TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) -White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen once boasted he would win if he ran for mayor of Chicago.
Now?
“I think Mayor Daley is doing a tremendous job,” he said.
Guillen wasn’t happy with the job he did last season, and reiterated Sunday that the White Sox should make a change if the team continues to falter. A switch seems unlikely, considering he signed an extension last September that runs through 2012, but that didn’t stop him from saying: “If I’m not the answer, they have the right to do what they want to do.”
Guillen has made similar statements in the past, but this time he said he’d be willing to tear up his extension and work on a short-term deal if the team stumbles the way it did last season. He made one thing clear, too: He won’t resign.
“I’m not a quitter,” Guillen said Sunday. “My point is if they think I’m not doing my job, that’s different, but I’m not going to quit on my team. It’s like if you’re the captain of the plane and all of a sudden you say, ‘I can’t handle this. I’m going to crash.’ And you have people you have to save. I’m not a quitter and I never will be a quitter.”
General manager Ken Williams dismissed Guillen’s comments, saying he’s “much more concerned about what may or may not be in the buffet line over here at lunch.”
Management showed its faith in Guillen by extending his contract, so it was no surprise that questions about the manager’s job status caught Williams off guard. Then again, the 2005 World Series champions faded from contention over the last few months of 2006 after a strong start. And even with a $100 million payroll and a roster packed with stars, the White Sox went 72-90 last season.
While Williams said he thinks Guillen was “probably serious,” it’s probably accurate to say a change in the dugout is not in the works.
Third baseman Joe Crede missed most of last year with a back injury, and Williams would like to trade him to make room for the promising Josh Fields. Paul Konerko and Jermaine Dye had subpar seasons, the starting pitchers were inconsistent, and the bullpen crumbled, blowing 23 saves and going 19-25 with a 5.49 ERA. The only reliable reliever was closer Bobby Jenks, and he went through stretches of inactivity because the setup men were ineffective.
And Guillen?
He insisted he wasn’t himself, either.
He thought he holed up in his office a little too often. There were fewer outbursts from the outspoken manager, who used a homosexual slur to describe a Chicago sports columnist the previous year. He didn’t want players to be peppered with questions about his latest rant, so he was more reserved. That’s what he said, anyway.
“Can’t say I thought that,” Konerko said.
Konerko did see a manager whose hands were tied by poor play but protected his players for most of the year.
“If he would have gotten upset and gotten in somebody’s face after every little thing that went on last year, he would have been doing it eight times a day,” Konerko said. “It’s tough to keep that up.”
Guillen finally lit into his players after a loss at Texas in late August, when they blew a 4-1 lead and lost 5-4 in 11 innings. “They’re killing me,” he said after that game. “They’re killing my family, my coaching staff and the White Sox fans. I hope they care the way we care. I’m tired of seeing this (expletive) every day.”
Guillen sees the new season as a sort of new day.
He vowed things will be different. And in this case, different apparently means familiar. Guillen vowed to be his old self, even if others never really noticed a change in him.
The new – or old – Ozzie showed up at camp saying he might run naked down Michigan Avenue if the White Sox win it all this year, and asked the team’s media relations staff not to show his postgame news conferences because he might offend people. He also plans to spend more time with his players, work the clubhouse more. Show more enthusiasm, more emotion.
“I’ve got to be with my players, smiling,” he said. “Every time I came down here, I saw long faces. It was my job to make sure those guys step it up and enjoy this game. That’s the point I want to change. I’ve got to go back to what I was. People think I’m going to change – like, what, kill somebody in the street? No. I’ve got to be Ozzie in the clubhouse.”
Konerko noticed one change this spring: More mandatory drills and less idle time.
If that translates into a better record, then Guillen won’t be talking to owner Jerry Reinsdorf or Williams about shortening his extension.
“My job is to win,” Guillen said. “My job is to get this ballclub to where it should be. If Kenny and Jerry don’t like the way I run this ballclub, they have the right to fire me. My point is (just because) they trust me and give me an extension, that means I can go out there and be freelancing and living off the contract. I’m the biggest White Sox fan of anybody. If Ozzie Guillen is not the answer to win, if Ozzie Guillen is not the guy to do what (needs to be done) for this organization to have success, I’ll be the first one to tell Jerry to get somebody else.”
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