Ozzie's antics usually take the pressure off of the players, though this episode is starting to spin out of control. I hope he doesn't meltdown at the All Star Game.
As for Mariotti, he has a history of not playing well with people.
Mariotti takes Sox, Sun-Times to task
Columnist also says Guillen should be suspended for slur
Teddy Greenstein
ON SPORTS MEDIA AND COLLEGES
June 21, 2006
A day after Ozzie Guillen slammed him in an obscenity-laced tirade, Sun-Times sports columnist Jay Mariotti fired back at the White Sox.
That response was expected.
Surprising, though, was that Mariotti accused his own newspaper of having a pro-Sox bias that resulted in one of his columns being pulled during the 2005 World Series.
"We're a rival of the Chicago Tribune and it's fair game to rip both teams," Mariotti said during an interview with Sun-Times colleagues Brian Hanley and Mike Mulligan on WSCR-AM 670. "But when it's the Sox, suddenly we have little meetings at the paper and suddenly there are issues and suddenly there's a column pulled here or there during the World Series, interestingly enough.
"That's where I have a problem with the Sun-Times."
The response came after Hanley asked Mariotti whether the Sun-Times has supported him during his long feud with the Sox and club Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf.
"I wouldn't be forthright and honest if I didn't tell you I have my own doubts about my paper and its relationship with the White Sox," Mariotti replied. "We've had discussions about it, so I'm not speaking out of school.
"If the Chicago Tribune, as we've all suspected through the years, isn't quite as critical of the Cubs as the Sun-Times, heck, the Sun-Times needs to treat every team equally."
Reached Wednesday, Sun-Times sports editor Stu Courtney declined to comment.
Mariotti also accused WSCR personalities, including Hanley and Mulligan, of going easy on the Sox because of the station's relationship with the team.
"I hear you guys all the time ripping Dusty [Baker], as you should," he said. "Well, rip the Sox, too, when they deserve it. Just because you're the Sox flagship station doesn't mean you shouldn't be just as critical of the Sox."
Sound familiar? It should.
In 2004, Mariotti accused WMVP-AM 1000 of trying to curry favor with Reinsdorf in an attempt to retain its Sox radio rights. The station parted ways with Mariotti after 11 months, with officials saying he was impossible to work with.
Mariotti also spoke about his custom of avoiding the Sox's clubhouse, and thus denying players and Guillen the chance to confront him.
After criticizing the Sox for not protecting him in the wake of "physical threats," Mariotti acknowledged the threats "really don't involve anyone there now."
"[But] until they come up with some sort of professional standard for how they deal with me in that clubhouse," he said, "I'm going to play by my own rules."
Mariotti also said that, as a columnist, he is not required to go face-to-face with players.
"I am like [WSCR's] Terry Boers and Dan Bernstein," he said. "Do you see Terry and Dan out at the ballpark very often? No. Why? Because they're columnists, they're talk-show hosts.
"And maybe the PR guys should get off their [butts] and do a better job of telling the ballplayers how this works. I'd be glad to tell them how it works, but I'm too busy wondering why this ballplayer wants to kick my [butt] every day."
Sox Vice President of Communications Scott Reifert responded that "we've received compliment after compliment from national and local media about our clubhouse—and how willing we've been to work with the media. For some reason we've had an issue with one guy."
Reifert also said he recently left two voice mails for Mariotti and sent him a letter inviting him to the ballpark to discuss his issues with Sox management.
"We never heard back from him," Reifert said.As for Guillen's tirade, which included the use of a derogatory, three-letter term for a homosexual, Mariotti called for the manager to be suspended.
"Look, Ozzie, when he pulls his stunts, is going to be criticized," Mariotti said. "If he wants to come back with slurs, he's only hurting himself, his organization and Major League Baseball.
"This is a direct slur. Personally, people call me worse when I'm ordering coffee in the morning at Starbucks. I get worse at home. When you're a critic, you have to accept criticism and I accept it. But this goes over the line. It shows a certain hatred.
"I could tell you stories behind the scenes about Reinsdorf and things they have tried to do at the paper, getting me thrown out of there. It's ugly. And yet it's up to me to keep my cool and continue to write the column."
tgreenstein@tribune.com
Copyright © 2006, The Chicago Tribune
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