The White Sox returned to town for their home opener last Friday looking very much the snakebit team they’ve been since they were swept by Seattle in the 2000 playoffs–since the 1919 Black Sox scandal, truth be told. Though picked to contend with the Minnesota Twins for the American League Central title this year after obtaining starter Bartolo Colon and bullpen closer Billy Koch during the off-season, the Sox opened by losing three in a row to the lightly regarded Royals in Kansas City–each game more aggravating than the one before. The vaunted Sox offense was shut out in the opener, a 3-0 defeat hung on ace Mark Buehrle. Colon pitched almost equally well in his Sox debut in the next game, but after the Sox tied the game at three, reliever Rick White gave up a two-run homer to take the 5-4 loss. The Sox led the series finale 6-5 in the eighth inning, but a parade of relievers couldn’t hold it, including Koch, who came on with two out and the Sox still in the lead and never did get the third out. The Royals sent 14 batters to the plate in the frame, and the Sox went tamely in the ninth for a 12-6 defeat. K.C. had scored all 12 of its runs with two out, and the Sox had committed four errors and a couple of other boneheaded plays on defense. And while the Sox were losing three to the Royals, the Twins beat the Detroit Tigers three straight. So the season was three games old and the Sox were three games out of first.
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Yet an hour before the scheduled first pitch it was upbeat rap music that surged through the clubhouse, as players talked to reporters or played cards. A new sign advised: “This is where the ‘Business’ of Baseball stops and the ‘Playing’ of Baseball BEGINS.” The Sox were anything but hiding away in the doghouse with their tails between their legs. When rain delayed the game and I hunkered down with the Sox media notes, one detail caught my eye: the 1983 “Winnin’ Ugly” division champions also began the season 0-3. True enough, the opening sweep came at the hands of the Texas Rangers, a legitimate contender that year, but the ’83 Sox went on to finish first by 20 games. There was hope.
Most fans stayed on the concourse, shifting their feet to stay warm, even after the game began. There’d been 40,395 tickets sold, but many of those fans never made the trip and many more decided to head for home or a bar TV; the lower deck seats were never more than half full and the population in the upper deck was sparse. Sox starter Esteban Loaiza, a Mexican native, walked out to the bullpen for warm-ups with a towel wrapped around his head like a heavy winter scarf and with what looked like a cup of hot coffee in his hands–complete with cardboard insulator. Even so, the Sox went through with the annual opening-day introductions, and when a few members of the Tigers’ starting lineup realized how long this was going to take they ran back to the clubhouse and put on warm-up jackets. Colon was greeted with big cheers, while manager Jerry Manuel, generally blamed for the team’s uninspired opening, got a lukewarm response complete with a few boos. Frank Thomas, the mercurial star, received cheers–a good sign.
Rain never did fall again during the game, but as the evening chill came on, the puffs of breath from the pitchers and hitters could be seen throughout the park. Loaiza walked two with two out in the seventh, and was removed to the cheers of the crowd, with Gary Glover coming on to get the final out. The annual opening-day fistfight broke out in the center field bleachers, but it distracted few of the remaining fans. Miserable as they were, they delighted in the game.
