Anti-Fan: Guys and dolls and clubhouse 'shrines'

Jim Gordon | The New Mexican

5/8/2008 - 5/9/08

"When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways." — Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians

When I was a child, I thought Major League Baseball players were men; by that, I mean adults. Actually, being a child in love with the game, I thought them much more — demigods, probably, but definitely what I considered grown-ups.

I've been consistently disabused of that notion over the last several decades, most recently by the Chicago White Sox and their peerless leader, Ozzie (&&##$) Guillen.

The latest embarrassment out of the Windy City comes courtesy of Sox players who erected a "slump-busting shrine" in their clubhouse. The shrine reportedly consisted of two nude inflatable dolls and "strategically placed" bats, along with a sign that read, "You've Got to Push."

For those innocents who haven't got the picture, let me add this: According to a reporter's blog, "A few of the bats were doing naughty things."

It's their clubhouse and their business, you say? To that, let me reply two ways.

One: While it is their clubhouse and their business, it's also a place of business, where by Major League Baseball decree media of both genders gather to interview Our Heroes — and I don't mean to imply that only women could be offended by such crudeness.

Two: The last time I looked, it was 2008. What decade are the Sox in?

And don't even try the boys-will-be-morons defense. Treating people as objects — even symbolically — is not good for anyone.

"No one meant any harm by it. It was just kind of one of those things that just kind of happened ... " White Sox center fielder Nick Swisher said. "If anybody was offended by it, then I sincerely apologize."

If anybody was offended? Hmmm. Maybe we should take a poll of the players' wives, mothers, sisters and daughters and see what they think of the shrine.

Guillen, best known — despite the Sox's 2005 World Series win — for his profanity-laced tirades and an anti-gay slur, predictably felt put upon.

"If people think we did something wrong, wow. I'm not going to apologize, I'm not going to say I'm sorry," he said. "I don't know what to say. I can't come up with the words because as soon as I say that, that means I'm guilty of something. I'm not guilty."

General Manager Ken Williams seemed to think the opportunity called for humor.

"I will assure Major League Baseball that the doll was not violated in any way, shape or form," he said.

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.

Roy Campanella, a Hall of Fame catcher from the 1950s, famously said that to play baseball, "you have to have a lot of little boy in you."

The 2008 White Sox would seem to qualify — and then some.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.