Tell me today's article isn't Mariotti stirring the pot some more. And by today I mean yesterday.
Sensitivity the issue, Guillen the problem
June 22, 2006
BY JAY MARIOTTI SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST
Try as I do, it's hard to view sports as some sort of guiding light for humankind. You want to believe in this stuff after sitting in a Dallas arena and watching Dwyane Wade, a credit to his hometown and as humble as he is spectacular, become the closest thing we've seen to Michael Jordan. But then you return to Chicago and are dragged into the gutter drain by Ozzie Guillen's homophobic circus.
I'm told the Blizzard of Oz, in one of his tiresome rants, referred to me as a "fag'' Tuesday night, among other niceties. Personally, I can shrug it off as an occupational hazard, knowing I'm called meaner things at the coffee stand every morning. I also know it places me on an extraordinarily long list of people the Blizzard has dissed or launched into, including Magglio ("Venezuelan [bleep]'') Ordonez, Buck Showalter, Phil Garner, Sean Tracey, the Los Angeles Angels, every American League umpire, the reporter he threatened to rub out last winter and, by not showing up at the White House for a ceremony, the President of the United States.
Ozzie? He makes Mark Cuban seem like Virginia McCaskey.
But I am not the story here in the latest chapter of OzFest, a farce that is averaging two new targets a week and will have another co-star as soon as tonight. The story is Guillen's mouth and the warped diatribes of a man who thinks slurs are an acceptable means of retaliation in American life, like one of his dugout-ordered purpose pitches. Twice in less than a year, Guillen has dropped derogatory homosexual terms in his public dealings as White Sox manager. Last year at Yankee Stadium, he claimed to be greeting a friend warmly when he said, "Hey, everybody, this guy's a homosexual! He's a child molester!'' Two New York-area columnists took offense, as they should have, and so did I -- the only writer in Chicago who did, which is often how it works in a town softer and more politically driven by the sports franchises than a genuinely tough, independent sports media town such as Boston.
Obviously, Guillen hasn't learned his lesson about using such ugly language. He hasn't because his boss, Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf, is an enabler who is letting Ozzie run amok, whether it's offending homosexual groups that want Guillen punished or saying someone should "shoot the [bleep]'' after Jason Grimsley served as a steroids informant in a federal investigation. Reinsdorf, as I pointed out last year, is co-chairman of Major League Baseball's Equal Opportunity Committee. Years ago, he and Bud Selig led the charge to oust Cincinnati Reds owner Marge Schott after she made racial and ethnic slurs. Sports and America are better off for that deed, yet where is Reinsdorf when his own manager has slurred the gay community not once but twice? Isn't Reinsdorf hypocritical when he refers to Guillen as "the Hispanic Jackie Mason'' and asks us to take everything he says in a humorous light?
Two-week suspension needed
The time has come for a two-week suspension, long enough for human sensibility and decency to kick in. It's more important the Sox send a message about what they stand for than what Guillen's absence might mean in a pennant race. Let Ozzie think about life a little. Send him out for some professional sensitivity training, not what is being attempted by unskilled shrinks in the public-relations office. Tell him why it's fine to admonish a media person all he wants -- a critic should accept criticism, naturally -- as long as Guillen doesn't step over the line and slur gay groups. Most importantly, explain what happened to Schott, Al Campanis and Jimmy "The Greek'' Snyder when they made insensitive comments.
They were fired, run out of their professions.
I am hardly alone in thinking Guillen, if he doesn't wise up, is headed toward a bad ending in Chicago. As somebody who lobbied hard in print for Ozzie to get the job, I knew he would be a politically incorrect load at times. But little did I know he would become a national embarrassment to a city, a franchise and a sport. The incidents are coming a little too frequently for comfort, and anyone who thinks he's just deflecting attention from his team isn't living on a sane planet. The shame of it is, his antics are taking away from the enjoyment of a rare World Series championship in this town, a title he made happen. As long as the Sox are winning, I suppose there will be enough Neanderthal fans who would defend a manager for an ax murdering. But when a lightning rod starts struggling and losing -- see Bob Knight, Indiana -- even the big bosses lose patience with the nonstop stunts.
Guillen's beef with me involves his belief that if I criticize him, I should rush down to the ballpark immediately and let him litter me with insults. If that sounds like high-school macho nonsense, realize it's the general mentality of baseball clubhouses. Imagine a critic panning a movie, then being required to take a tongue-lashing the next day from an angry Vince Vaughn. Imagine a restaurant critic not liking an Italian joint, then having to show up so the chef can throw meatballs at him. Sorry, guy, I'm not a beat writer who covers the team every day. Tuesday night, I was at Game 6 of the NBA Finals, where I should have been. Next week, I'll be at the NBA draft. Next month, I'll be at the British Open.
If Ozzie has a problem with my schedule, he should behave better so I don't have to write about him.
I might cede to Guillen's wishes, by the way, if Sox management through time had been more professional in controlling numerous incidents in which I was threatened physically in their clubhouse. This, in turn, led to published stories about the episodes and turned me into what no journalist wants to be -- the news -- which led to a Sox-generated perception that I am some evil being who roots for the Cubs. Tribune Co. will confirm that as thoroughly absurd.
Finally, last season, there were death threats and an incident at U.S. Cellular Field involving Carl Everett. Again, the Sox don't even address volatile issues when they involve me and other writers. Until they do, these are the rules they'll have to live by. Consider the latest Guillen flareups to be Exhibit A of why this situation exists.
Self-destruction looming
I treat all Chicago franchises with the same brush. When a team wins, I tell you why, which might explain the scads of recent columns commending Guillen for his baseball leadership, general manager Ken Williams for his aggressive trades and Reinsdorf for his $100 million payroll. When a team doesn't win, I might write why Dusty Baker should be fired, why Jerry Angelo is a hit-and-miss football executive and why the Blackhawks have fallen farther than any franchise in sports. That's what a columnist does.
But no media person walking into the locker rooms of the Bears, Cubs, Bulls or Hawks has been subjected to regular slurs and threats. Isolated incidents, perhaps, but not a running war. Those clubs run professional shops, and when a player, manager or coach has an issue, things are handled with a certain dignity.
In Ozzie's world, you are called a "fag.''
He is the story. He is the problem. And someone better save him from himself before he self-destructs.
Jay Mariotti is a regular on ''Around the Horn'' at 4 p.m. on ESPN. Send e-mail to
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