In defense of Comiskey...err, Guaranteed Rate Field

It was great when it opened; it still is a better place to watch a ballgame than sitting behind a pillar at the sanctified Wrigley Field.

My son Don and I enjoying the first game of the 2005 World Series in Guaranteed Rate Field

As sure as mushrooms show up in autumn, so does the bashing of Guaranteed Rate Field regularly make an appearance.

It’s happening again as the destruction of Guaranteed Rate is linked to a possible sale of the club by Jerry Reinsdorf, a move to a suburb or a complete abandonment of Chicago and Sox fans to a place like Nashville.

For my part, the White Sox should stay here and at Guaranteed Rate Field.

For some reason, the debut of Guaranteed Rate (can’t we find another name? How about White Sox Park?) brought widespread ridicule especially in press. Most criticized were the height and steep incline of the upper deck. “Do we get parachutes?” “Get me some oxygen.”

The park was called boring. Bare-bones and impersonal. Why, critics asked, couldn’t it be more like Camden Yards. Or like Wrigley

Ridiculous. Sox Park was a major improvement over the old Comiskey. Better views. Wider and more attractive concourses. Accessible food booths. Much better bathrooms.

I was there, for the last game at Comiskey and the first game in the new ball yard across 35th Street.

Sox fans come out to see a ball game. Unlike Cubs (and Bears) fans who jam the place no matter how much the team stinks. Sox fans to watch crap.

And that’s been the problem. The 2005 World Series filled every seat. Unmatched starting pitchers Mark Buehrle, Jon Garland, Freddy García, and José Contreras. Superstars Frank Thomas and Jermaine Dye. Skipper Ozzie Guillen. A four game sweep of Houston Astros. Downtown victory parade that drew 1.75 million.

In the 1950s the Sox were the dominate team in Chicago. Battling the Yankees tooth and nail for the entire decade. Big crowds. A World Series. The Cubs were a perennial cellar dweller. Up in Wrigley, the upper deck was closed for a lack of fans. Broadcaster Jack Brickhouse did his best to lure fans to the park, urging non-existent fans to “To come out an have a picnic at the friendly confines of beautiful Wrigley Field.”

And that is the problem: Put a lousy team on the field and Sox fans won’t turn up. For decades now, Sox Park has been hosting just that. This year’s team is no exception, starting with high expectations and descending into the pitiable. Some fans proposed the same solution as Bears fans: Reinsdorf and McCaskey—step aside and let someone who knows how to run the teams run them. Perhaps the Sox’s newly announced front office change will reignite this historic team.

This uncertainty about the Sox isn’t new. When the doldrums arrived, Reinsdorf and partner Eddie Einhorn in the 1980s threatened to move away. Suburban Addison was a possibility More likely was Tampa Bay. The town was so sure the Sox were coming that they already had started building a new stadium. Jerry and Eddie were roundly condemned for threatening a move to wrangle a state subsidy to build a new South Side ball yard

Sounds familiar, does it?

I don’t know if the threat to move or sell is a ploy or real. It’s a damn shame that the Sox are now regarded in some quarters as a small market team. Nashville, which beckons is the fastest growing American city. Reinsdorf would have good reason to sell: He bought the franchise for roughly $20 million in 1982. It’s worth is now estimated at just over $2 billion.

Clearly, the fans wouldn’t as rewarded for their loyalty. Some of us have been fans for decades (me, going back to 1950). Be on our side or pity us. Don’t remove the team from Chicago. Let play continue at a real baseball yard—White Sox park.