Does the MLB Network see dollar signs in a nascent White Sox Nation? Long shunned by the camera’s eye on a network where Chicago history means the Cubs (yes, lets look at Ernie Banks round the bases yet again while we have to rely on photographs to remember Dick Allen – or for that matter any White Sox between 1959 and 2005) MLB Networks has announced a new reality TV show centered on the Chicago White Sox front office and management. In addition to giving fantasy league managers the world over further reason to avoid productive work, Kenny Williams, Jerry Reinsdorf and Ozzie Guillen are on tap to become the reality genre’s next…whoever the reality genre puts on TV. The big question: subtitles for Ozzie or no? The Sun-Times Chris DeLuca reports:
”We have to provide the viewers something different about the game that they haven’t experienced before. How many fans of baseball are in baseball fantasy leagues? I know some people that are three leagues at the same time. We wanted to provide people a unique look at how one team — an owner, general manager and manager — go about their business.”
They couldn’t have picked a better season to focus on the Sox. Tension has already been running high between Guillen and Williams about the makeup of the 2010 team. We got a glimpse of that over the Jim Thome debate last month during SoxFest.
That’s when the cameras began rolling. They roll again Sunday, when the Sox open camp. Gavant’s crew will gather hours of footage for the one-hour July 4 debut that takes viewers from the offseason to the weeks before the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline. After the debut, each of the next five episodes will be half-hour segments that provide a glimpse of the Sox’ midseason manuevering.
Glad to see this. I thought the end of UHF meant the end of Sox TV.