Our family have been Sox fans since 1921. I attended my first game at Comiskey Park in 1954 (or maybe 1953) and have seen the Sox play every season since (not counting 2020) except 1970, when I saw the Sox play in Fenway Park. I’ve attended Game 1 of the 1959 and 2005 World Series, Buehrle’s no-hitter and perfect game, two one-hitters (one by the Sox, the other by the Cardinals), Joe Stanka’s only MLB win, Bill Veeck’s Twins Night in 1961, at least one postseason game except 1983, the last Opening Day and final game in Comiskey Park in 1900 and the first game in the new ballpark the following season. In addition to Wrigley Field, I’ve watched the Sox (usually lose) in Boston, New York (pre- and post-renovated old Yankee Stadium), Milwaukee, Seattle, Washington, D.C., Pittsburgh, Denver and St. Louis.
Last game at Comiskey Park, 9/30/90/First game at Comiskey Park, 4/18/91
Luckily, I was out of Chicago during the most recent worst-of-times. September 1967 collapse and 0-10 start to the 1968: freshman at Lehigh University. Losing 106 games in 1970: senior at Boston University. Things turned around after returning home to Chicago, including sitting in the first row behind the Yankees’ dugout with my parents sitting in the second row next to Yankees president Michael Burke (tickets courtesy Yankees manager Ralph Houk) in the famous doubleheader in June 1972 when Dick Allen came off the bench to hit the walk-off homerun to sweep both games. Other than the South Side Hitmen and Winning Ugly teams, there wasn’t much to stimulate excitement until 2005.
As recently as 2021, I attended 35 White Sox games. Unfortunately, severe lower back pains and subsequent spinal surgery limited my attendance last year to only Opening Day. In relating my plight to a Sox employee and a limited partner (both who will remain nameless), their responses were identical: “You didn’t miss anything.”
Section 126, a familiar spot
Several instances of organizational indifference and worse have multiplied in recent years, many of which I will not relate in print. Most obvious, of course, is the utter inability to field a team this season that could challenge the 1962 Mets record of 120 losses in one season. Fellow fans question roster moves that have proven disastrous, most notably a veteran relief pitcher who was lit up in spring training, only to make the Opening Day roster and blow a save before finally being DFA’d. The lineup begs a new hitting designation, as several players recently under the Mendoza Line (.200 batting average). At least Angel Bravo hit .294, even though he couldn’t get a throw in from the outfield on less than three bounces.
Finally, my excitement about attending my 18th Opening
Day (all but one since 1990), was tempered by the following incident. As
someone who has taken digital SLR cameras into Sox Park since 2008, as well as
into all of the previously mentioned ballparks, I was greatly surprised when
questioned about my small Olympus OM-D Mark II mirrorless DSLR. After placing
the small mirrorless camera, extra lens, keys and cellphone in the basket and
passing through Gate 3 security successfully, I was told to walk back out, and
another security guard questioned whether the lens came off my camera. I showed
them it did; I figured it was something about security.
I'm not sure what he requested next, as I asked if this were a new policy - he said it wasn't - to which I responded that in the 16 years I've been bringing a camera to Sox Park I was NEVER questioned. He then said I could argue but this was the rule (not sure what the rule was); I said fine if that's the rule. Fortunately, another security guard came in and told me everything was o.k.
I wrote to the Sox via email – I couldn’t find a security desk at the ballpark – pointing out it took 70 years for staff to hassle me but it didn’t make it any more palatable. Response . . . surprise!: nothing to date.
