Why I am (really) a White Sox Fan

OK, ok I grew up 7 miles form Sox Park (by the way, true Sox fans never refer to US Cellular or even Comisky, it’s always Sox Park). But my formative years in Chicago were marked by the success of the northside rivals and the squaky clean Cubs enjoyed the large media coverage of WGN and the Tribune Company.

Dick Allen was the prodigious power hitter whose off-field antics cost him prodigious fines. But in 1972, he earned the AL MVP while almost getting the Triple Crown for the White Sox and that was enough for any 11 year-old on the Southside.

Allen’s ignominious SI cover-- cigarette and all-- adorned my bedroom wall to the consternation of my dear mother. Despite her frustration, she took me to many ballgames to root for the Red and White. As the years wore on, my friends and I would root for Harold Baines in right field with chants of “HAR-ol’, HAR-ol’” with the two or three thousand other stalwart fans who braved the southside to see our desperate and beloved Sox. Those sporadic catcalls can be heard occasionally now whenever Baines peeks his timid countenance from the dugout where he serves as Ozzie’s bench coach.

Sox Park has since moved—across the parking lot—and the chronic losing has miraculously turned to winning. I’ve always promised myself that I’d go to a World Series game only if it was played in Sox Park. Now that it’s here, I’m reluctant to part with the $1300 needed to sit in a seat that just last month cost me 30 bucks-- it's as much principle as working-class frugality. But my heart will be next to Harold and Ozzie, and I may smoke a butt just in remembrance of Dick.