But to me, I can’t help but wonder why this hasn’t occurred long ago.

BALLCLUBS HAVE ALWAYS used their ballparks as a source of advertising income – allowing companies to place tacky billboards all over their outfield walls and scoreboards.

In some cases, creating images that are regarded as a part of baseball’s history.

Who can forget the old “Schafer” beer sign on the scoreboard of Ebbets Field in Brooklyn (the “h” lit up for a hit and the “e” for an error)? Or the old right field wall at Baker Bowl in Philadelphia, where the ad told us in no uncertain terms that “the Phillies use Lifebuoy” soap.

And any baseball fan worth their salt knows exactly what phrase was added on to the ad by a graffiti-ist.

HECK, EVEN IN Chicago, the old Comiskey Park scoreboard clock was an ad for Elgin watches. While one of my own memories of the first ballgame I went to as a kid was seeing the ad for Carta Blanca beer (which made the first time I actually tasted that cerveza brand a complete letdown).

To this day, baseball fans know the Phillies 'still stink' despite Lifebuoy

And while Wrigley Field denizens used to try to claim their ballpark maintained some sort of purity with no ads on the outfield walls, one can’t ignore that house across the street from left field that was turned into a giant Budweiser ad that everybody in the ballpark could see.

The point being that advertising is part of the character of baseball. And seeing how teams are eager to sell the naming rights to their stadiums themselves to the highest bidder, it probably is inevitable that the uniforms themselves will become space to be sold.

Which means we’ll probably get the day when fans will debate which players bear the most interesting advertising logos. And some smart-aleck will probably speculate that Ernie Banks couldn’t have been that special – nobody ever used his jersey for product placement!

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EXTRA: 8-8 a double historic date for Chicago baseball both sides of town

Future Hall of Fame pitcher Rich Gossage once joked he'd only wear the Sox shorts if given a matching halter top. But he wound up getting a save in the victory the Chicago White Sox acheved over the Kansas City Royals. 

Aug. 8 is one of those dates we’d otherwise ignore, but ought to acknowledge for the moments of baseball trivia it produces here in Chicago.

For it was on this date in 1976 that the Chicago White Sox first wore the version of a uniform that included short pants. There was a double-header that day, and the White Sox showed off their knobby knees during the first game -- in which they beat the Kansas City Royals.

THE SECOND GAME that date gave us a ball club reverting back to their long pants and losing ways of the ‘76 season, although the Sox did dig out the shorts again later in the month, and actually managed to beat the Baltimore Orioles 11-10 in 10 innings while wearing them on Aug. 21.

The date also became significant 12 years later when the Chicago Cubs tried to get cute in their first staging of a night baseball game at Wrigley Field. The game was scheduled for the date otherwise known as 8-8-88. The only problem was it wound up raining heavily that night and the game was called before they could get in enough play to make it an official ballgame.

Hence, the first night game ever played at Wrigley was actually on Aug. 9, 1988. That’s what happens when one tries to get cutesy – the baseball “gods” wreck havoc upon your plans for silliness.

 

Then the rain came falling from the skies, ending play after merely 3 innings

Does this mean that the baseball gods, by not hitting Comiskey Park with a tornado some 12 years earlier, secretly approved of the shorts scheme? Or just that night games at Wrigley are a true abomination that I’m sure the bulk of the Lake View neighborhood would still think true!

  -30-

No sale for Sale, even though many Sox fans liked the jersey giveaway

I find it ironic that the Chicago White Sox got themselves into a funk concerning their promotional giveaway from Saturday night.

 

The 'controversial' jersey

The ballclub had as its ballpark giveaway meant to attract fans to the game replica jerseys such as the team wore in the late 1970s. The ones of dark blue and white with the funky collars that were a ‘70’s take on what the team wore back when they were first created in the early 20^th Century.

I WAS AMONG the people who went to the ballgame (although I didn’t put up with the heavy rain that caused the game to be halted three times before ultimately being postponed until Sunday).

I saw for myself how there were several fans who were there specifically for the jersey giveaway (although to tell you the truth the jerseys being given away were cheap knockoffs of what the team actually wore in those days some four decades ago).

There were many people who, upon being handed the package containing the jersey couldn’t wait to open it and wear it – stripping themselves as quickly as possible of whatever shirt they were really wearing so they could change into their new freebie giveaway jersey.

 

This uniform has some interesting detail,...

For a team that perennially faces attendance issues (although the reality is that no team has a right to think they’re entitled to capacity crowds for every ballgame), the mood was a plus.

DESPITE THE HEAVY rains that came off and on, and the presence of Detroit Tigers fans who made sure to wear their own gear while working their own way around the ballpark.

 

...unlike this garish predecessor...

There just seems to be one person who couldn’t get with the program, so to speak. And that was White Sox starting pitcher Chris Sale – who probably was the other big reason that some fans chose the Saturday night game to show up at U.S. Cellular Field.

For he is arguably the best pitcher in the American League these days, and is one of the few assets the White Sox can claim as their own, and a reason to not totally count out their chances of competing for something resembling a championship this season.

 

...or this truly tacky successor

The plan was that the White Sox were going to wear the late ‘70s uniforms as well during the Saturday game – bringing to memory for those of us old enough to have see it such ballplayers as Francisco Barrios, Bill Nahorodny and Harry Chappas.

BUT DEPENDING ON whose report one reads, Sale either didn’t like the look or the feel of the uniform. He didn’t want to wear it.

And when team officials responded to his tantrum by telling him to just take the ball and pitch, he sliced up the special promotion uniforms with a knife. Meaning nobody was able to wear them.

The White Sox wound up wearing their uniforms they usually use for Sunday ballgames – the ones copied from the 1980s with the big red-white-and-blue stripe across the chest reading “SOX” that some have sarcastically dubbed as the “license plate” uniforms.

 

Maybe he didn't want to pitch in rain?

Now I know some White Sox fans don’t think much of the uniforms from the second coming of Bill Veeck (his wife, Mary Frances, designed them). They may well be willing to brand Sale as a hero for preventing the ball club from making a horrendous fashion statement.

WHILE OTHERS ARE quick to denounce him as a whiny baby – yet another ballplayer who thinks that what he does has some inherent value to society, rather than just serving as entertainment for the masses.

Personally, I always thought the lettering across the jerseys had some interest. The fact that the uniform has the White Sox wearing white socks also is a plus.

It will be interesting to see what kind of fan reaction he gets when he returns to play. Suspended for five days, he won’t be available to pitch again until Thursday which is the final game to be played in this week’s “city series” against the Chicago Cubs.

It could be more intriguing than the actual games – what with the way the Sox are struggling for that .500 winning percentage and would consider it a plus if they could be the team that knocked the Cubs off-stride in their own drive for a first National League pennant in 71 years.

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Keeping ‘em covered; will we have more hot, sweaty cops during summer?

Why do I suspect we’re going to see a lot more police officers in long-sleeved shirts while on duty, regardless of how hot the temperatures become.

This is my reaction to learning of the fact that the Chicago Police Department is implementing a new policy this week concerning tattoos.

SPECIALLY, OFFICERS ON duty aren’t allowed to show off any tattoos they might have.

They’re not going to be forced to have them removed. But they’re going to have to cover them up. Either with their uniforms, or with matching skin tone adhesive bandages or tattoo cover-up tape.

The order, according to the Chicago Tribune, was issued Monday, and takes effect Friday. No official explanation was given, but considering that it also makes mention of “conservative business attire” I suspect that someone in the higher ranks thinks of tattoos as being unprofessional in appearance.

Perhaps they’re considered a bit thuggish. Almost as though tattoos ought to be on the people who get arrested by police, rather than by the law enforcement officers themselves.

I’LL HAVE TO admit that I find it a bit off-putting to see police officers with tattoos poking below their short-sleeve uniform shirts. It seems to go against the image that police try to create for themselves of a unified force of people.

Which may be why the top brass with the Chicago P.D. would want such a policy. Either that, or require all officers to have identical tattoos. That would probably create a bigger rebellion than the notion of having to cover up one’s tattoos.

Although I’ll also admit that the most heavily-tattooed police officers I have ever seen have been with certain suburban police departments.

And those officers won’t be impacted by this new policy. Perhaps it means that the Chicago officers who have a problem covering up their tattoos can go get jobs in those surrounding municipalities, where the need for qualified cops overrides a concern about appearance.
 

Let's hope Mayor Rahm never feels compelled

SO WHAT SHOULD we think about this new policy? Which also has a provision for headgear – no stocking caps or ball caps, even if they bear the Chicago Police Department logo. Be honest, a ball cap on anything other than a ballplayer during a game does look ridiculous. Think New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in that recent photo from a charity ballgame in New York photo.

I’m sure some people are going to rant and rage about how this policy hits at what little individuality an officer might try to express. They also will complain about how monitoring an officer’s cap or tattoos does nothing to make them behave more professionally while on the job.

In fact, there already is (anonymous, of course) Internet commentary saying that officials ought to be more concerned about police brutality than about officer tattoos.

Although I’m not convinced about the latter. There are some people who manage to make it through the police hiring process even though they have character flaws that make it likely they will use their law enforcement authority poorly. Some of society’s bullies wind up becoming cops – just like some wind up becoming crooks.

WHILE OTHERS WHO get into law enforcement are those who have some noble aspects of their character and use police powers to benefit our society. I’m sure that some of those people, particularly amongst the younger types who now are of age to apply for police positions, are tattooed.

So perhaps this is an issue that needs to be addressed, even though some people who want to complain about everything will now choose to rant and rage about this.

Such a policy may be needed because of the prevalence of younger people who felt compelled to get something drawn on their bodies in their youth (or the youth-like years that they’re refusing to give up on).

And as for those people who managed to get something put on their face? Perhaps those cops will have to go around with cover-up bandages, forevermore telling people that they “cut myself shaving” that morning.

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64 + 75. Are we in for worse in 2012?

The real baseball season in Chicago begins Friday, yet the return of professional ball keeps making me think about the conditions that existed in this city some 36 years ago.

64-97



I’m referring to 1976, which isn’t officially the worst combined season for the Chicago White Sox and the Chicago Cubs. But it isn’t that far off.

FOR THAT SUMMER during which I was 10 years old, it was a truly dreadful time on the playing field. Sixty-four wins coming from Comiskey Park, while the Cubs were barely better at 75 victories. Both teams had losing records, and the most memorable aspects of those seasons had little to do with actual athletic activity on the playing field.

So while I understand, in theory, that if Adam Dunn hits even remotely close to what he’s capable of that the White Sox won’t be as completely dreadful as they were last season, the cynic in me wonders if what we’re going to see this season will be reminiscent of the summer of ’76 – when the Spirit of the Bicentennial didn’t impact our city’s baseball clubs.

Or maybe it did. Because I recall those teams playing like two collections of 200-year-old men whose athletic skills were far in the past. It literally was the year the White Sox were managed by Paul Richards (a holdover from the 1950s) and had 50-year-old “Cuban Comet” Minnie Miñoso become a four-decade player – actually managing to get a base hit in one of the three games he played in September of that year.

At 75-87, not much better



Is that what we’re in store for this year? It has me wondering if I’d have a better time this summer recalling that summer from just over a third of a century ago.

BECAUSE THERE WERE quirky moments that will forevermore be remembered by baseball fans. Take April 25 when the Cubs were at Dodger Stadium and a couple of fans got onto the playing field to make what they thought was a political statement – burning a U.S. flag.

Only to have Cubs center fielder Rick Monday charge over and snatch the flag away from them – a moment that the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y.,  chose as one of the 100 “classic moments” of the game.

This team card (from '77) shows the shorts



The White Sox got their own memorable moments on August 8, 21 and 22. Those were the three dates that the ball club actually wore those short pants with their uniforms that so many people like to call the “ugliest” uniform ever, and that they’d have you believe the White Sox wore for every ballgame of the mid-to-late 1970s.

Of course, everybody inclined to take the Chicago Cubs seriously (why, I don’t really know) is making much of the fact that Theo Epstein now runs their ball club, instead of the Boston Red Sox. They have hopes that new management will revitalize the team.

I CAN’T HELP but think the Cubs problems are so deep (the Red Sox were never as bad as their fans want to believe they were) that Epstein isn’t enough for a real revitalization.

For the return of Bill Veeck to the White Sox beginning in 1976 sure wasn’t enough to jolt that franchise. ’76 is arguably one of the ball club’s worst teams ever. With the exception of the following season, the rest of the decade was a collection of losing teams.

Will Harry look like a star compared to now?



Names such as Bill Nahorodny and Harry Chappas are what come to my mind when I recall the era. Although I’m starting to wonder if ’12 and the 20-teens will be just as mediocre.

Not that this mediocrity will keep the hard-core fans from still going out to the ballpark. For there is something about baseball when it is watched live that is entrancing – even in cases where the “home team” consistently manages to get its butt kicked.

THERE EVEN CAN be moments that are memorable on the playing field in those games.

Take 1976 in Chicago.

On April 17 at Wrigley Field, the Cubs lost to the Philadelphia Phillies 18-16 in a game that seems like a preview of the 23-22 loss to the Phillies in ’79. In that game, now-Hall of Fame member Mike Schmidt managed to hit four home runs, with the final one being the game winner in the 10^th inning.

The wind must really have been blowing out toward Waveland Avenue.

FOR THE WHITE Sox, July 28 was the unique moment in a bad season. That was the date the Oakland A’s, in their final seconds of glory in the Charlie Finley era, lost to the Sox, with pitchers John ‘Blue Moon’ Odom and Francisco Barrios combined to pitch a no-hit game.

It also was the season that two future Hall of Fame ballplayers both pitched for Chicago ball clubs – Rich Gossage in his last season with the White Sox and Bruce Sutter in his first season with the Cubs. Yet who remembers that fact?

So even amidst this season’s mass of mediocrity beginning Friday in Arlington, Texas (the Washington Nationals' 2-1 victory Thursday was entertaining, but really doesn't count), there are bound to be a couple of games that will be worth watching.

  -30-

Much adieu of Bears orange & blue

Perhaps it is just the ultimate evidence of how mediocre-to-dreadful professional baseball is expected to be this season.

They have evolved



We’re a day away from Opening Day (although Chicago White Sox fans will correctly note that the season, for them, doesn’t begin until Friday), yet the Chicago sports scene seems more concerned about the Chicago Bears – who don’t show their faces around Bourbonnais until July!

OF COURSE, THE big deal this time around is that the National Football League has signed a deal with Nike to provide uniforms for all professional football teams for the next five seasons.

That is a switch away from Reebok, which had been providing the uniforms.

Some teams have essentially the same look, while some tried to use the new manufacturer as an excuse to shake things up. Although all teams are getting a new style meant to be tighter jerseys and lighter-weight pants.

The whole point is supposed to be to make the football players feel lighter-weight while they are stomping around on the gridirons that comprise the NFL.

FOR THE CHICAGO Bears, it is going to take a double-take to realize the differences. They’re really not obvious at first glance.

The “GHS” that the Bears have worn on their jerseys as a tribute to team (and NFL) founder George Halas is now bigger and placed on the sleeves.

While the uniform numbers that used to be on the sleeves are now on the shoulders. Although I suspect most people just look for the big number on the back to figure out which player is which when they’re all piled up like dirty laundry following a tackle.

But the bottom line is that we still have a team named “the Bears” dressed in blue and orange (as though anyone has ever seen a multicolored bear in their lives).

THEY’RE STILL THE team that took its colors from the orange and blue of the Fighting Illini of the University of Illinois (Halas’ alma mater).

It is a common mistake for people to make. Just last week, I saw someone all dressed up in Bears garb who got sort of ticked when passersby assumed he was wearing his “Illini colors.”

Considering that this happened at the height of the NCAA Division I basketball tourney and the Illini didn’t even come close to qualifying, I can understand why a Bears fan would think it illogical anyone would mistake the two.

But the reality is that at first glance, there isn’t much to differentiate them – even though I’m sure the Illini alums who stumble across this commentary will claim they are predominantly orange, while the Bears are overwhelmingly blue.

THE BOTTOM LINE is that the only real difference is that all the NFL jerseys are now going to have the Nike “swoosh” on them – indicating that they are official NFL garb and not some sort of knockoff counterfeit merchandise.

Which makes me think the only real purpose behind the NFL making such a big deal Tuesday out of jerseys was to encourage everybody to go out and spend more money to get themselves an official modern jersey – or else run the risk of looking like a cheapskate living in the past by wearing something bearing the Reebok brand logo.

I detest this kind of attitude. If I were a football fan of any type, I’d go out of my way NOT to get a new jersey.

And I must admit to kind of enjoying the misery that Nike felt when quarterback Tim Tebow was traded to the New York Jets and sports fans there felt the need to rush out and buy Jets jerseys with Tebow’s name – and the Reebok logo.

TEBOW HIMSELF WILL never wear such a jersey, but I am pleased to see Nike lose out on a few merchandise dollars. Who knows. Maybe the Reebok-logo Tebow jerseys have potential to become collectible some day?

Would you buy this?



Although none of these new jerseys are the most hideous sports sight of the week.

For that, we have to go to south Florida where the Miami Marlins opened their new stadium with baseball exhibition games against the New York Yankees, and we got subjected to the sight of manager Ozzie Guillen in a jersey of bright orange!

That might be the ugliest thing in all of sports -- even moreso than the all-red jerseys and pants the Cleveland Indians wore in the mid-1970s. You have to go back to the 1930s to find the Bears wearing anything comparable.

  -30-

A DAY IN THE LIFE (of Chicago): Kirk wants his Blackberry! Why?

I got my big chuckle for this week from the reports coming from Northwestern Memorial Hospital – the ones that were meant to reassure us that Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., has a good chance at recovering from the stroke it appears he suffered this past weekend.

KIRK: Gimme my Blackberry?!?

For it seems that one of the first things that Kirk did after undergoing surgery meant to reduce the damage that could be caused by the stroke was to ask for his Blackberry.

IT SEEMS THAT the senator from the North Shore suburbs was more than eager to get back to work – even though it will be several months (if ever) before Kirk can claim to be fully recovered.

But the idea of asking for a Blackberry?

Personally, I have been carrying a Blackberry for nearly a year – and there are times I wish I could get away with flinging the thing into the Chicago River (or maybe Lake Calumet).

If I were in recovery from a serious medical condition, I’d want to use the time to get away from constant communication with certain people.

BUT THAT’S ME. As for Kirk, the officials at Northwestern Memorial seem determined to give us optimism. On Wednesday, they were saying they were “hopeful” about the senator’s long-term prospects.

For the talk we have been hearing is that the stroke he suffered affected the side of the brain that impacts his body movement – NOT the side that impacts his mental state.

Which means that his continuance in the U.S. Senate will depend on whether he can continue to move about. It means the image he tries to project of himself as a vigorous warrior is a thing of the past. Then again, he certainly couldn’t be any worse off than some of the near-centennarians (Strom Thurmond, for example) who have served in the Senate.

What else is notable these days on the slushy shores of the southwestern corner of Lake Michigan?

WILL HOOSIER GOPers TURN SUPER BOWL SUNDAY INTO LABOR CELEBRATION?: The Indiana House of Representatives gave its approval to a measure turning the Hoosier State into the 23^rd state to have “right-to-work” laws on its books.

With the state Senate expected to follow suit on this measure in the near future, there is some speculation that final approval of this measure by Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (who got some national attention by giving the GOP rebuttal statement to the State of the Union address this week) could literally be timed to coincide with the Super Bowl – which this year is being played in Indianapolis.

It would figure that some ideologues would want to turn an occasion for sports celebration into an excuse to make their anti-organized labor statement even louder than it will be regardless.

Personally, I’d like to think most people will be disgusted by any attempt to turn this over-bloated sports event into a political statement. Then again, I also think many people are disgusted that the Super Bowl this year isn’t being played at some warm-weather locale.

WHITE SOX TO MAKE SUNDAYS PARTICULARLY GARISH: I never cared much for those bright-red pinstriped uniforms the Chicago White Sox wore back in the early 1970s. Yet it seems the ballclub in 2012 will resurrect them.

The White Sox said on Wednesday they plan to wear uniforms modeled after those get-ups for all 13 of their Sunday home games. Since they won’t be using road uniforms, we won’t get to see the light blue-with-red trim jerseys with a zipper up the front that the ballclub used to wear in other cities.

I couldn’t help but notice the Chicago Tribune’s write-up about this act made references to Dick Allen – the slugger who had his best season ever (American League Most Valuable Player for 1972) while wearing this jersey.

Yet I can’t help but think of two other ballplayers from that era who wore those uniforms – Bucky Dent and Rich Gossage. Both were products of the White Sox system and it was apparent that both were exceptional ballplayers while in Chicago. Yet both had their glory days later in the decade playing for the New York Yankees. To me, that inability to keep talent is what is glorified by this get-up.

  -30-

White Sox “shorts” aren’t even ugliest thing worn by team, let alone baseball

The Miami Marlins have a new stadium, a new manager (our very own Ozzie Guilen) and now new uniforms, whose use of teal, orange and black seems to be offending some baseball fans.

New uniforms for Miami. How do they rank on the "tacky" scale? Photograph provided by Miami Marlins.

There are a lot of people who are complaining that these outfits for next year are downright ugly. Personally, they don’t move me one way or another.

BUT THIS HAS caused several sportswriters (most of whom wouldn’t have a clue about fashion) to decide to write about the ugliest uniforms ever worn by ball clubs.

And invariably, everybody is picking  the same getup as THE ugliest outfit ever – those uniforms worn for three games late in the 1976 season by the Chicago White Sox.

You know, when Bill Veeck decided to have his cellar-dwelling ballclub (which struggled to avoid losing 100 games) wear shorts along with their pullover jerseys and the white socks.

U-G-L-Y! Garish! Disrespectful to the game of baseball! And how did those guys manage to slide into second base without scraping up their thighs something fierce?

ALL OF WHICH strikes me as a whole lot of nonsense talk. That particular variation on the team uniform from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s wasn’t the tackiest thing that was worn by a ballclub during that decade (the Cleveland Indians all-red outfit and any of those gold-and-brown combo worn by the San Diego Padres fight it out for my vote).

Are those Hall of Fame knobby knees hiding?

It certainly isn’t the ugliest outfit that the White Sox themselves have ever worn (my nomination goes to the uniforms that replaced them back in the 1980s – the ones with the big stripe across the chest that read “SOX” and uniform numbers on the pants).

Perhaps my real point is that I am weary of pieces that make more of the shorts than they’re personally worth. For they truly were nothing more than a Bill Veeck stunt.

Something that we were supposed to see and get a chuckle from. It was something different from a day at the old ballpark. Which usually was the point of a Bill Veeck stunt – to create an atmosphere where no one really knew what to expect, and where something bizarre could occur on any given day.

Ugh!!!!! (Outfit, not ballplayer)

WHICH WOULD BECOME the motivation to go out to a game.

Personally, the best photograph I ever have seen of the White Sox in those uniforms was one showing outfielder Chet Lemon at first base, with coach Minnie Miñoso standing nearby.

But because of the angle, we only get to see Lemon’s knobby knees – and only a sliver of Minnie’s aging bones. How much you want to bet some clown brings up this moment as “evidence” of why Miñoso doesn’t belong in the Baseball Hall of Fame (he’s up for consideration this year, along with Ron Santo of the Cubs).

But they truly were a stunt. Not a regular uniform. So to claim they were the ugliest uniform? No way.

AND AS FOR those who want to argue that the jerseys worn with the shorts were tacky, I’d disagree.

Preserving the shorts for posterity



I always liked the old-style lettering spelling out “Chicago,” plus the fact that these uniforms had the White Sox wearing white socks (which they haven’t done so in decades). And I always liked the idea that the color scheme (dark blue and white) and general look were meant to copy the original uniforms that the White Sox wore back when they were created in 1901.

A 1970s touch to the turn-of-the-century fashion. It certainly was more intriguing than those efforts to get garish color schemes into the game. The Oakland A’s and Houston Astros succeeded in doing so. But other ball clubs were just downright tacky.

The ugliest Chicago baseball outfit?

I know I’m not the first person to comment on the sight of one-time rotund slugger Boog Powell in the all-red getup of the Indians being a hideous one. But it didn’t do any more for Jackie Brown, or any of his Indians teammates.

IT’S JUST TOO garish, too much of one color – which is also why I am bothered by those multiple shades of brown used by the Padres way back when. Way too overdone. They both make anything the White Sox have ever worn look downright subdued.

Although perhaps it gets topped by those mid-1970s uniforms worn by the Chicago Cubs on the road – the light-blue with white pinstripes. That is the ultimate “ugh” in my mind! Then again, maybe it was just the sight of pitchers Rick and Paul Reuschel wearing them that creeped me out!

Besides, those uniforms with shorts got their own immortalization from Topps Chewing Gum, which when putting out its set of baseball cards for the following season used a White Sox team shot that showed an entire ballclub in short pants. When will you ever see such a sight again?

Which may well mean that Veeck’s stunt must still be considered a success – people are still talking about those otherwise-completely forgettable ballgames from 35 seasons ago?

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