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DEL.ICIO.US‘Sub Rosa Series’ could be compelling
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
CHICAGO — Remember the Subway Series? This is the Sub Rosa Series.
For those without a Funk and Wagnall’s handy, “sub rosa” is a Latin phrase that means “in secret,” a definition that surely fits this Fall Classic. The White Sox are the No. 2 team by some distance in what used to be known as the Second City. The Houston Astros are the baseball pride of a state famous for its football.
Some World Series pairings — Dodgers-Yankees, for example, or even Red Sox-Cardinals — occupy whole shelves of baseball lore. The 2005 installment is the ultimate blank slate. The Astros haven’t been here before. The White Sox haven’t been since 1959, haven’t won since 1917. The Red Sox and Cubs became nationwide darlings because of their long histories of futility and curses and whatnot, but the White Sox can’t even lay claim to being cuddly. The White Sox, also known as the Pale Hose, are essentially beige.
Said the cab driver carrying a visiting correspondent to U.S. Cellular Field, the impersonal home of the South Side Sox: “I’m a Cubs’ fan… . Being here just isn’t like being on the North Side.”
The White Sox feel the same way about the Cubs that the school on Atlanta’s North Avenue feels about Georgia’s state university. The White Sox believe the Cubs are the favorites not just of the populace but also of the local press. (The Cubs and the Chicago Tribune, as it happens, are owned by the same conglomerate.) As Paul Konerko, the best everyday player among the White Sox, told the assembled media Friday: “I always look at it as a positive because we get to play in a big-time sports city, but there’s a lot of stuff those Cubs’ players have to deal with that we don’t… . We kind of fly under the radar.”
Statistical evidence: The Cubs won 20 fewer games than the White Sox this season but averaged roughly 10,000 more paying customers a game. Konerko again: “As long as Wrigley [Field] is up and running, it’s going to be a Cubs’ town. They’re going to draw the sell-out crowds whether they’re in last place or whatever.”
When Paul Konerko is the biggest name on the favored team, you have the makings of a faceless World Series. The biggest name here is Roger Clemens, who’ll start Game 1 against Jose Contreras Saturday, but Clemens has pitched in so many of these that he’s beginning to seem not just old but old hat. Indeed, the guy who figures to be the breakout star of this Series won’t swing a bat or throw a pitch. Ozzie Guillen, who served as a utility Brave in 1997 and 1998, manages the White Sox and is beloved by the media both in this country and in his native Venezuela. His briefings this postseason have been rather more entertaining than a Harriet Miers Q&A.
This from Friday’s session: “I’m different between being on the field and being in the house. On the field you see me talking to everybody. When I get home I don’t want to say anything — I’m just tired.”
Then, asked if he’ll make good on his preseason promise to retire as manager and run for mayor if the White Sox win the Series: “The main thing to me is winning here, and [then] I will make up my mind. But I don’t know if I can handle my family for the rest of my life without baseball. I’m already tired seeing them, and we had three days off [after the ALCS]. It’s not fun.”
Against the odds, this Series could wind up being tons of fun. Yes, it will draw terrible TV ratings — no Yankees, no Red Sox, no viewers — but the baseball figures to be compelling. Both teams can really pitch. Ozzie Guillen can really talk. Both teams play the game the right way. This might be the Sub Rosa Series, but it shouldn’t be substandard in any way.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Mark Bradley
Comments
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By Tom
October 21, 2005 10:20 PM | Link to this
GO WHITE SOX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By Josh
October 21, 2005 11:13 PM | Link to this
Mark,
HOW DARE YOU compare the Cubs to the Dawgs? At least Georgia has one titles of significance before WWI. I think you need to be grouping the Jackets and the Cubs together - they’re both destined for many losing seasons for the years to come.
By Larry
October 22, 2005 01:40 AM | Link to this
Hey, Mark…
How DARE you? This is so funny, I can’t even expound upon the idiocy of it all because I’m laughing too hard to type…and I’m a ‘Dawg fan. Oh, well…there’s always a Braves blog to exploit…
By Dave
October 22, 2005 10:05 AM | Link to this
Ummm, Josh…
I’m pretty sure “won” is not spelled “one”. Of course, “dogs” isn’t spelled… You get the point.
By HB Ando
October 22, 2005 11:27 AM | Link to this
Dave,
As a UGA grad, I have to sheepishly suggest that Josh probably doesn’t get the point. But hey, at least he’s rooting for the good guys. I’m also a bit disconcerted that Mr. Bradley has again gone vanilla with his post, leaving me nothing specifically to belittle him about.
To appropriate the theme of Jeff Foxworthy: You know you’re superfluous when you’re a senior editorialist for a prominent sports page and you can’t come up with a single thing to say that is either pertinent or of interest to your readers.
I can only guess that your families’ response to your possible relocation to Fargo left you chastised and gunshy.
Off the top of my head, I can think of at least ten other worthy sports stories that could have been addressed, relevant to either the time of year, or the region in which we exsist.
If you were going to touch on Houston, you could have at least addressed that their place in the Series is not a surprise to people who rightly recognize that they have the best “top-three” rotation in baseball, by a wide margin (it would have been a great opportunity to educate the masses of Braves fans who thought our loss to Houston to be unacceptable, ignoring the fact that Clemens, Pettite and Oswalt are better than any three starters the Braves could answer with this season). But I guess, “both teams can really pitch” is an adequate substitute for actual insight.
Oh well.
By Eric
October 22, 2005 11:38 AM | Link to this
I agree, Mark, that the series could be compelling, but it won’t be for most people. There just aren’t that many baseball junkies. Most are johnny-come-latelies, bandwagon-jumpers, who want to associate themselves with whichever team looks like a winner. The Yankees are winning? Okay, I’m a a Yankee fan. Oh, the Braves are winning? Okay, now I’m a Braves fan. Teams like the Yankees and Red Sox are media creations, and the media are the ones ripping their hair out because their darlings are not there to pull in the ratings. Those of us who truly enjoy the game couldn’t be happier seeing the White Sox and Astros in the big event.
By gary
October 22, 2005 01:01 PM | Link to this
I agree with Eric and am happy to see some non-“big name” teams having at it. Neither team got there by accident: they had to kick some other teams’s butts. Hopefully, we’re in for a good Series and that some new names will come out of this. Although they are not my favorite team, I’m pulling for the White Sox in this match-up just because they have been such underdogs. Then again, I became a Patriots fan in the 70’s when THEY were playing Houston, so who knows?
By Matt
October 22, 2005 02:19 PM | Link to this
Of course since the Braves are out of the playoffs, does anyone care really? I mean, it’s football season now! ;)
By Curveball
October 22, 2005 05:22 PM | Link to this
This will be a great World Series—no Yankees or Braves stinkin’ it up!…
By gcsutechfan69
October 22, 2005 07:13 PM | Link to this
awwwwwwww sounds like josh got his feeling hurt. get over it focer!!!
By Mary Jo Taylor
October 26, 2005 02:20 PM | Link to this
Mark Bradley hit it on the head with the article about this particular Sub Rosa Series.
Being born and raised in Chicago, then moved to Altanta when my Father was transferred, my brothers and father have always have been Cub fans. When not rooting for the Atlanta Braves, we always pull for the Chicago Cubs otherwise, hoping to see the “curse” lifted from them.
BUT there always has been another section of my extended Italian/Polish family living in Chicago, that have been White Sox fans and always took the grief from us Cub fans ever since I can remember.
My Grandfather, Guiseppe’, an Italian blue collar restaurant owner, while I was growing up, fed the players of the Chicago White Sox at his Southside restaurant during the 50s, 60s & 70s while I was growing up. Do you think those White Sox players paid for their meals? No way, my grandfather was the “die hard” White Sox fan in my family, along with my cousin and his namesake, Joseph.
Talk about arguments that extended from discussing the Cubs vs. the White Sox at dinner tables! Also, I can remember the days when we pulled two TVs together in the same room; one for the Cubs and the other for the White Sox for all to watch. These were the days when there were not remote controls or Cable/Dish TV. This is what kept the peace in our house between my Dad & two brothers, the Cubs fans and my grandfather, an uncle, and other cousins, the White Sox fans.
Now, that the White Sox are the shining blue collar team in this World Series, is there still a division in our family, at this particular time in the Series? No, because my beloved grandfather, Joseph Calzaretta is now deceased. My grandfather just wasn’t a White Sox fan, he just loved baseball, period. Through him, loving baseball, period, is embedded forever in his children, his seven grandchildren and numerous great-grandchildren. Baseball in the blood!
Is anyone watching this particular blue collar Sub Rosa World series? Heck yes! Is anyone pulling for the White Sox in my family? Heck yes!!! All because my grandfather and cousin, Joseph, have believed in them and been waiting on this World Series for 46 years. Chicago is still our hometown, no matter where all we live.
So, to let you know there are a few of us Atlantans cheering into the weeeee hours of the morning, this week, as Houston has been giving Chicago a good run for their money and wonderful World Series to watch!!!
In the meantime, my grandfather, Guiseppe’, is watching his 2005 World Series White Sox from the “real” Field of Dreams, named “Heaven.”