Insulting My Fanhood
My 2-day stint at first place in Dudo League Baseball is over. But I remain upbeat about my team.
After Tuesday night's debacle at the Sox game, and reading Piya's blog, I have been thinking about my Sox fanhood. As many of you know, baseball is my favorite sport and the Sox are my favorite team. But in the past few years, I have found it harder and harder to support them as a fan.
The toughest thing for me is not when the Sox lose. Of course, I love to see them win, but I could still love my team and follow them religiously if they were in last place. What bothers me the most is that there are literally zero players on the Sox that I like. I used to like Frank Thomas, about 10 years ago when he was good and I didn't know he was a jackass, but since then I have hated him more and more with each passing season. I never liked Billy Koch, Flash Gordon, or even Bartolo Colon, either, and those happened to be our top 3 signings this season. My hate for Koch has intensified already, as it's less than 3 weeks into the season and he's blowing big saves.
The rest of the guys, I am pretty indifferent to. Magglio, Buerhle and Konerko are good players, and Crede has potential. But I couldn't really say I love watching any of them. It's been a while since there was a Sox player I liked. I thought Mike Caruso was gonna be awesome, but then he showed why there are no good lefty shortstops in the league. And I was starting to like Ray Durham more, but then my best friend Kenny Williams (worst... GM... ever) traded him away.
In any team sport, and I think in baseball more than any other, the human factor is so very important. Okay, so in some cases (Yankees, Braves, Lakers) teams can win on pure talent alone, but I really believe the best way to go is to build team chemistry and play together as a whole. Some good examples in the past few years are the Angels, the Twins, and this year's Royals. Not only do they win, but they're a lot more fun to watch too.
But "chemistry" seems like a foreign word to the Sox. We have no clear leader on this team. Our players don't seem to be focused on winning, nor do they show hustle. This shows that they don't care about letting down their teammates. We lack solid fundamentals in fielding, baserunning, etc., which is at least partly the fault of Jerry Manuel and the coaches.
We've had no shortage of prospects in a pretty good farm system, but so few of them seem to develop into true star players. Meanwhile, Kenny gets these big name players in the offseason and hopes that they the team will magically mesh together, all of a sudden.
Then we have Jerry Reinsdorf. I'll give him some props for at least showing some effort to spend money and improve the team, but he's still a putz overall. I'm still a little pissed that he didn't put more effort into making New Comiskey a better ballpark from the start, at a time when really nice fields like Camden Yard and Jacobs Field were also being built. And this year, he dumped one of the oldest names in baseball and made our stadium "US Cellular Field"*. As if the White Sox tradition and personality weren't dry enough already.
So they wonder why Sox fans don't show up to games. No, it's not because we're still bitter about the strike. No, it's not because of the neighborhood. No, it's not even because the stadium is unfriendly or because they raised prices for parking. It's because the team is just not worth paying to watch. I mean, I still follow the Sox on TV, and I've still been going to some games, but I would go so much more if they gave me a reason to get excited about being at the park.
They could do the Jumbotron pizza races, plane races, which-cap-is-the-ball-under game, and Kiss Cam all they want. They could have all the promotions you can possibly think of. They might even try making parking free with ticket stub and reducing the price of hot dogs to under $3. But all that's gonna do is probably attract more of the lowlifes who just wanna get drunk, run on the field, and do something stupid. True Sox fans go to the park for good baseball, not for all the other stuff.
The fact is, what we true fans really want is a team to get behind and cheer for, one that will make us actually want to get off our couches and drive to the field to root them on. We need more of the players who show leadership by example on the field, who are friendly to the media and make an effort to show appreciation to the fans. We'd like to see people hustle to first base, slide headfirst into home plate, and dive for groundballs. We want to see high fives, rally caps, or jumping out of the dugout to watch a home run.
You can't expect us to pay to see a team that blows leads late in the game, with guys who can't lay down a bunt, and who get caught stealing for the final out when you're down 3 runs anyways. It's just not right.
Hopefully we see improvements in the Sox organization sometime soon. I say we get rid of Frank Thomas and Kenny Williams for starters and see where it goes from there. Maybe dump Jerry Manuel too, for good measure. I don't care, waive the whole team and call up your minor league affiliate. I bet they're more entertaining to watch anyways.
I guess in the meantime, I'm gonna have to reluctantly follow my team and hope for the best. I still have faith that we can win this year. It's just not an easy time for me to be a Sox fan, that's all.
*****
US Cellular happens to be on my "list" too, which includes Structure and Home Depot. Me and my sister used to have PrimeCo. It sucked, so eventually I switched to Cingular and she switched to VoiceStream. But for some reason, when we quit, they kept a one-cent balance on my account. Now, Voicestream is T-Mobile and PrimeCo is US Cellular, but throughout all this time, PrimeCo/US Cellular have been sending us bills for $.01 every single month. We've called more than once to have them fix this, but obviously they never do because the bills keep coming.
I think next week I am gonna stop into the US Cellular store nearest me with a baseball bat and ask them not-so-politely to fix my balance and terminate my account. Maybe I'll bring a bucket of pennies and fling them at the employees.
*****
Update on the pants: I tried the "Goof-off" stuff on my pants based on Rich's comment, but I think, like he said, the paint was already brushed deep into the fabric beyond repair. Thanks for the suggestion anyways, though, it was worth a try.
On the plus side, Goof-off has a nice gasoliney smell. It gave me a nice dizzy and high feeling as I went to bed last night.
