When Jeff Torborg died at the beginning of the year, I was struck by the universal praise he received as a fundamentally decent human being. He managed five different franchises over 11 seasons and only had a winning record in two of them, but to the extent that he could be blamed, it was seemingly because the culture of baseball couldn't naturally rise to his level of dignity.
Reviewing the White Sox-specific chapter of his life, I was also struck by the circumstances driving Torborg's departure from the team, which was a classic example of White Sox passive-aggression that is natural to recognize now, but was harder to spot back then.
New GM Ron Schueler preferred to hire his own manager instead of the one he inherited, but coming off those two winning seasons that bridged the gap from Old Comiskey to New Comiskey and bland uniforms to ones that became widely adopted, firing Torborg would've been an unpopular decision. So instead of owning the choice, Schueler made it clear that Torborg should take the Mets up on their interest and make the move for him.
Those interested in this particular chapter of White Sox history would do well to check out Matt Flesch's new documentary, "Jeff Torborg: A Wonderful Baseball Life" Dovetailing with the work on the production of "Last Comiskey," Flesch expanded a video tribute for Torborg, whose family he developed a close relationship with, into a 96-minute film, and a half hour covers the highs and lows with the White Sox.
The contemporary reporting of Torborg's departure never seemed to square up with the team’s purported motivations, and the reaction of Torborg's friends and family in the documentary make it clear that they shouldn't.
Spare Parts
The Detroit manager -- who would've been the White Sox's manager if Rick Hahn had his treasured druthers -- is no stranger to watching young players do the hard work of figuring it all out, and he sees the White Sox starting to do the same.
‘‘They’re growing into a problem, aren’t they?’’ Hinch said before the Sox’ 7-5 victory, their season-high sixth consecutive win, in the series opener Friday against the Tigers. ‘‘They’re playing a more stabilized version of baseball, and you can see [the young players] growing up and growing into these roles. We’ve got to pitch well to beat these guys. They’re never out of it.’’
Miguel Vargas is making great use of his time on the injured list, as he got to watch the White Sox sweep the Twins at Target Field and visit his favorite NFL team's practice facility on the trip to Minneapolis.
The Andrew Vaughn story may feel a little played out now that Vaughn is only hitting .228/.287/.326 over the last month, but I appreciated Isaiah De Anda Delgado's heroic attempt to write a feature about Vaughn, given how little the subject is willing to say about himself.
We ran into this issue on the Sox Machine Podcast, and it's nice to know that even the people paid to say his name on a regular basis fight this battle every week.
Ken Dryden's 1983 book "The Game" is my favorite sports book of all time, and one of my favorite books, period. He won six Stanley Cups in eight years as goalie for the Canadiens, but held out for a year during the dynasty and used the downtime to work as a legal clerk and fulfill legal requirements for a law degree at McGill University, then retired at the top of his game to pursue other interests. In terms of titles, he was effectively the Michael Jordan of his position. In terms of what drove him, he couldn't have been wired more differently.
I don't know whether I'll watch 'The Paper' because I don't have Peacock and I've reached my limit of streaming services to subscribe to, but as somebody who briefly experienced working for a mid-sized paper in the pre-recession days, then watched the staffing go from "sending an Albany TV writer to a Hollywood press junket" to "one reporter per county," I'm not sure if need to.
