Ownership breakdown: ishbias 35%, Reinsdorfs 50%

[77 Hitmen]

1 hour ago, Buehrle>Wood said:

Like downtown being the loop? Sure. But any new park isn't being built downtown. And no one goes "downtown" after 5 anyways. Otherwise, no it's not. They have a very accessible park for transportation that likely can't be replicated without new infrastructure. I'm cool with a new park but that one is a losing argument.

How to you define "downtown"?  Is it the actual physical loop bordered by Van Buren, Wells, Lake and Wabash?  IMO, most people define it as a broader area.  And the 78 is a 15 minute walk to the Van Buren El station, which is the southern boundary of the actual "Loop".

And no one goes downtown in the evenings anyways?  I've seen plenty of people coming off the Metra heading downtown while I'm on my way home.

Edited May 1 by 77 Hitmen

[Rey21]

I hope the state continues to show Jerry the middle finger, guy absolutely 1000% does not deserve any help from anybody to build a new stadium when the current stadium is perfectly fine. He’s getting what he deserves, when you spent years cutting corners it’ll come back to bite you.  Literally the only thing that isn’t good about the stadium is the product on the field, we’ll show up when the team is good, it’ll make the hour+ commute for some/most of us worthwhile  

[tray]

The 78 , really? That thing has been dead in the water since the last supposed anchor tenant, U of I, abandoned their plans to build there.  That cost IL taxpayers millions of dollars.  Who pays us back? Ouch, I mean Auchi:

https://chicago.suntimes.com/the-watchdogs/2025/01/31/discovery-partners-institute-university-illinois-the-78-related-midwest-bruce-rauner

Now there's your alternate reality.

Edited May 2 by tray

[southsider2k5]

9 hours ago, tray said:

The 78 , really? That thing has been dead in the water since the last supposed anchor tenant, U of I, abandoned their plans to build there.  That cost IL taxpayers millions of dollars.  Who pays us back? Ouch, I mean Auchi:

https://chicago.suntimes.com/the-watchdogs/2025/01/31/discovery-partners-institute-university-illinois-the-78-related-midwest-bruce-rauner

Now there's your alternate reality.

Perfect way of saying "not true".  Great job.

[tray]

58 minutes ago, southsider2k5 said:

Perfect way of saying "not true".  Great job.

Not true and

[Kyyle23]

[Snopek]

1 hour ago, tray said:

Not true and

[Chicago White Sox]

12 hours ago, tray said:

The 78 , really? That thing has been dead in the water since the last supposed anchor tenant, U of I, abandoned their plans to build there.  That cost IL taxpayers millions of dollars.  Who pays us back? Ouch, I mean Auchi:

https://chicago.suntimes.com/the-watchdogs/2025/01/31/discovery-partners-institute-university-illinois-the-78-related-midwest-bruce-rauner

Now there's your alternate reality.

Yup, let’s ignore Jerry going down to Springfield and pitching the 78 stadium deal to our state government.

[southsider2k5]

10 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

Yup, let’s ignore Jerry going down to Springfield and pitching the 78 stadium deal to our state government.

Oooh, you are about to get a laugh react.  TAKE THAT WITH YOUR FACTS

[77 Hitmen]

3 hours ago, southsider2k5 said:

Perfect way of saying "not true".  Great job.

What is more fanciful, the idea that the Sox under new ownership might privately fund a new stadium in the South Loop, or that the Ishbias will spend $2B to buy a franchise and keep them at the current location surrounded by the same acres of parking for the next 30 years?  I'd say the latter is less likely.   Maybe the new owners can turn the area around the current park into a thriving entertainment district to keep up with today's baseball economics, but I have my doubts about that.

But, then again, maybe the 78 is indeed a cursed Indian burial site, perpetually tied to criminals, a Love Canal-like toxic waste site, and Chicago's version of the Bermuda Triangle all wrapping into one.   In which case, then yeah, anyone talking about this site is crazy.  

Edited May 2 by 77 Hitmen

[southsider2k5]

9 minutes ago, 77 Hitmen said:

What is more fanciful, the idea that the Sox under new ownership might privately fund a new stadium in the South Loop, or that the Ishbias will spend $2B to buy a franchise and keep them at the current location surrounded by the same acres of parking for the next 30 years?  I'd say the latter is less likely.   Maybe the new owners can turn the area around the current park into a thriving entertainment district to keep up with today's baseball economics, but I have my doubts about that.

But, then again, maybe the 78 is indeed a cursed Indian burial site, perpetually tied to criminals, a Love Canal-like toxic waste site, and Chicago's version of the Bermuda Triangle all wrapping into one.   In which case, then yeah, anyone talking about this site is crazy.  

Look, all you have to do is look at the actual actions of one Jerry Reinsdorf and you can see they don't view 35th and Shields as the best option.  Hell even on the west side they are already working on a literal entertainment complex out of their own pockets. The idea that Jerry doesn't want this flies in the face of all of his actual actions, no matter what happens at the 78.

[Thad Bosley]

23 hours ago, tray said:

As older Chicago fans recall, the Cubs drastically increased their fan base decades ago, ironically, because of free OTA  broadcast/antenna TV and Harry Carey moving his drunken rambling broadcasts to the Northside, NOT because they always had winning/championship team.

As for  proponents of  the Wrigley experience (i.e., going to eclectic bars after games)  they should go there for however many games they attend each year. Have fun. It is a nice experience, especially for North siders.

As for old era baseball park architecture, Ricketts destroyed part of that by demolishing and rebuilding taller bleachers  with a  giant scoreboard atop them in LF, and scoreboards and advertising signs in RF to block the views to and from classic Chicago graystone buildings.  I recall sitting down the 3rd base line many years ago and seeing  Dave Kingman hit a 500 foot blast over Waveland  and  likewise watching Ch. 9  as Brickhouse did his "Hey-Hey" as Banks hit his 500th.

A new ballpark on 35th street can capture much of the features that made the original Wrigley and the original Comiskey special, including bleachers facing North where balls can be hit outta here instead of banging off a scoreboard. Original Comiskey originally had that  (way back when) as well. They can also come up with residential and commercial development  including bars for the patrons that like to congregate  after games. McCuddy's 2.0 , Turtles, etc.   Maybe relocate Armor Park although that is another issue.

 

You mean that very same “OTA broadcast /antenna TV (superstation WGN!) and Harry Caray” that Reinsdorf inherited from Veeck way back in 1981, only to throw both to the curb a year later in favor of the very ill-advised, get-rich quick scheme called SportsVision.  How did that work out for Reinsdorf and the organization?  It was the first of a continuous series of franchise-crippling decisions made by Reinsdorf over four and a half decades.  It’s a very long list.  

[southsider2k5]

53 minutes ago, Thad Bosley said:

You mean that very same “OTA broadcast /antenna TV (superstation WGN!) and Harry Caray” that Reinsdorf inherited from Veeck way back in 1981, only to throw both to the curb a year later in favor of the very ill-advised, get-rich quick scheme called SportsVision.  How did that work out for Reinsdorf and the organization?  It was the first of a continuous series of franchise-crippling decisions made by Reinsdorf over four and a half decades.  It’s a very long list.  

Leave it to the Sox to be going to open air when the rest of the world has moved on to the thing the Sox did four deacdes ago.

[Lip Man 1]

From my "History of SportsVision" chapter which will be included in Dr. Fletcher and the Chicago Baseball Museum's next book:

"The idea of pay-per-view or cable TV was also in its infancy. HBO, started by Dolan, came into existence in 1972 and just turned 10 years old. ESPN began operations on September 7, 1979 with George Grande, who left to become the primary Reds TV broadcaster from 1993 through 2009, and Lee Leonard as the first hosts of SportsCenter. The idea of an advanced, relatively cheap national or regional television channel devoted to sports was a difficult idea to grasp. The technology wasn’t fully developed yet either, from satellites which provided crystal clear digital picture and sound, to the graphics and statistics needed in the important production aspect of showing sports events. 

Einhorn’s idea was brilliant, but the timing was wrong. 

If SportsVision had come along even five years later, its chances for success would have been much greater. If the idea had first been conceived in a baseball crazy market like Detroit, Baltimore or St. Louis and worked, it would have been easier to accept. For that matter, if Chicago was simply a one team town, it probably would have worked because fans wouldn’t have had any choices. In Chicago though, the Cubs were still offering fans their games for nothing, which added to the resentment felt by Sox fans. For the most part an entire generation of baseball fans in Chicago grew up without watching or being able to watch a number of Sox games every season during the 1980s."

[tray]

3 hours ago, Lip Man 1 said:

 In Chicago though, the Cubs were still offering fans their games for nothing, which added to the resentment felt by Sox fans. For the most part an entire generation of baseball fans in Chicago grew up without watching or being able to watch a number of Sox games every season during the 1980s."

WGN was a broadcast superstation with tremendous coverage across the Midwest.  Fans throughout the Midwest loved Harry/Cub broadcasts coming in free over their house roof antenna.  Meanwhile, Einhorn tried something else with Sportsvision and as a result, the Sox lost a generation or more of fans. UHF as a broadcast medium was inferior to VHF  as many TVs were not able to pick it up without snow and rolling pictures.   The neanderthal days of my youth..

[poppysox]

On 5/2/2025 at 6:15 PM, tray said:

WGN was a broadcast superstation with tremendous coverage across the Midwest.  Fans throughout the Midwest loved Harry/Cub broadcasts coming in free over their house roof antenna.  Meanwhile, Einhorn tried something else with Sportsvision and as a result, the Sox lost a generation or more of fans. UHF as a broadcast medium was inferior to VHF  as many TVs were not able to pick it up without snow and rolling pictures.   The neanderthal days of my youth..

Thank God for radio and newspapers.

[WBWSF]

On 5/2/2025 at 1:19 PM, Lip Man 1 said:

From my "History of SportsVision" chapter which will be included in Dr. Fletcher and the Chicago Baseball Museum's next book:

"The idea of pay-per-view or cable TV was also in its infancy. HBO, started by Dolan, came into existence in 1972 and just turned 10 years old. ESPN began operations on September 7, 1979 with George Grande, who left to become the primary Reds TV broadcaster from 1993 through 2009, and Lee Leonard as the first hosts of SportsCenter. The idea of an advanced, relatively cheap national or regional television channel devoted to sports was a difficult idea to grasp. The technology wasn’t fully developed yet either, from satellites which provided crystal clear digital picture and sound, to the graphics and statistics needed in the important production aspect of showing sports events. 

Einhorn’s idea was brilliant, but the timing was wrong. 

If SportsVision had come along even five years later, its chances for success would have been much greater. If the idea had first been conceived in a baseball crazy market like Detroit, Baltimore or St. Louis and worked, it would have been easier to accept. For that matter, if Chicago was simply a one team town, it probably would have worked because fans wouldn’t have had any choices. In Chicago though, the Cubs were still offering fans their games for nothing, which added to the resentment felt by Sox fans. For the most part an entire generation of baseball fans in Chicago grew up without watching or being able to watch a number of Sox games every season during the 1980s."

I always thought that Sportsvision  flopped was because the Chicagoland area wasn't wired for cable.

[Lip Man 1]

4 hours ago, WBWSF said:

I always thought that Sportsvision  flopped was because the Chicagoland area wasn't wired for cable.

That was part of it as I wrote in the chapter. What I posted was simply an short conclusion from it. 

By the time Einhorn came up with his idea of moving the Sox off of ‘free’ TV in May 1982, Chicagoans were conditioned like no other city, to getting virtually the entire baseball season for nothing.

The bottom line was that when the Sox announced what they intended to do; they were met with a bunch of angry fans who rightly or wrongly expected the right to get virtually an unlimited number of games for nothing. 

Adding to that anger was the fact that the nation, especially Chicago, was going through an economic recession, not seen since the early 1970’s. People were out of work and simply could not afford the hook-up fee, let alone the monthly charge to get the sports programming.

Reinsdorf though understood the reality of the situation when in 2004 at a luncheon promoting the start of the new Comcast Sports Network-Chicago regional channel he said, "Unfortunately, Chicago wasn't ready for us. There wasn't cable of any consequence, and we were on subscription pay-TV. I don't remember how many subscribers there were, but I know that more than that number went to Radio Shack and bought the parts for their own boxes." 

How to sum up the experiment known as SportsVision? 

Well you could do a lot worse than to say, ‘A brilliant idea that simply was ahead of its time, limited by historical factors as well as technological shortcomings.’

 

Edited May 4 by Lip Man 1

[caulfield12]

2 hours ago, Lip Man 1 said:

That was part of it as I wrote in the chapter. What I posted was simply an short conclusion from it. 

By the time Einhorn came up with his idea of moving the Sox off of ‘free’ TV in May 1982, Chicagoans were conditioned like no other city, to getting virtually the entire baseball season for nothing.

The bottom line was that when the Sox announced what they intended to do; they were met with a bunch of angry fans who rightly or wrongly expected the right to get virtually an unlimited number of games for nothing. 

Adding to that anger was the fact that the nation, especially Chicago, was going through an economic recession, not seen since the early 1970’s. People were out of work and simply could not afford the hook-up fee, let alone the monthly charge to get the sports programming.

Reinsdorf though understood the reality of the situation when in 2004 at a luncheon promoting the start of the new Comcast Sports Network-Chicago regional channel he said, "Unfortunately, Chicago wasn't ready for us. There wasn't cable of any consequence, and we were on subscription pay-TV. I don't remember how many subscribers there were, but I know that more than that number went to Radio Shack and bought the parts for their own boxes." 

How to sum up the experiment known as SportsVision? 

Well you could do a lot worse than to say, ‘A brilliant idea that simply was ahead of its time, limited by historical factors as well as technological shortcomings.’

 

A brilliant idea for a different, non-split market...with the Cubs basically giving their product away to the entire Midwest with an iconic broadcaster.

[77 Hitmen]

7 hours ago, WBWSF said:

I always thought that Sportsvision  flopped was because the Chicagoland area wasn't wired for cable.

 

8 minutes ago, caulfield12 said:

A brilliant idea for a different, non-split market...with the Cubs basically giving their product away to the entire Midwest with an iconic broadcaster.

Yep, you beat me to it.  Not only was Chicago not wired for cable, but Jerry and Eddie basically ceded an entire generation of baseball fans to the Cubs as that team skyrocketed to national popularity.   And many suburbs were actually wired for cable by 1982/83 (our family got it in 1983), but I want to say it was maybe 5(???) years before they finally moved SportsVision from a premium channel subscription to basic cable.   Epic failure of a product, but to his dying day, Eddie Einhorn would claim he was right all along about the pay TV sports model.

.....and I think that's part of the reason why this franchise has fallen to such lows Jerry and (while he was around) Eddie never had an ounce of self-reflection.  They only wanted vindication for the moves they made with the Sox.

As far as CHSN goes.  I expect both them and the Cubs' Marquee Network to end up on Comcast's more expensive tier.

[caulfield12]

33 minutes ago, 77 Hitmen said:

 

Yep, you beat me to it.  Not only was Chicago not wired for cable, but Jerry and Eddie basically ceded an entire generation of baseball fans to the Cubs as that team skyrocketed to national popularity.   And many suburbs were actually wired for cable by 1982/83 (our family got it in 1983), but I want to say it was maybe 5(???) years before they finally moved SportsVision from a premium channel subscription to basic cable.   Epic failure of a product, but to his dying day, Eddie Einhorn would claim he was right all along about the pay TV sports model.

.....and I think that's part of the reason why this franchise has fallen to such lows Jerry and (while he was around) Eddie never had an ounce of self-reflection.  They only wanted vindication for the moves they made with the Sox.

As far as CHSN goes.  I expect both them and the Cubs' Marquee Network to end up on Comcast's more expensive tier.

And the only way it gets there is to stop giving your product away for free.

Should have waited until they had a really compelling product to offer the viewing audience...at least 2026.

Then fans might be (eventually) willing to pay something for it again.

[77 Hitmen]

This is going to trigger some posters, but IMO this ties back to the whole ballpark situation.  The SportsVision debacle followed by the botched design of New Comiskey Park nine years later with lack of anything to do around the park has really put this franchise in a huge hole as far as winning over market share in Chicago.  Progress was made in winning over more fans after the 2005 championship, but that bump is ancient history now.  They did an admirable job in improving the ballpark in the early 2000s, but issues still remain with some aspects of the park design and with lack of much to do around the location.

Short of winning multiple pennants in quick succession, which isn't exactly easy to do even with competent ownership/management, it'll be really tough to make inroads against the Cubs, who even in down times, are a big draw thanks to their ballpark and neighborhood.  It wouldn't surprise me one bit if the next owner of the White Sox will see investment in a new ballpark in the South Loop as the best way to turnaround the fortunes of this franchise on a long-term basis and as a good ROI for the value of the franchise. 

Boasting that the current park is near expressways and has acres of convenient parking lots is no longer a winning formula for MLB teams in the current era of how people decide to spend their entertainment dollars.

Edited May 4 by 77 Hitmen

[Lip Man 1]

1 hour ago, caulfield12 said:

A brilliant idea for a different, non-split market...with the Cubs basically giving their product away to the entire Midwest with an iconic broadcaster.

As I wrote for the book chapter and posted the excerpt a little earlier in the thread. I'll repost it here since it looks like you missed it:

"Einhorn’s idea was brilliant, but the timing was wrong. 

If SportsVision had come along even five years later, its chances for success would have been much greater. If the idea had first been conceived in a baseball crazy market like Detroit, Baltimore or St. Louis and worked, it would have been easier to accept. For that matter, if Chicago was simply a one team town, it probably would have worked because fans wouldn’t have had any choices. In Chicago though, the Cubs were still offering fans their games for nothing, which added to the resentment felt by Sox fans. For the most part an entire generation of baseball fans in Chicago grew up without watching or being able to watch a number of Sox games every season during the 1980s."

"Over time both Eddie Einhorn and Jerry Reinsdorf commented on SportsVision, the idea, the execution and the aftermath; Einhorn in particular defended the decision telling Bob Logan, “If you want people to come, you can’t give the product away. That’s the way it’s been done everywhere else except Chicago for years. The best organizations, the ones that draw the most people at the gate, don’t go that way. They have limited TV.”

 

Edited May 4 by Lip Man 1

[kitekrazy]

No light at the end of the tunnel until this ownership is gone.  That is not a sure thing either.  Creating a small market in one of the largest cities in the world is a major accomplishment.