77 Hitmen

There seems to be something ingrained in modern American culture to just step over everyone else to get what you want right or wrong. It's nothing new, but it's been normalized and in some cases lauded in the last few years.

Except that isn't what happened here. The women in question wasn't in possession of the foul ball and then was shamed for not "handing a kid a baseball". Quite the opposite, the kid was in the possession of the ball and a grown women demanded that the ball be handed over to her. If it was the former scenario, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Can people not see the difference?

I'm a suburbanite and if they move to the 78, I'd just walk 20 minutes or so along the riverwalk to Union Station and catch a Metra train to and from the game. I wouldn't need to use the CTA at all. This is just me, but I can see myself going to more weeknight games with that arrangement since driving into the city from where I live can be such a pain in the ass with the traffic. Right now, taking the train to a game involves a lot more steps, including the CTA. Post game, it means waiting on the crowded red line platform for a train to the loop and then walking 15 minutes to Union Station. People do it now - I often see fans coming out of Union Station all decked out in Sox gear as I'm heading home from work. For people who want to drive to the game, there will be parking at the ballpark even if they redevelop much of the lots and stay at Rate Field or they move to a new park at the 78. The Fire already said there will be 2000 parking spaces at the site for their new soccer stadium.

Yeah, I think some are missing this point. The Sox are not ELIMINATING parking at the ballpark no matter what they end up doing. For anyone who can't or won't ride the CTA, there will be parking spaces either at the current stadium or the 78 for fans who want to drive to the game. It just likely won't be 70 acres (or whatever) of surface lots.

But it is so important that a middle aged woman get a baseball? Maybe all middle age fans who berate others into getting their way should get free tickets and free food and gift bags? All for free.

Your first four words are key - PART of the issue. We can all agree that JR has made misstep after misstep in his 44 years of ownership that has left the White Sox franchise reeling. At least it looks like he's doing one right thing at the end by lining up a local billionaire to be the next Sox owner after he's gone. But it's going to take a lot of work on the Ishbias part to right this ship. It won't be as simple as just cranking out checks for free agents. They've probably already learned that with their first few years of owning the Suns. Yes, this team needs to eventually start spending on premium free agents just like the big boys but there's a lot of leg work that needs to be done before we get to that point such as rebuilding all the scouting, player development, coaching, etc. that has been a failure over the last 2 decades. IMO, while the on the field stuff is of primary importance, there's other work that needs to be done to win back fans. That includes the ballpark experience and yes, even down to jettisoning that incompetent clown in the broadcast booth. It's not just that White Sox fans are angry. Worse than that - many are just indifferent and really don't care anymore. That's what the new owners need to overcome. Also note that the people who remember the White Flag trade, the 1994 strike, SportsVision, etc. aren't the future. The youngest of us are pushing 40 or 50. What have they done to attract any younger fans in the last 15 years who don't even remember the 2005 WS win let alone all the pre-2005 missteps?

Using a very very very very very extremely unlikely scenario is a rather weak argument. I guess we can just go ahead an excuse any boorish behavior because we just never know if that person is doing something for a dying child. That asshole who cut me off in traffic the other day? I shouldn't get mad, he might be rushing to see a dying child! Come on. And to be clear, this person didn't wrestle the ball away from a kid, she KARENED her way to getting the baseball after some kind dude gave it to a child. You know what I'm getting tired of? These loudmouths who think they can verbally bully their way into getting what they want. And people might be tired of the term "Karen", but this women fits the bill to a tee and totally deserves it.

The Rockies will have to go 1-19 from here on out to match the 2024 Sox and lose all 20 of their remaining games to break our futility record for losses in a season. Jerry Reinsdorf's infamy is almost certain to be safe.

So many other franchises are moving away from stadiums surrounded by so much surface lots and they all seem to be doing just fine to the point where other franchises are rushing to follow suit. I'm not sure what's so unique about the White Sox that we must have a stadium that is near mass transit lines and yet has to be surrounded by acres of surface lots. The only MLB teams that come to mind to me that plan to stick with extensive surface lots around their ballpark are the two L.A. teams and Milwaukee. But even with the Angels, there's a huge $4B entertainment district under construction within walking distance of Angel Stadium and surrounding the Honda Center (home of NHL Anaheim Ducks).

Yep, we Sox fans should be the last people to poke fun at the crosstown rivals skipping over someone we picked later. We picked Nick Madrigal at #3 and the Cubs took Nico Hoerner at #24. Ouch. And how about that guy we picked just ahead of Ian Happ? Woof!

If the Ricketts, even with owning a team that always draws well, has a huge fan base, and plays at a popular location that already had a lot of things around it, decided that they needed to spend a ton of money to develop the land around Wrigley to generate more money, what are the Ishbias intending to do with the White Sox who have NONE of those things? Whether they stay at the current park or move to the 78, I can't imagine the new owners intend to keep the status quo of current ballpark surrounded by acres of parking lots. Those fans who think that the Ishbias will spend their fortune on $300M payrolls forever more once they own the Sox without enough money coming in to sustain that kind of expenditure are in for disappointment. With a change in ownership (eventually) coming, don't expect the new guys, rich as they are, to go into this planning to operate at a loss indefinitely. And for those fans who think all they need to do is win and fans will come, the real world is not that simple or easy. Over the last 30 years, even when the Sox were fielding competitive teams, the only time they've been higher than 15th in attendance is the year after they won the World Series. And winning pennants are easier said that done. Teams like the Mets and Padres have been spending a ton of money on their payroll for years now and how many pennants have they won in the last 20 years?

It is indeed true that the Sox MLB payroll was higher than the Cubs in 2022, but there needs to be some context to go with those numbers: First, even when JR puts money into the major league payroll, he doesn't invest elsewhere in the organization. Scouting, player development, major league coaching/conditioning/analytics, getting international talent have been terrible for many years. Successful teams invest in both the MLB payroll and the rest of the organization. The Sox always seem to skimp on the latter. Second, 2022 was the result of the common ebb and flow of payrolls as multiyear contracts get more expensive in the later years resulting in bloated payrolls and then teams need to retool as their previous core of talent leaves. Of course, in the case of the Sox, it wasn't that the players they signed to multiyear deals got old, they just totally fizzled out. Perhaps that's part of how Jerry's bargain hunting backfired - sign all this emerging talent to extensions before they get too expensive but before they've proved themselves. It worked splendidly for the Chris Sale extension, so therefore it became their template going forward.

Wasn't the theory at the time that Jerry handed out that huge contract to Belle to spite the other owners for not sticking to their guns enough during that 1994 strike? And JR was very smart in giving Belle an out clause after 2 seasons, which made it very likely that he wouldn't be on the hook for the entire contract - which is indeed what happened.

Excellent summary. To your point #7, I think what also prompted JR to make a deal for a future sale now is that he saw Ishbia (as a current minority owner and potential source of cash infusion) was on the verge of buying the Twins and wanted to make this deal before he got away. It's also possible that, since his proposal to publicly finance a new ballpark at the 78 was DOA in Springfield, he needed to make a deal with Ishbia now to get the private funding needed to keep his ballpark dream alive. Was it just coincidence that they went public with their deal within a few days of the Fire's announcement that they intent to build at the 78? Whether ballpark funding is part of this deal is anyone's guess at this point.

I hate Jerry as an owner as much as anyone, but I suspect many fans still think he's raking in huge profits on this team thanks to the sweetheart stadium lease and all the parking lot fees he collects. The economics of baseball has changed such that these don't translate into huge profits anymore, especially with the collapse of the RSN money stream teams have been relying on for a few decades now.

I'm not sure why people actually expect JR to suddenly spend more money in 2026 ahead of a possible strike/lockout. It should be clear to all that the money Ishbia is putting into this franchise this year and next is not going to free agents. They've said it's to pay down debts and support organizational operations, not to go on a payroll spending spree. To be honest, I'm not all that worked up about this. It's not like the Sox are going to suddenly go out and sign Kyle Tucker to some massive contract as long as JR is the owner. The Sox are still by far the 2nd worst team in MLB this year, there's a lot of things they need to fix organizationally before I'm going to lose sleep over the 2026 MLB payroll numbers. I'd rather the next owners put money into getting this organization turned around long term than handing out huge contracts in the short term.

Pretty crazy that teams 1, 2, and 3 have an equal shot at any of the first six picks with team #4 having negligibly worse odds. Why not give a bit more weight to the eligible team with the worst record? I suppose that's because they don't want bad teams in September having an incentive to lose instead of winning a meaningless game. But as I suggested earlier, it would be such a White Sox thing to have the most losses in MLB history and then another season where they have the worst record of any team eligible for the top pick and end up with the #10 and #7 picks out of it. Of course, this front office got the #4 and #3 picks not too long ago and totally botched both of those, so maybe I shouldn't fret too much about the lottery system.

Pretty cool story. For those who don't want to bother watching, some dude in the UK who's never been to Chicago found a late 70s era Sox jacket on eBay that was apparently used by a player and was not a retail jacket. As he tracks down the owner, he gives a brief history of the late 70s/Veeck era Sox and particularly the 1977 team. Any Sox fan who wants to nitpick this to death needs to lighten up and perhaps get a life.

This would be such a White Sox outcome. It wouldn't shock me at all.

It'll be a long slog to win back market share in Chicago, that's for sure. The new owners will have their work cut out for them (both on and off the field) and the Cubs aren't going anywhere as far as attracting fans goes. The one thing that irked me about the 2012 attendance numbers is that some of JR's mouthpieces went public with "attendance shaming" Sox fans for not supporting the team enough even when they won. I'm thinking of Don Cooper, specifically. Typical Reinsdorf PR blunder and "blame the fans" mindset that we've been dealing with since 1981. The next owners can start off by realizing the fans are NOT the problem. Sox fans are as loyal and diehard as anyone. As @WBWSF noted, making games affordable to families will help. The good news is that the Ishbias have offered affordable concessions at Suns games. Something like that would be a good start. But IMO, they'll have to do more than just make the Sox a discount alternative to the Cubs if they want to be more than an afterthought in this city.

The economics of baseball have changed. It looks to me like teams are finding that developing the land around a stadium is a much bigger money maker than surface parking lots. I wonder how often the Sox actually fill up all of their parking lots. Even at games with 35k+ in attendance, do the lots ever get full? And even if the Sox had middle of the pack attendance, how many times a year would they actually need all those parking spaces? It looks like other sports teams are redeveloping a good chunk of the surface lots around their stadiums. The Mets and Phillies are the latest. Heck, even in our own city, the Bulls and Blackhawks are spending billions to turn most of parking around the United Center into the "1901 Project". Whether the Sox move to the 78 or stay at 35th & Shields and redevelop much of the parking lots, I am sure there will be parking available for fans. It just won't be dozens of acres of surface lots adjacent to the stadium.

Former Sox pitcher Rich Hinton has also passed away. He was drafted by the White Sox in 1969 and had three stints with the Sox between 1971 and 1979. He also played for the 1976 "Big Red Machine" Cincinnati Reds, who won the World Series that year. https://www.newsweek.com/sports/mlb/former-yankees-pitcher-world-series-champion-passes-away-2122455

After that totally blew up in their faces with the last round of emerging talent? I doubt it. If Montgomery can sustain this type of success, we just have to hope that the Sox are under new ownership by the time he gets close to free agency. Otherwise, get ready for another Cease or Crochet-type trade to kick off the next "rebuild"

That's crazy that the Stateway Gardens land is still mostly vacant given the shortage and demand for affordable housing in the city. Yes, I seriously doubt they'd change the orientation of the current park if they stay there. That would be insanely expensive for not building a completely new park. I'm not sure what they could do with the current park. Perhaps add some sort of "home run porch" in RF as had been rumored when they did the major renovations 20 years ago. I seem to recall that some renderings floating out there at the time also showed adding a new "grand entrance" somewhere along 35th St. And, of course, develop some sort of commercial district on much of the parking lots.

Based on historical data, NO. The only time they were higher than 15th in attendance in the last 30 years was 2006, the year after the won the World Series. In 2005, they were 15th and by 2007 they were back down to 15th. They were reigning division champs in 2009 and 2022 and were 16th and 19th in attendance, respectively. https://www.thebaseballcube.com/content/mlb_attendance/ If it was as simple as "just winning", the vast majority of MLB teams wouldn't have wasted their time over the last 30 years building ballparks with character and in locations that attract more fans. If the Sox stay at their current ballpark (which is very possible if not probable), the new owners are going to have to do something with the stadium and its surroundings.