It's over

John Thorn called it the "Wallflower World Series," and it was a short date. Real White Sox fans, I think, are blinking in confusion this morning--how'd it happen so fast? How did they win the World Series so suddenly? Elwood reports the gym is empty this morning, and possibly all the revelling and parades will give us Northsiders a few days' respite from the accusatory glares and hisses of "You're a Cubs fan, aren't you, I can tell." Ironically, the hangovers might actually make Sox fans nicer for a few days.

My (careful and respectful) little study of south side baseball left me with a few insights. South side baseball is not supposed to be fun. It's supposed to be epic and difficult. I think that White Sox fans believe that their 88 years of suffering and near-choke in late summer have somehow ennobled them, and that they deserved to win for those reasons. They didn't. They only deserved to win because they were a really good team this year, with a stellar manager. Hopefully, Guillen will do it again over the course of the next several years, so that the players feel they're getting some more respect and Sox fans can finally let the chip drop from their shoulder. I'm also hoping for the public firing of Astros' manager Phil Garner, who was obviously not up to the challenge of managing a team through the World Series. Slumps from any given player are to be expected every now and then, but if the whole team starts playing badly all of a sudden, it's probably the manager's fault. Guillen showed just the opposite: that a good manager can talk a team into doing things they'd convinced themselves were impossible. When we went to the Sox-Sox game last week, we sat next to a sign that said, "Ozzie para presidente!" and Guillen claimed (in September) that he'd run for mayor of Chicago if his team won the Series. I imagine he's receiving offers of campaign funds this morning.

I also had the odd experience of reading about Jimbo's in the NYTimes.com, which is where a bunch of Real Sox Fans hung out and watched the game last night. NYTimes is careful to correct a bunch of Chicago websites that report Jimbo's only sells beer in bottles. According to the bartender, Jimbo's serves both bottles and cans.

I'm proud of my city, but it was also a tiring season of baseball. I'm not really cut out for epic drama; I'm happy with my brat and my beer and my game on the radio (since I've found at the actual game, I can't tell balls from strikes and have to rely on the scoreboard). I'm not a real Sox fan. But that's okay, because I'm enjoying them anyway.