The Decline of White Sox Fan Culture

[bmags]

There is no real tl;dr of this post, though I'm sure I will write one part poorly enough that it will get argued about over and over. It's long and melodramatic. [edit: alternate possibility, nobody reads it ]

 

But throughout this year I have been working with the idea that something just feels different about being a sox fan than when I was younger. It's hard to figure out whether something like this is just personal - change in social interactions, change in social life - or something actually happening so I wanted to write a post on it.

 

First off, I'm 30. My white sox fandom becomes conscious around 93, takes a vacation after 95 strike, and comes back with a vengeance with the 2000 group and never stops. I basically grew up on this board, like many others. So it's very possible that older fans have seen this before.

 

How can you tell they're a sox fan

 

As the Cubs explode around us, it's hard not to notice the signs of being a cubs fan surpass ours. The W flag, that f****** song, the "try not to suck" shirts - whether or not these things make you want to vomit - there is a culture around being a cubs fan that extends beyond wearing a cubs hat. A shared experience of watching the team extending to memes and memorabilia.

 

When I talk about culture of being a white sox fan, this is what I'm talking about. In a time that is more meme-able than ever, it feels like there has been a huge dropoff of these shareable experiences as a sox fan, and anything that's tried is very corporate, very astroturf (melkman tshirts, soxmath)

 

In fact, the only thing that seems to hold us together at this point is misery. There were a lot isolated happenings this year that taken my themselves and put in more prosperous times, they'd have been no big deal.

 

But with Twitter, the sale jersey cutups, the drake laroche scandal, the Guaranteed Rate change, it all feels agonizing. And the only thing that grounded me to other sox fans was that, that we were miserable, that we couldn't stand being the butt of the joke.

 

"Hey you are pissed off, you must be a sox fan!"

 

This frankly just reminds me of Royals fans when I moved to Missouri in 2005. In the face of all of the Cardinals fans, all they had was their camaraderie that they face humiliation every day but keep coming back.

 

When we were young

 

I compare this to just 10-15 years ago. Perhaps not-coincidentally, these were the formative years of my fandom.

 

We were winning - to be sure. But it felt like I was soaked in a White Sox culture that extended beyond a box score.

 

The thing that reminded me all of this was raBBit's post about his friend's all wearing their CORK shirts until they were full of holes. That was me! It was also 4 sizes too large.

 

But there was more. There was the OH-EE-OH, MAGGGLIO chants. There was the JOSE OLE chants for Jose Valentin. There was the super embarrassing now, but certainly happened GONG phase from Shingo. Thunderstruck. Metallica when Jenks came out.

 

Then of course - there was the co-opting of don't stop believing by the 05 white sox. I'll chalk this one up to the things that happen when you win.

 

Some of these are as "astroturfey" as melkman. But there was a time when the white sox players and organization would feed us something and we would eat that s*** UP. New chant? I'll sing it ad nauseum. New player from far away? let's find a nickname and scream it.

 

But now, I feel like I'm spitting up everything that they are spoon feeding me.

 

There were always less sox fans, since I've been around. There was always a monopoly on "LORE" that the Cubs held. But there was a time when being a sox fan was different. It was an alternative pick. You were there for the baseball, and you mythologized and meme'd the players, not the losing (like the cubs).

 

But now? Hey ... the k zone. Um, melkman. Oh those cool handmotions they do. What about Hawk? Oh he's old and incoherent.

 

Am I just older? That's a definite possibility. But I guess you all can tell me.

 

Being a sox fan this decade has been a bitter, bitter pill. And maybe all of this stuff is the stupid crap that doesn't matter. But damn if I can't wait for an intro song to play, a chant to start, that I can share with everyone, and it's ours. But until then, I guess misery is what we got.

Edited October 24, 2016 by bmags

[lostfan]

I think 75% of what you wrote here is directly attributable to experiencing lengthy periods of time watching a team lose with no apparent end in sight. Like everyone else, 2005 was the high point of my fandom, but it was really a fluke, and everything after that was a mirage, they were never seriously competing for anything except 2006. The team's management is totally tone-deaf, out of touch, and lacks self-awareness. There's not all that much to be proud of - we've got Sale and Quintana, Abreu, and Anderson, that's about it.

 

I'm experiencing something like this with the Bears, although this has less to do with the Bears being bad and more to do with me being tired of the NFL culture at large. I really can't stand most football fans because they're dumb, I don't like being associated with most Bears fans either, because they're all stereotypical meatballs, etc.

[shysocks]

I remember thinking Stir the Drink was gonna be the thing we latched onto in 2015. Walk around the Loop, see somebody in a Sox hat, stir the drink, you've both bonded over your fun contending team. That's how I imagined it would go. Yes, I'm a dork.

 

As with everything else, it comes down to winning. If the team is bad, all the meme stuff that would normally be fun just makes you grumpy. When the team gets consistently good again, that type of thing will come back.

[bmags]

I think you are right, lost, but I tried to focus in on the pre-2005 years as well.

 

That is why I thought of my Royals fans friends in 05. Maybe there is that tipping point after so many years of losing that can't be interesting no matter how much you care.

[shipps]

Its the losing and us getting older. You are way more forgiving when you are younger and not a care in the world. As an adult you have many more elements that come into play that make you question whether or not you should give a s*** about your team. You have to make time to watch now putting off other things that you should/could be doing that are probably more important( not the case 10-15 years ago). You think about the costs involved and all the other things you can do with your money (not really the case 10-15 years ago).

 

The more you observe and the wiser you become you begin to realize a whole lot easier when a teams FO doesnt really care about you and thinks you are pretty stupid (not the case when we were young and dumb). This is a big turn off when deciding if you really identify with a team especially after factoring in those other elements.

[iamshack]

Its the losing and us getting older. You are way more forgiving when you are younger and not a care in the world. As an adult you have many more elements that come into play that make you question whether or not you should give a s*** about your team. You have to make time to watch now putting off other things that you should/could be doing that are probably more important( not the case 10-15 years ago). You think about the costs involved and all the other things you can do with your money (not really the case 10-15 years ago).

 

The more you observe and the wiser you become you begin to realize a whole lot easier when a teams FO doesnt really care about you and thinks you are pretty stupid (not the case when we were young and dumb). This is a big turn off when deciding if you really identify with a team especially after factoring in those other elements.

Yeah, I agree with Shipps. A lot of it is simply you getting older and wiser about the world. Additionally, part of it is you are interacting on a daily basis with a subset of White Sox fans that are devoted to their team, but also intelligent and fanatical about them. Just listen to sports talk radio and you'll hear how a White Sox fan might sound if he isn't spending time reading and debating the merits of ALMOST EVERYTHING the organization does on Soxtalk. Your opinions about the team are generally going to be the result of things that have been vetted and tested and formed by some of the brightest fans the organization has.

 

You simply don't really allow for yourself to drink the cool-aid, because to be honest, Soxtalk won't let you. More on that later...

 

To piggyback off that, the world as a whole has changed. I am a little older than you, so my fandom started with the '83 team (I'm 39, almost a man!). I followed the team on sportsvision and then sportschannel, and there really wasn't much else in terms of coverage. You read the papers, sure, but that didn't offer much, at least not for a young kid. You could talk to your friends, but they were usually as ignorant as you (even if they were older), and you read the back of baseball cards to keep yourself informed. Now there is sabermetrics, and the internet, and social media, and everyone has more clear lines in the sand and measuring sticks to point to. Debates are much less about opinions you could argue til the cows came home and now all about data, facts, and being "owned."

 

And now back to Soxtalk and the Sox sucking...I won't go through all the nonsense that's happened in the last 10 years, but things haven't been pretty, and that's resulted in a bit of a groupthink pessimism amongst educated Sox fans that seems to persist almost at all costs. We expect failure out of this ownership group. We expect poor decisions out of this FO. And then we all remind one another of it ad nauseum. It's tough to really have a childlike enthusiasm and wonder for an team and an organization when everyone tells you your nuts for thinking that way (just ask El Rockin).

 

Time for a meeting...perhaps more ramblings later on...

[caulfield12]

It was a succession of embarrassments after that 23-10 start.

 

The fact you could just feel it slipping away. Robin Ventura. At one point, even rookies like Fields, Owens and Wasserman were fun in 2007. Honestly, not even Tim Anderson could redeem this season very much because there was pretty much nothing to care about for almost three months other than the draftees.

 

Then you had the deadline inactivity...Chris Getz, offering Ventura the opportunity to stay but not really?

 

The White Sox had their history, too. Shoeless Joe Jackson. Bill Veeck. Southside Hitmen of 1977. The Field of Dreams. They were the team true baseball fans followed in Chicago, and maybe the hollowing out of those blue collar factory workers from the 60s and 70s is representative of the ebbing and fading of the franchise now as well. Heck, I even used to only drink Miller Lite because it was associated with the team and union workers...Budweiser was for the yuppie Cubs fans.

 

And yeah, when you get older...priorities change. It's different for the fans who grew up in the 70s and 80s and remember the Old Comiskey...and how far things fell in the mid to late 80s for the franchise. It feels like with the Cubs winning, the organization has completely lost its identity. We're currently mirrors of the Bulls, except we don't even have any playoff appearances to hold onto as each year passes. Pretty soon, the Padres and Mariners will make the playoffs and the only team with a longer string will be the Jose Fernandez-less Marlins, and at least they have the weather, new stadium and two World Series trophies in a lifetime.

 

Hope that one day the White Sox don't become so irrelevant like the Dolphins that totally giving up the sport becomes an option...but it's 2-3 years away at the rate they're going.

Edited October 24, 2016 by caulfield12

[Rowand44]

I think for me a lot of it has to do with how much more information there is available now compared to when we were younger. I see and read about the misery of this franchise all the time and it definitely starts to wear on you. When I first started on this board I honestly didn't realize how pathetic the Sox franchise has been on the whole. And we're old too.

[caulfield12]

Yeah, I agree with Shipps. A lot of it is simply you getting older and wiser about the world. Additionally, part of it is you are interacting on a daily basis with a subset of White Sox fans that are devoted to their team, but also intelligent and fanatical about them. Just listen to sports talk radio and you'll hear how a White Sox fan might sound if he isn't spending time reading and debating the merits of ALMOST EVERYTHING the organization does on Soxtalk. Your opinions about the team are generally going to be the result of things that have been vetted and tested and formed by some of the brightest fans the organization has.

 

You simply don't really allow for yourself to drink the cool-aid, because to be honest, Soxtalk won't let you. More on that later...

 

To piggyback off that, the world as a whole has changed. I am a little older than you, so my fandom started with the '83 team (I'm 39, almost a man!). I followed the team on sportsvision and then sportschannel, and there really wasn't much else in terms of coverage. You read the papers, sure, but that didn't offer much, at least not for a young kid. You could talk to your friends, but they were usually as ignorant as you (even if they were older), and you read the back of baseball cards to keep yourself informed. Now there is sabermetrics, and the internet, and social media, and everyone has more clear lines in the sand and measuring sticks to point to. Debates are much less about opinions you could argue til the cows came home and now all about data, facts, and being "owned."

 

And now back to Soxtalk and the Sox sucking...I won't go through all the nonsense that's happened in the last 10 years, but things haven't been pretty, and that's resulted in a bit of a groupthink pessimism amongst educated Sox fans that seems to persist almost at all costs. We expect failure out of this ownership group. We expect poor decisions out of this FO. And then we all remind one another of it ad nauseum. It's tough to really have a childlike enthusiasm and wonder for an team and an organization when everyone tells you your nuts for thinking that way (just ask El Rockin).

 

Time for a meeting...perhaps more ramblings later on...

 

Yeah, for me it was 1980 Strat O Matic, collecting baseball cards and following the boxscores in the QC Times....although the late scores you had to wait two whole days to update your own personal stats you kept and erased which each game over the course of six months. Reading the Sporting News religiously, and USA Today/Baseball Weekly. Finally, listening to that powerful WMAQ signal at night, almost anywhere in the country.

Edited October 24, 2016 by caulfield12

[lostfan]

I think for me a lot of it has to do with how much more information there is available now compared to when we were younger. I see and read about the misery of this franchise all the time and it definitely starts to wear on you. When I first started on this board I honestly didn't realize how pathetic the Sox franchise has been on the whole. And we're old too.

I didn't think they were pathetic when I was younger, for the first 20 years or so of fandom. I always thought of their default as above-average, but never actually good enough to compete. But that normal bar gradually got lower and lower, to where we are now, a high 70s win team.

[bmags]

I think for me a lot of it has to do with how much more information there is available now compared to when we were younger. I see and read about the misery of this franchise all the time and it definitely starts to wear on you. When I first started on this board I honestly didn't realize how pathetic the Sox franchise has been on the whole. And we're old too.

 

I'm not saying we shouldn't be miserable - the play on the field has been miserable. There's no sugarcoating that stuff.

 

But what I'd point to is even laker fans in the basement have had fun passing around Nick Young gifs. My friends that are phillies fans were still having fun with things that are only fun to phillies fans.

 

The only thing that comes close was fleeting - the albers double. Last year the Abreu home run with JBJ jumping into the bullpen and losing the ball.

 

There is no optimism around this teams performance, but there's also nothing aside from winning that we can suck enjoyment out of now. There's no nancy faust fawning, there's no Sodfather talk, there's no Man Soo Lee in the bullpen.

 

But there is one part that hits me. When I was a kid I liked Bill Veeck, I loved all the gimmick stuff, added the lore that we were different.

 

Now I think he was a failure that ruined numerous chances at a pennant. Zoops.

[Rowand44]

I'll add that there's nothing worse than rooting for a team that "goes for it" every year and is still miserable. You brought up the Lakers and Phillies, these are teams that are in some sort of a rebuilding phase and as a fan you know they're going to have down years and you can deal with it or even enjoy it some. The way the Sox have been for the last 6 years now is about as bad as it gets from a fan stand point.

[bmags]

I'll add that there's nothing worse than rooting for a team that "goes for it" every year and is still miserable. You brought up the Lakers and Phillies, these are teams that are in some sort of a rebuilding phase and as a fan you know they're going to have down years and you can deal with it or even enjoy it some. The way the Sox have been for the last 6 years now is about as bad as it gets from a fan stand point.

 

That's a great point.

 

When you are already being sold a lie, you aren't going to buy into the other marketing ones.

[caulfield12]

If we could be optimistic they weren't going to blow the last golden opportunity in JR's lifetime...that new broadcasting rights deal, things would be at least a bit more upbeat.

 

Now it just feels like the Cubs are the shark that's going to swallow what's left of White Sox Nation from 2005 whole and spit it out. Adding to the misery was the temporary feeling of light at the end of the tunnel at 23-10 and even a possible World Series match up with the Cubs. Gone in the span of 2-3 weeks of abysmal play and mediocre managing/leadership.

 

I'd say 50% of the frustration is with the Cubs doing things right with a nearly unlimited budget, Epstein, Maddon...heck, we can't even keep up with the Royals, Indians and Tigers in our own division.

 

Oh, and more James Shields to look forward to as well.

[greg775]

There is no real tl;dr of this post, though I'm sure I will write one part poorly enough that it will get argued about over and over. It's long and melodramatic. [edit: alternate possibility, nobody reads it ]

 

But throughout this year I have been working with the idea that something just feels different about being a sox fan than when I was younger. It's hard to figure out whether something like this is just personal - change in social interactions, change in social life - or something actually happening so I wanted to write a post on it.

 

First off, I'm 30. My white sox fandom becomes conscious around 93, takes a vacation after 95 strike, and comes back with a vengeance with the 2000 group and never stops. I basically grew up on this board, like many others. So it's very possible that older fans have seen this before.

 

How can you tell they're a sox fan

 

As the Cubs explode around us, it's hard not to notice the signs of being a cubs fan surpass ours. The W flag, that f****** song, the "try not to suck" shirts - whether or not these things make you want to vomit - there is a culture around being a cubs fan that extends beyond wearing a cubs hat. A shared experience of watching the team extending to memes and memorabilia.

 

When I talk about culture of being a white sox fan, this is what I'm talking about. In a time that is more meme-able than ever, it feels like there has been a huge dropoff of these shareable experiences as a sox fan, and anything that's tried is very corporate, very astroturf (melkman tshirts, soxmath)

 

In fact, the only thing that seems to hold us together at this point is misery. There were a lot isolated happenings this year that taken my themselves and put in more prosperous times, they'd have been no big deal.

 

But with Twitter, the sale jersey cutups, the drake laroche scandal, the Guaranteed Rate change, it all feels agonizing. And the only thing that grounded me to other sox fans was that, that we were miserable, that we couldn't stand being the butt of the joke.

 

"Hey you are pissed off, you must be a sox fan!"

 

This frankly just reminds me of Royals fans when I moved to Missouri in 2005. In the face of all of the Cardinals fans, all they had was their camaraderie that they face humiliation every day but keep coming back.

 

When we were young

 

I compare this to just 10-15 years ago. Perhaps not-coincidentally, these were the formative years of my fandom.

 

We were winning - to be sure. But it felt like I was soaked in a White Sox culture that extended beyond a box score.

 

The thing that reminded me all of this was raBBit's post about his friend's all wearing their CORK shirts until they were full of holes. That was me! It was also 4 sizes too large.

 

But there was more. There was the OH-EE-OH, MAGGGLIO chants. There was the JOSE OLE chants for Jose Valentin. There was the super embarrassing now, but certainly happened GONG phase from Shingo. Thunderstruck. Metallica when Jenks came out.

 

Then of course - there was the co-opting of don't stop believing by the 05 white sox. I'll chalk this one up to the things that happen when you win.

 

Some of these are as "astroturfey" as melkman. But there was a time when the white sox players and organization would feed us something and we would eat that s*** UP. New chant? I'll sing it ad nauseum. New player from far away? let's find a nickname and scream it.

 

But now, I feel like I'm spitting up everything that they are spoon feeding me.

 

There were always less sox fans, since I've been around. There was always a monopoly on "LORE" that the Cubs held. But there was a time when being a sox fan was different. It was an alternative pick. You were there for the baseball, and you mythologized and meme'd the players, not the losing (like the cubs).

 

But now? Hey ... the k zone. Um, melkman. Oh those cool handmotions they do. What about Hawk? Oh he's old and incoherent.

 

Am I just older? That's a definite possibility. But I guess you all can tell me.

 

Being a sox fan this decade has been a bitter, bitter pill. And maybe all of this stuff is the stupid crap that doesn't matter. But damn if I can't wait for an intro song to play, a chant to start, that I can share with everyone, and it's ours. But until then, I guess misery is what we got.

 

Good post. You and the Sox have been "Robin-ized." Ozzie kept itr fun and entertaining always as he knew the Sox were second fiddle in town. Winning a title had us on Cloud Nine. But the Robin years have been just what the front office wanted: calmness, focus on the field, but our performance has been .500ish and very blah. The post Ozzie era has been crickets, just like everybody demaneded it be.

Overall Sox have done a pretty darn good job of fielding a competitive team the past many years it's just that in the Robin era we've had a few too many holes to even finish above .500. We're always going to be second fiddle to the Cubs and when they are winning? Ouch.. It's too bad Ozzie had to get X rated and political to where nobody would ever touch him again. But he had the right idea. He had everybody buzzing. Overall the Sox have done a great job of putting a competitive team on the field. It's just been the Robin era where we've had zero chance of making the playoffs. Sad.

Edited October 24, 2016 by greg775

[Thad Bosley]

I remember thinking Stir the Drink was gonna be the thing we latched onto in 2015. Walk around the Loop, see somebody in a Sox hat, stir the drink, you've both bonded over your fun contending team. That's how I imagined it would go. Yes, I'm a dork.

 

As with everything else, it comes down to winning. If the team is bad, all the meme stuff that would normally be fun just makes you grumpy. When the team gets consistently good again, that type of thing will come back.

What he said!

[Lip Man 1]

BMAGS:

 

A thoughtful discourse which brought up some very good points.

 

I've only a few things to add:

 

1. And it pains me to say this since it is my profession, is that the media which is supposed to be "neutral" is far, far from it with Cub fans literally in the media, open about it. Mark Gonzales told me about covering a Sox/Cubs game and when a close call went against the Cubs, certain members of the media stood up in the press box and b****ed about it. Simply a Cardinal Sin in broadcasting or journalism. This is just one example.

 

2. The fact that the White Sox simply don't seem to have any coherent plan, everything is RE-acting instead of being PRO-active from a baseball and a marketing sense. Brooks is a friend and I know he works very hard at his job but really has anything come close to the "Win or Die Trying" or the "Us vs. Them" ad campaigns?

 

3. This town actually was a Sox-town (despite what JR has publicly stated) back in the 50's and 60's until Durocher came to town. Seriously, the Cubs had Ernie Banks...and that's it. The Sox got the lion's share of media attention because they usually were fighting for a pennant every season. At the very least they had a winning season 17 years in a row. (Think about that one for a minute). They also had the stars, nationally known guys who could play...Aparicio, Fox, Pirece, Wynn, Minoso, Peters, Horlen etc.

 

4. Maybe the most important to me is that the Sox HAVE NEVER EVEN TRIED to take on the Cubs directly. Almost from the moment the new owners took over it was "we're Chicago's American League team..." (direct quote) Ownership never understood (which was bizarre since both guys lived full time in Chicago since the late 50's), that Sox fans WILL NOT ROOT for the Cubs and visa versa. It's that simple. The Sox are directly competing with the Cubs in the same market...but they refused to acknowledge that or deal with it. And the Sox had their chances. As "recently" as 1983 the Cubs were closing the upper deck because nobody cared. That's just one opportunity. The Sox urinated everyone of those chances away.

 

Again you see the result of that folly today.

 

In short this is an ossified, inbred (as in only members of the "family" get hired), stuck in the mud organization. Making a lot of money and satisfied with the status quo.

 

I'm lucky. I have a library full of audio / video / print material that I can turn to in bad times, like right now. Others aren't so lucky.

 

Mark

Edited October 24, 2016 by Lip Man 1

[caulfield12]

The Will To Win...forgot about that marketing debacle.

 

Pretty soon Harrelson will be gone, too.

[Lip Man 1]

Good post. You and the Sox have been "Robin-ized." Ozzie kept itr fun and entertaining always as he knew the Sox were second fiddle in town. Winning a title had us on Cloud Nine. But the Robin years have been just what the front office wanted: calmness, focus on the field, but our performance has been .500ish and very blah. The post Ozzie era has been crickets, just like everybody demaneded it be.

Overall Sox have done a pretty darn good job of fielding a competitive team the past many years it's just that in the Robin era we've had a few too many holes to even finish above .500. We're always going to be second fiddle to the Cubs and when they are winning? Ouch.. It's too bad Ozzie had to get X rated and political to where nobody would ever touch him again. But he had the right idea. He had everybody buzzing. Overall the Sox have done a great job of putting a competitive team on the field. It's just been the Robin era where we've had zero chance of making the playoffs. Sad.

 

I disagree in the fact that the Sox have put competitive teams on the field during Robin's tenure. 2012 was a fluke a reaction to Ozzie not being around and everyone saw how it ended. From that point on, the Sox teams were basically "a wish and a prayer" or "hoping to catch lighting in a bottle."

 

Just look at last season...Rollins, Latos, Jackson ? That says it all about the overall talent level. They have had some very good players but little to no depth and more holes then a block of swiss cheese.

 

Just my opinion.

 

Mark

Edited October 24, 2016 by Lip Man 1

[BigSqwert]

Good stuff Mark

[Lip Man 1]

The Will To Win...forgot about that marketing debacle.

 

Pretty soon Harrelson will be gone, too.

 

Regarding Hawk, I don't think so. He is like Harry was, you would have to physically remove him kicking and screaming from the booth. Hawk has always stated his wish is to die in the booth and as long as JR owns the team, he's got a job.

 

Mark

 

[Hatchetman]

The past 50 years of Sox history have been pretty bad, broadly speaking. There have been some extended stretches of extreme horribleness (a word?). Then the Sox got a new stadium and have a pretty nice team and then.....WHAM STRIKE/LOCKOUT followed by the infamous White Flag trade and back to mediocrity. The mother of all fluke seasons, 2005, put them back on the map, but that goodwill has been long squandered away by ineptitude and boring baseball.

 

After all these decades, I'm not sure how many Sox fans are left. Why should there be?

[southsider2k5]

BMAGS:

 

A thoughtful discourse which brought up some very good points.

 

I've only a few things to add:

 

1. And it pains me to say this since it is my profession, is that the media which is supposed to be "neutral" is far, far from it with Cub fans literally in the media, open about it. Mark Gonzales told me about covering a Sox/Cubs game and when a close call went against the Cubs, certain members of the media stood up in the press box and b****ed about it. Simply a Cardinal Sin in broadcasting or journalism. This is just one example.

 

2. The fact that the White Sox simply don't seem to have any coherent plan, everything is RE-acting instead of being PRO-active from a baseball and a marketing sense. Brooks is a friend and I know he works very hard at his job but really has anything come close to the "Win or Die Trying" or the "Us vs. Them" ad campaigns?

 

3. This town actually was a Sox-town (despite what JR has publicly stated) back in the 50's and 60's until Durocher came to town. Seriously, the Cubs had Ernie Banks...and that's it. The Sox got the lion's share of media attention because they usually were fighting for a pennant every season. At the very least they had a winning season 17 years in a row. (Think about that one for a minute). They also had the stars, nationally known guys who could play...Aparicio, Fox, Pirece, Wynn, Minoso, Peters, Horlen etc.

 

4. Maybe the most important to me is that the Sox HAVE NEVER EVEN TRIED to take on the Cubs directly. Almost from the moment the new owners took over it was "we're Chicago's American League team..." (direct quote) Ownership never understood (which was bizarre since both guys lived full time in Chicago since the late 50's), that Sox fans WILL NOT ROOT for the Cubs and visa versa. It's that simple. The Sox are directly competing with the Cubs in the same market...but they refused to acknowledge that or deal with it. And the Sox had their chances. As "recently" as 1983 the Cubs were closing the upper deck because nobody cared. That's just one opportunity. The Sox urinated everyone of those chances away.

 

Again you see the result of that folly today.

 

In short this is an ossified, inbred (as in only members of the "family" get hired), stuck in the mud organization. Making a lot of money and satisfied with the status quo.

 

I'm lucky. I have a library full of audio / video / print material that I can turn to in bad times, like right now. Others aren't so lucky.

 

Mark

 

The idea of a neutral media is dead. With a profit motivation pushing reporting today, reporting is going to be tailored to where ever the most money is there to be made. I mean we have news channels that break along political lines now a days, why would sports be any different? Take the king of the mountain in sports of ESPN. Their reporting skews towards the sports in their parent companies sports package, and the teams that bring them the highest ratings. Small markets, and non-Disney sports are secondary to their profit centers.

 

Neutrality in reporting is a unicorn. It just doesn't exist.

[bmags]

I'm not sure I would trust a sports reporter that claims they don't root for a team. How on earth did you get into sports then?

[Black_Jack29]

To put things in perspective, things were way worse as a Sox fan in the late '80s when they sucked, they couldn't draw flies, and JR was threatening to move the team to Florida. Their decline in the mid/late 90's was, in my opinion, probably a little worse than now from a fan's perspective, as this was pre-World Series and pre-stadium renovations.

 

In both cases, though, the Sox got better within a few years and produced some exciting teams. I don't expect things to be all that much different this time.