VAfan

In case anyone has missed my post about my Sell the Team, Jerry! book on Amazon, I encourage you to check it out. It is a thorough history of the 44 years of Sox mismanagement by JR. It does have one bright spot. My 36 page recap of the magical 2005 World Series season.

I hope it enticed you to buy it! And review it once you have. Thanks.

Yes, that is a direct quote from the book. When you have the book, feel free to share other quotes with Sox Talk if you like. And anything else. I hope enough people here read it to have a good discussion. Then leave a review on Amazon please. Thanks!

Thanks. Chris Lanuti of Sox in the Basement interviewed me. Please write a review when you read it.

Both the paperback and hardback just posted. Order away!

Both versions just posted on Amazon. See the post above for the link. Thank you!

My book is now available in 3 formats on Amazon -- eBook, paperback, and hardback. Here's the link. Please leave a review here. Though I stand by my opening post about being willing to send a free PDF copy to anyone who messages me with their email.

It depends on Amazon making it live. I uploaded it about 24 hours ago. Could take a day or two more. I will post here when it's live. I also uploaded a hardback version that might take a bit longer. Thank you.

Very funny! Yes, I got a few things wrong. Probably the biggest was defending the La Russa hire. I've seen the light!!

Hardcopy, which I've uploaded to Amazon. It usually take a couple of days to go live. Thank you for getting the book!

Hello Sox Talk bloggers. At the beginning of last year, I swore off my allegiance to all the sports teams I had followed since I was a kid, including the White Sox. And I've pretty much held to that. But with the horrific and comical season the Sox just finished, I decided to write a book about Jerry Reinsdorf's 44-year mismanagement of the White Sox. The book name is the title of this post. You can find the ebook on Amazon. Here's the link. The paperback will be up in a day or so. I'm giving away free copies of the book to members of Sox Talk because this has always been my White Sox blog home. You just need to message me your email address so I can send you a pdf copy of the book. All I ask is that if you like the book, you give me an honest review on Amazon. Here's that link. The book is a decade-by-decade review of all the incompetence of Reinsdorf's oversight of the team. Believe it or not, the "Sell the Team, Jerry!" title came to me in a dream. I wasn't even aware that was the name of the fan campaign to oust Reinsdorf, because I don't live in Chicago. But I have followed the Sox all these years, so this is the inside view of an avid fan and former Sox blogger on this site. The book is not all negative. I included my 10,000 word personal recap of the magical 2005 World Series winning season in an Appendix. So you can relive some joy too. I hope the book provides fodder for the ongoing campaign to oust JR, which has already forced Reinsdorf to give up his "never selling" mantra. With more pushing, we might get him to sell. But it will need to be to the right owners, not someone like Reinsdorf who threatens to move the Sox to leverage a new ballpark in the South Loop.

I've been a sports fan nearly all of my life. I was born in Indiana, but after my mother divorced and remarried, we moved to Evanston where I started school. I think the first team I rooted for was the Cubs. But I gave them up after the 1969 collapse to the Mets and became a White Sox fan in 1970. My first baseball game was at Wrigley, but I went to many more Sox games. So for 53 years I have been a Sox fan. 2005 was a magical year for the Sox, and totally unexpected. I wrote, and have posted the link on Sox Talk, a 17-page tribute to that 2005 Sox team. There's no question that was an exciting year. I don't live in the Chicago area anymore, but I sought out Sox fans to watch the World Series together and had a blast. In around 1966, I started rooting for the Dallas Cowboys, so I've been a Cowboys fan even longer. And, unlike the Sox, they had tremendous success under Tom Landry. But that lasted only until 1995 and since then, they haven't even made an NFC Championship game. Now almost 30 years of falling short. I was also once a big NBA fan. First of the Bulls of the era with Chet Love, before MJ. Then, after moving to Seattle, of the Supersonics, who won a title in the late 1970s. I never got too much into hockey, though I recall listening to the Blackhawks on the radio. But I never really had a team. At some point, I started to break my infatuation with sports teams. First to go was the NBA, which I stopped liking because the NBA finalists could be easily picked before the season even began. The Supersonics were no more, and I never picked up another team. I liked the MJ Bulls, but didn't live in Chicago, so I never got too close. My mother, on the other hand, was a bit of a fanatic. I don't remember the year, but it was when Gary Payton and Karl Malone joined the Lakers. That was it for me. The Dallas Cowboys were next, but the 58 year hold they have had on me isn't easy to break. Still, I haven't paid any attention to them since they lost again in the playoffs. Will I pick it up again in the fall? I hope not. I want to keep my resolve and let them go. Now it's the Chicago White Sox. Last year really broke my connection with the team. And this year? Well, it's the same old same old. What I find is that it's mostly pain and stress to follow a team that isn't doing well. All you tend to see is the disappointment, mistakes, and failures. And who needs that in their lives? There's really no pleasure in rooting for a particular team any more for me. And if you can free yourself from that, then it's fine to watch sports for what it is. Take the concern about the outcome out of the equation and you can see the agony and ecstasy as just part of what makes us human beings. So I just thought I would pen this to see if other people are feeling this way. And also to strengthen my resolve to be done rooting for any particular teams any more. I'm too old to want to carry around the stress that comes up from rooting. The highs no longer come anywhere close to making it worthwhile to stress about the outcome. I believe I'll be happier this way. Anyone else? *************** P.S. The other topic I thought about writing was whether the Sox need to start over again. But that would just be filled with a lot of angst. Instead, I'd rather just let go.

It's only a few games, but already Pedro Grifol has left Michael Kopech and Lance Lynn in as starters while they got shelled. Why does that remind me of Ozzie? Because Ozzie's philosophy was to make his starters give him 100 pitches regardless of whether they had their stuff that day or not. Today, nobody gets to 100 pitches, but making a starter who doesn't have it go 80-90 pitches or more is essentially the same thing. I recall a story about Ozzie and Jon Garland. Garland was skittish. If he got into trouble, he would start looking into the dugout expecting the hook. The story I recall is that Ozzie came out and said "why are you looking into the dugout? Are you expecting me to take you off the hook? This is your mess. Clean it up." (Something like that.) He made Garland realize he wasn't going to get relieved just because he got into trouble. He had to learn how to get out of it. Made him a much better pitcher. Plus it saved the bullpen. I think Grifol might think the same way. Game's out of hand anyway. As long as the starter isn't hurting themselves, make them learn how to get out of trouble, and save a thin bullpen that hasn't pitched very well itself. Not much of a track record to go on, but I'm okay with that approach. In 2005, it allowed White Sox starters to post something no team is ever going to come close to matching ever again. 4 complete games in a row in the ALCS. Won't happen at any point in any season ever again. And in the 5th game, the bullpen pitched 2/3 of an inning. 5 games, 2/3 of an inning from the bullpen. Ozzie helped turn his starters into aces. We'll see how Grifol's approach works with this staff.

I have not been in this topic. But it just occurred to me that Rick Hahn is probably the person most responsible for hiring Pedro Grifol. So if Grifol works out, Hahn will deserve a lot of the credit.

I thought Moncada should have been in the #3 hole before the season started, based on what he showed in the WBC. He has a higher ceiling then Benintendi. I would go Anderson, Robert, Moncada, Eloy, Grandal, Vaughn, Benintendi, Andrus/Gonzalez, Colas. Robert will come around, and should steal a lot of bases. I leave him #2. I'm putting the 2 slowest guys together in Grandal and Vaughn. Grandal is hitting well enough to reprise his 2021 season. You could swap him with Benintendi if you wanted to. I just think his power and OBP will play better in the 5 spot. Colas deserves to hit higher, but I'm just splitting up the lefties and so I don't have 3 RHs in a row at 9, 1, 2. I wouldn't hesitate to hit Zavala in the same spot as Grandal. His bat has been amazing.