Lincicome: Sell the White Sox? How about stay and get better

OK, so the White Sox have turned the page. Chances are the next page will be just as blank as the last page. The Sox have more blank pages than Wally's diary.

Still, something had to be done. Everyone knew that. And by everyone I mean those few who are paid to pay attention and those few who pay to get attention, chanting, "Sell the team, Jerry," and wearing paper bags over their heads and such.

A disclaimer here. Public consensus on what to do is undependable as our recent romance with bullyism in high office has shown, not to draw too great a connection between national shame and the American League.

These things have a proven pattern. The first thing you do is fire the manager, this after promising you are not going to fire the manager. This is the time-honored vote of confidence, except in the case of the White Sox firing Pedro Grifol an introductory press conference would be necessary just to identify Pedro Grifol.

Such an obscure and incidental figure as Grifol does not inspire bag heads and fan chants. This relieves him from any responsibility for the woeful Sox, unlike the twice-lamented Tony La Russa who, for all his habit of sleeping in the dugout, did inspire chants of "Fire Tony," which turned out to be unnecessary. A man is known by the disgust he inspires.

Condemn the players? There is that, of course, and this collection of White Sox operatives earns the boos. The team plays like it is waiting for a bus. Desultory, unfocused, half hearted, pick a picture, though not that much different from the Sox teams that have preceded them.

So, then, who is to blame? The general manager, of course, the guy who built the team, except in the case of the Sox, Rick Hahn was not so much a builder as a bystander, leaving the heavy lifting to Ken Williams, also known as "the executive vice-president," a title as hefty as it is hollow.

The two, longtime Sox fixtures as well as BFF's according to their post-dismissal statements, have no hard feelings, nor responsibility for that matter.

"I firmly believe," stated Hahn, "that many vital ingredients of a championship team are in that clubhouse."

Taking credit for tomorrow is a huckster's habit.

For his part, Williams agreed that "we did not accomplish what we set out to do." On the other hand, "we managed to always find a laugh even in the darkest times." Giggles echo in an empty house.

The Sox season has been one dull wait for the next shoe to drop, in this case two shoes, used shoes, familiar shoes.

This, then, leaves the owner, minority holder of a sacred trust, like poor Yorick, a man of infinite tolerance, not usually a character flaw but in the world of sports mortally abnormal.

In Jerry Reinsdorf's four decades of stewardship, the White Sox have floated on the periphery of baseball, as well as in their own city, winning one World Series and threatening few.

The wish to "Sell the team, Jerry," assumes that new ownership will fix everything, and it is hard to refute the logic or the yearning. The question is, to whom?

There might still be an odd Rickets hanging about or, just spitballing here, a Walton or an Anschutz, looking to buy used lore and an uninspired park, a fan base numb but forever hopeful, not noticeably upset with another alternative, moving away.

There is an itch in all of baseball for something else, something better, usually centered around Las Vegas, where the A's of Oakland are bound, following their old friends, the Raiders. Kansas City wants a new stadium, whereas the old one is just fine.

The Tampa Bay Rays want to move where the population is, across the bay or to Orlando, anywhere but in the covered saucer they play in. Miami, with a splendid and recent park, is unhappy, and on and on.

The race seems to be who will get to Nashville first, while places like Salt Lake or Buffalo or Charlotte or Portland press their noses to the window. Even Chicago's own suburbs wave from the freeway.

Here is my solution for the Sox. Stay there. Get better. Dump those stupid "Southside" shirts and get off Reinsdorf's back.