Maybe Jerry Reinsdorf was right. Perhaps the White Sox fanbase isn’t ready to handle the emotional trauma of a rebuild. Or, have we leaped ahead of ourselves and let our heart lead our minds?
@Matt_Enuco are the @whitesox losing the fan base?
— Coach O’Donovan (@kpodono24) May 16, 2018
This a great question to ask ourselves as the White Sox dive into the major-league cellar and toil in the darkness without much of a protest. If the old maxim that it is not the dog in the fight, but the fight in the dog that matters, well maybe we’d like to find another dog.
That’s a very good question. No, because #WhiteSox fans are intelligent enough to understand what phase of the rebuild we’re in. I think our current frustration is a function of wildly high expectations for rookies. These early struggles are a necessary correction for the… https://t.co/foM6UBkqYI
— Matt Enuco (@Matt_Enuco) May 17, 2018
But that’s not what fandom is about, and such fairweather loyalties are exactly what Sox fans rail on Cubs fans for. After the lovable losers hoisted the World Series trophy in 2016 Sox fans let loose about Cubs nation frothing over Sox fans perpetual dumpster dwelling. To which many Sox fans reminded the amnesia struck and victory blinded Cubs fans that the White Sox took home a few championships between the 108-year drought on the north side of Chicago. In fact, many White Sox fans called out their brethren for flipping to the Cubs side after they won in 2016 and accused many Cubs fans of joining the southside chants in 2005.
Meh, fans that bail on a team that loses in a season they are supposed to lose in might not qualify as fans. I’d say they’re more like aquatintences. BUT, I agree that it is difficult to watch. They’re hardly competing and playing bad baseball. #WhiteSox https://t.co/HYVWP1Qxtc
— Matt Enuco (@Matt_Enuco) May 17, 2018
Look, I don’t know how to measure loyalty to sports organizations. Sure there are fan clubs on social media and Reddit pages saturated with pride for one team or another, but calculating a fan base is much more than just following attendance figures and tracking merchandise sales. There is an ethos that enraptures a certain being and pulls them into an organization for better or worse; call it a marriage.
Cubs fans — and the rest of Major League Baseball for that matter — get all tickled pointing out the White Sox sour attendance numbers. Spinning this is impossible. Our attendance numbers are embarrassing, exacerbated by a large ballpark with more day-games than advisably prudent leaving the Sox with A LOT of empty seats beamed into our homes.
As you can see, there is a correlation between winning and attendance. This is no secret phenomenon. Attendance swells with any organization as they start to win. But the White Sox are notoriously accused of a spineless fanbase that refuses to support their team. And yes, our attendance figures are typically near the bottom of the major-league average, but we are in a unique situation.
What about evaluating merchandise sales as an indication of the fanbase?
Well, considering this graph shows merchandise sales in Oct. 2016 is anyone surprised Cubs gear was a hot commodity? Still, merchandise is equally correlated to winning with a few cultural caveats sprinkled in. White Sox hats witnessed a surge of popularity in the early 90s as hip-hop culture adopted the logo as their own. But some fans just arent’ interested in donning jersey’s and hats to support their team. Should we refuse membership to the fanbase for this reason alone?
You can see the White Sox suffered a dip in brand loyalty commensurate with the Marlins and Pirates as wins were scarce. But we weren’t the only ones suffering. The Houston Astros had a good season in 2016 and couldn’t keep pace with the Mariners in merchandise sales — AND THE ASTROS WON THE WORLD SERIES IN 2017.
But the most frustrating revelation has yet to come. Here you are, Sox fans…we may never recover from this…
Yes, the St. Louis Cardinals outsold the White Sox in Illinois in 2016. However, the Cardinals are another one of those fanbases that travel well and sticks with their guys through the peaks and valleys.
The Cubs will always be Chicago’s first team. There is no arguing this point and Sox fans that wish to challenge this fact are just silly. The Yankees are New York’s team and Mets fans have accepted this reality. All fans have to endure the “we’ve got 27 of them, we don’t need this one” arguments from Yankees fans when they lose in the playoffs, and how can we argue with them? Boston is the nearest equivalent to the Cubs fan base and without a second team in New England, the Yankees are the de facto rival.
No, this is not an apples-to-apples comparison, but it serves to illustrate the peerless dynamic of Chicago baseball. Boston rallied around the Red Sox as the Yankees slaughtered major league competition for decades. They embraced their losing culture by adopting the “there’s always next year” idea of competing. And there’s always that pesky curse involving Babe Ruth that boosted the rivalry to new heights.
The White Sox and Cubs play in different leagues. Both teams have their origins in Chicago and find their genesis in the 19th century. There is no analog to these facts anywhere else in Major League Baseball. The city has always had two baseball teams and as one fell into a historic losing streak the other endured a black eye. Perhaps the White Sox have never recovered from the Black Sox scandal of the 1919 World Series. Perhaps we haven’t been able to shed the criminal stench of gambling and Hollywood’s memorialization of our sins (8 men out was a good movie, after all). For a game that asks its players to have short memories it sure doesn’t forget the transgressions of its players — I mean, Pete Rose is still exiled for something that was just legalized nationwide, sports betting.
But the current state of the franchise is exciting and recent struggles should not be underscored by doom-and-gloom fans. Reinsdorf was wrong in assuming that fans would jump ship in a full teardown of the roster. It had to be done. Retooling would have been a fool’s errand that hadn’t yielded a world series the results expected by the fans.
So, yeah, we got ahead of ourselves with all the exciting trades and optimism teaming around the farm system. It is still there, the prospects haven’t gone anywhere and patience is required — perhaps more than we originally thought as Rick Hahn cast a spell over the whole league in 2017. Maybe 2019 and 2020 is too soon to call for a World Series, but does that mean we shouldn’t be competitive in those seasons? Certainly not.
The developmental process is delicate and requires patience. Yes, it is enraging to accept this reality, but instead of lamenting our status why not embrace our history and our future? Yoan Moncada is only 21 years old and learning how to approach big-league pitching. Carlos Rodon might finally be 100 percent healthy. Matt Davidson is only in his second full major-league season. Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez are in their first big-league campaign and rushing Michael Kopech and Eloy Jimenez to the show could cripple their confidence with setbacks they are not equipped for.
…and we haven’t even discussed the promise of Luis Robert, Dylan Cease, Dane Dunning, Alec Hansen, Micker Adolfo, Zack Collins and Zack Burdi.
Keep your chins up, Sox fans. We are processing…and losing is a necessary part of that process.
