Tag / Ken Harrelson

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You’ve Gotta Be Bleepin’ Me

Just when you think things can’t get any worse in White Sox Nation, the Tigers announced yesterday that they were poaching play-by-play man Jason Benetti, signing the announcer to a multi-year deal.  Benetti, 40, started with the White Sox in 2016, splitting time with Ken Harrelson until 2019 when he took over full time.

Benetti’s frustration with the White Sox organization has seemingly been growing for some time.  In 2021, he was a loud voice in favor of returning to broadcasting from the road instead of in studio following the pandemic shutdowns of 2020.  Things got testy again this past offseason, when he left ESPN for FOX and took on more national responsibilities, which irked some in the White Sox front office.  To add fuel to that fire, the White Sox refused to negotiate with Benetti’s agent, preferring instead to deal directly with Benetti, which is, frankly, odd behavior.

Whoever replaces Benetti in the broadcast booth will have very large shoes to fill.  They will also need to win over a fan base that has been repeatedly poked in the eye by the ownership and front office of their favorite team for the last two years.

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The Hall Comes Calling

Cubs radio play-by-play man Pat Hughes was awarded the 2023 Ford C. Frick Award yesterday, presented annually for excellence in broadcasting by the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.  Hughes, who joined the Cubs booth in 1996, will have spent 28 of his 41 seasons as a broadcaster for the Cubs after starting his career with the Twins in 1983 followed by a twelve-season run with the Brewers.

Hughes joined the Cubs booth in 1996, joining long time color commentator, and Cub legend, Ron Santo.  The chemistry between the two grew to the point where their broadcasts came to be known as “The Pat and Ron Show”.  Following Santo’s death in 2010, Hughes has worked alongside former Cubs Keith Moreland and Ron Coomer.

Along the way, Hughes has called many memorable moments, including eight no-hitters, the 25-inning contest between the White Sox and the Brewers which remains the longest game in American League history, Kerry Wood’s 20-strikeout game in 1998, Mark McGwire’s record-breaking 62nd home run in 1998, and, of course, the final out clinching the Cubs 2016 World Series title.

Hughes, 67, is the sixth announcer with ties to Chicago to earn the honor, following Ken Harrelson, Milo Hamilton, Harry Caray, Jack Brickhouse, and Bob Elson.

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By The Numbers – 26

In 1929, uniform numbers appeared on the back of baseball jerseys for the first time, thanks to the Indians and the Yankees.  By 1937, numbers finally appeared across all uniforms, both home and away, across both major leagues.  Since that time, 81 distinct numbers have been worn by members of the White Sox, while the Cubs boast 76.

Today, we continue our look at those players, picking our favorite, if not the best, player to wear each uniform number for both Chicago teams with #26.  71 different players have donned #26 while playing in Chicago, 58 for the White Sox and 13 for the Cubs, who have retired it for a Hall of Fame outfielder.

Sweet-Swinging Billy Williams first wore his familiar #26 in 1961, his first full season with the Cubs, where he played in 146 games, hitting 25 home runs with 86 RBIs, while earning Rookie of the Year honors.  Williams hit at least 20 home runs and drove in 84 or more runs in every season from 1961 to 1973, earning 6 All-Star team nods along the way, in 1962, 1964, 1965, 1968, 1972, and 1973.  In 1963, he started a consecutive game streak that would last into 1970, setting the National League record with 1,117.

In 1970, Williams batted .322 with 42 homers and 129 RBI and finished second in MVP voting.  He replicated that finish in 1972, winning the batting title with a .333 average, along with a .606 slugging percentage, 37 home runs, and 122 RBIs.  That gave him his 3rd top ten finish in 5 seasons.  Following the 1974 season, Williams was traded to the A’s for, amongst others, Manny Trillo.  Williams was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1987 and his number 26 was retired by the Cubs later that summer.

On the South Side of town, nobody has really made their mark wearing #26, though one of the greatest “what ifs” in team history did don the number in 1986.  Acquired in the Rule 5 draft from the Pirates in December of 1985, Bobby Bonilla made his major league debut with the White Sox on April 9, going 0-1 as a pinch hitter in the Sox loss to the Brewers.  Bonilla was putting together a pretty decent rookie campaign, especially since he was making the jump from A ball, hitting .269 with 2 home runs in 75 games when GM Ken Harrelson decided send Bonilla back to the Pirates, in exchange for pitcher Jose DeLeon.  DeLeon went 23-22 across parts of 5 seasons in 2 stints with the White Sox, while Bonilla made 6 All Star teams, earned three Silver Slugger awards, and two top ten MVP finishes over the next 10 seasons.

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2020: The Year In Books

As we wrap up 2020, a year where I should have been setting records due to the pandemic and stay at home orders, I managed to read only 23 books, a decrease of 5 books over last year.  Of those 23, 8 were non-fiction and, of the 15 novels, only 2 were tied to a TV show.  None of the books came out of my dwindling “to-read” drawer and 15 were e-books.  I read just over 7,800 pages, my seventh highest total of all time.

For the first time in years, a majority of the books I read this year were by authors I have read before. The 11 authors that I read for the first this year were:

  • Ken Harrelson
  • Jeff Snook
  • Liz Phair
  • Megan Abbott
  • Greer Hendricks
  • Sarah Pekkanen
  • Cameron Esposito
  • Rich Lindberg
  • Sara Schaefer
  • Alex Trebek
  • Trevor Noah

Tom Perotta, Erle Stanley Gardner, and Karin Slaughter were the only authors that I read multiple titles from during 2020.

6 of the books I read were released this year, while 5 of them were released last century, with the oldest first published in 1933.

Finally, the breakdown by month.  My vacation to Hawaii in February and being off in December certainly helped pad its totals a tad bit. Continue reading →

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Everything Old Is New Again

About 2 1/2 weeks ago, Rick Hahn described the ideal candidate to become the next manager of the White Sox: recent post-season experience with a championship organization.  Depending on your definition of recent, the White Sox found their man today, announcing that Tony LaRussa, who retired from the dugout after leading the Cardinals to a championship in 2011, would once again take the reins on the south side of Chicago.

LaRussa, who is third all-time with 2,728 wins, first became manager of the White Sox in 1979, under owner Bill Veeck.  After leading the team to the AL Western Division title in 1983, LaRussa was fired in June of 1986 by Ken Harrelson.  This has long been cited as the biggest sports-related regret for owner Jerry Reinsdorf.

 

LaRussa caught on with the A’s less than a month after leaving the White Sox, staying there for 10 years, winning 3 AL pennants and one World Series championship.  He then spent 16 years on the bench for the Cardinals, winning 3 NL pennants and 2 World Series championships, retiring after the final one in 2011.  Since then, he has spent time working for MLB and in the front office for the Diamondbacks, Red Sox, and Angels.

LaRussa, who will be 76 on opening day 2021, becomes the oldest manager in the major leagues and the oldest to take over a team since Jack McKeon in 2011.

The two biggest concerns, to my mind, are 1) has the move toward analytics changed the game enough in the last 9 years that he’s been left behind and 2) will the exuberant players on the White Sox roster, namely Tim Anderson, Luis Robert, and Eloy Jimenez, chafe under an older school manager who may not appreciate the bat flips and political outspokenness.  This will either end very well, with post-season success, or will bomb spectacularly.  There really will not be a middle ground.

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Book 1 (of 52) – Hawk

Hawk: I Did It My Way – Ken Harrelson with Jeff Snook

As his broadcast career was winding down, Ken Harrelson decided to move his stories to a different medium, looking back at his life and career in Hawk: I Did It My Way.  He chronicles his life, from being born in South Carolina and raised in Savannah, Georgia, to the minor leagues, the big leagues, the PGA tour, and, eventually, the broadcast booth.  Harrelson has crossed paths with everybody who was anybody, from his former A’s boss Charlie O. Finley to Arnold Palmer to Frank Sinatra to, as you may not have known, Carl Yastrzemski.

While Harrelson’s exploits during his playing days and his attempt to make it as a professional golfer offer interesting stories, its his time as a broadcaster that was most appealing to this White Sox fan.  Originally hired in 1982, along with Don Drysdale, to replace fan favorite Harry Caray, Harrelson spent 32 years broadcasting for the White Sox, with a break after his ill-fated tenure as the team’s general manager in 1986.

If anything, I would have liked to hear more about that season.  Harrelson did go over some of the moves that he made, including firing Tony LaRussa and trading Rule 5 draft pick (and future star) Bobby Bonilla back to the Pirates, but there were other controversies that went untouched, like moving Carlton Fisk to left field.  In fact, given how often the two must have crossed paths between Boston and Chicago, there is only one mention of Fisk at all, a throwaway tale from spring training in the late 60s where Hawk and Yaz quipped that he’d never make the big leagues.

This is a must read for any White Sox fan, regardless of your thoughts on Harrelson.  He was the voice of the team for a generation and his stories offer a unique insight in to one of the most successful eras in White Sox history.

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52 Books in 52 Weeks – 2020 Edition

A new year is once again upon us, and it is time to start the second decade with the goal to read an average of a book a week for the entire year, totaling 52 books in 52 weeks.

In year one, I only managed to finish 8 books.  Year two doubled that total.  Year three used a few graphic novels to improve once again, finishing with 24.  Year four was the first where I dropped from the year before, only finishing 18 books, which was well short of the ultimate goal.  Year five, I bounced back to finish with 23 books.  Year six, I had my best year since starting this challenge, not to mention my best reading year ever, finishing with 31 books.  In year seven, I matched that high point in total books, though far surpassing it in total pages read thanks to reading the entire Harry Potter series.  Three years ago, I dropped back down to 28.  Two years ago, I finished with my lowest total since 2014, finishing with only 22 books. Last year, I managed to up my total back to 28.

I’m going to give it another go this year.  I’ve got plenty of new books stocked up in the Kindle app on my iPad, not to mention one or two birthday and Christmas presents, so I’ve got a good pile to start with.  As a reminder, the rules I am using are:

  • You can count a book as read as long as you have completed the book in 2020 and at least 50% of that reading takes place in 2020
  • Any book counts as long as you’re not embarrassed to count it.
  • Poetry collections do indeed count.
  • Re-reading a book is okay as long as it isn’t done this year. (Reading Twilight twice in 2010 only counts as 1 read)
  • Audiobooks also count.

My first book of the year looks like it will be an autobiography of 2020 Ford C. Frick Award winner Ken Harrelson.  All told, 2020 should be another good year.

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You Can Put Him In The Hall, Yes!

Former White Sox broadcaster Ken “Hawk” Harrelson, who retired following the 2018 season, was awarded the 2020 Ford C. Frick Award yesterday, presented annually for excellence in broadcasting by the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.  Harrelson spent 33 of his 42 seasons as a broadcaster for the White Sox, starting in 1982, with a brief interruption caused by his inadvised turn as the teams General Manager in 1986.  He returned to the broadcast booth in 1989, where he stayed until retiring last fall.

Harrelson’s broadcasting career began in 1975, following the end of his playing career and a short foray into professional golf.  He, along with Don Drysdale, joined the White Sox booth in 1982, replacing Harry Caray, who had clashed with the team’s new ownership group.  He returned to the south side in 1989, alongside former Sox player Tom Paciorek. In 2000, he was joined in the booth by another former White Sox outfielder, Darrin Jackson.  2009 saw his final broadcast partner, Steve Stone, join the team.  A five-time Emmy Award winner, Harrelson’s trademark calls of “You can put it on the board…Yes!” and “Mercy!” became the nightly soundtrack for multiple generations of White Sox fans, including a young Jason Benetti, who would grow up to replace him with the White Sox.

Harrelson, 78, is the fifth announcer with ties to Chicago to earn the honor, following Milo Hamilton, Harry Caray, Jack Brickhouse, and Bob Elson.  Two other finalists for next year’s award also have strong ties to the city: current Cub radio announcer Pat Hughes and former Cub announcer Dewayne Staats.

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#6 – Carlton Fisk

Name: Carlton Fisk

Rank: 6

Position: C

Years With White Sox: 1981-1993

Carlton Fisk became a free agent after the Red Sox failed to tender him a contract for the 1981 season in the proper time frame, and thus he signed with the White Sox on March 18, 1981.  He paid immediate dividends for his new team, hitting a 3-run home run in the 8th inning against his former team at Fenway Park on Opening Day, leading the White Sox to a 5-3 victory.  Following the strike, he started the All Star game for the AL, going 1-3 with a run scored.  He finished the year with a .263 average and only 7 home runs in 96 games.  His efforts earned him his first Silver Slugger award.

Fisk enjoyed another successful year in 1982.  For the third straight year, he started behind the plate for the AL in the All Star game.  In 135 games, he hit .267 with 14 home runs and 65 RBIs.

1983 was a magical season on the South Side, as the White Sox won their first division title.  Fisk played a big role in the team’s success, both in managing a pitching staff that featured 2 of the top 4 finishers in Cy Young Award voting and at the plate, where he hit .289 with 26 home runs and 86 RBIs.  In the ALCS against the Orioles, Fisk struggled, just like the rest of his teammates, though he did launch 2 home runs in the 4 game series.  His season was good enough to earn 3rd place in the MVP vote, coming in behind Cal Ripken and Eddie Murray.

With expectations high, 1984 turned out to be a tough year, for both Fisk and the White Sox, though there were a few high points.  On May 9, he caught all 25 innings of a 7-6 win over the Brewers, breaking the major league record of 24 innings shared by 5 players.  A little over a week later, on May 16 against the Royals, Fisk became just the third player in White Sox history to hit for the cycle.  Unfortunately, injuries befell Fisk, limiting him to just 102 games, finishing with a .231 average and only 43 RBIs.  The bright side, though, is that it led him to begin a new training regimen, which he used for the rest of his long career.

The regimen paid immediate dividends, as Fisk put up the best numbers of his career in 1985.  At the age of 37, Fisk set career highs with 37 home runs, tying Dick Allen for the White Sox single-season record, and 107 RBIs, while tying his career high with 17 stolen bases.  He was voted to his 10th All-Star team, won his second Silver Slugger award and finished 13th in the AL MVP voting.

1986 was a strange year for Fisk and the White Sox.  New General Manager Ken Harrelson thought Joel Skinner was ready to take over behind the plate and, with Fisk about to enter his age 38 season, he convinced manager Tony LaRussa to move Fisk to left field.  On May 9, with Skinner hitting in the .150s and LaRussa’s job on the line, Fisk was moved back behind the plate and the White Sox proceeded to win 10 of their next 13 games.  By the end of the year, Skinner, Harrelson, and LaRussa were all gone, and Fisk remained, putting up a .221 average with 14 home runs and 63 RBIs.

In 1987, with a new management regime in place, Fisk was back behind the plate full time.  He appeared in 135 games at age 39, hitting .256 with 23 home runs and 71 RBIs.

1988 looked to be a good year for Fisk, until a broken hand limited him to just 76 games.  Despite that, his .277 average, 19 home runs, and 50 RBIs earned him his 3rd Silver Slugger award.

At age 41, Fisk, along with pitcher Jerry Reuss, who was 39, set a record starting the 1989 season, becoming the oldest battery ever to start on opening day, surpassing pitcher Johnny Niggeling and catcher Rick Ferrell of the 1944 Washington Senators, as the White Sox beat the Angels 9-2.  Splitting time behind the plate with Ron Karkovice, Fisk appeared in 103 games, hitting .293 with 13 home runs and 68 RBIs.

In 1990, Fisk was the elder statesman on a young White Sox team that unexpectedly challenged the A’s for the division title.  On May 22, at Yankee Stadium, Fisk had a run in with two-sport star Deion Sanders.  When Sanders drew a dollar sign in the dirt before a pitch, then didn’t run out an easy out, Fisk and Sanders went back and forth, sharing expletives.  Later in the game, Sanders told Fisk that “the days of slavery are over,” infuriating Fisk.  “He comes up and wants to make it a racial issue — there’s no racial issue involved.”  During Sanders’ next at-bat, Fisk told him, “There is a right way and a wrong way to play this game. You’re playing it the wrong way. And the rest of us don’t like it. Someday, you’re going to get this game shoved right down your throat.”  Later that year, on August 17, Fisk hit his 328th home run as a catcher, breaking Johnny Bench’s career record.  As the team closed out Comiskey Park, Fisk finished the year with a .285 average, 18 home runs, and 65 RBIs, which earned him 15th place in MVP voting.

As the White Sox moved across the street to the new Comiskey Park in 1991, Fisk, at age 43, put together his last season as an everyday catcher.  He was named to his 11th, and final, All Star team, becoming the oldest player in MLB history to collect a hit in the mid-summer classic.  He finished the year having appeared in 134 games, hitting .241 with 18 home runs and 74 RBIs.

With Ron Karkovice taking over the majority of the work behind the plate, Fisk moved into a backup role in 1992.  He appeared in just 62 games, his lowest total since 1974, and hit only .229 with 3 home runs.

1993 looked to be the end of the road for Fisk, though not by his choice.  On June 22, at Comiskey Park, Fisk broke Bob Boone’s record for career games caught with his 2,226th game behind the plate.  Six days later, Fisk was abruptly released by the White Sox.  Fisk was notified of his dismissal in his hotel room in Cleveland, and was ordered to turn in his equipment and fly back to Chicago immediately and alone.  To add insult to injury, Fisk, along with former teammate Donn Pall, came to Comiskey Park before game 1 of the ALCS to wish their former teammates well.  Sadly, they were both turned away, souring Fisk’s relationship with the organization for years.  His career ended with a .189 average in only 25 games, getting a mere 53 at bats.

At the conclusion of this career, he was the all time leader in games caught and home runs for catchers, the all time leader in home runs for the White Sox, the leader in home runs hit after age 40, and the most seasons played as a catcher.  His number 72 was retired by the White Sox on September 14, 1997, and he was part of the 2000 Hall of Fame class.

Fisk’s numbers in a White Sox uniform, both for games I attended and overall, were:

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