Sox' loss of Kusnyer will be felt

Coaches come, and coaches go.

In major-league baseball, they are the thankless pawns. The lucky ones make maybe a third of the minimum players' salary ($380,000), even though coaches are typically the first to arrive at the ballpark and the last to leave.

And don't forget about the unbalanced public scrutiny.

When the White Sox won the World Series in 2005, pitching coach Don Cooper and hitting coach Greg Walker were viewed as giants in their fields.

Two years later, they were stunted, stammering incompetents, and many of the same admirers demanded they be fired.

It's all part of the game. Odds are, Cooper and Walker will indeed go on the chopping block one day. Most do, especially in this win-or-else climate.

To their credit, the Sox are better than most when it comes to taking care of coaches. They are paid comparatively well, and manager Ozzie Guillen expects only an honest day's work, not miracles.

Late last week, the White Sox announced third-base coach Razor Shines is not coming back in 2008. It was Guillen's call, and it had nothing to do with Shines' performance in his one season with the Sox.

Rather, the White Sox are determined to get back to the scrappy style of play that lifted them to the highest heights in 2005, and they need a coach to help reach that goal. Shines is a good guy, but he's not a good fit in the restructuring process.

The White Sox also announced bullpen coach Art Kusnyer has been reassigned within the organization. Outside, it's a move that might have elicited a yawn.

Inside, it's a devastating loss.

Given his age (61) and the wear and tear 47 years of professional baseball have put on his body, the announcement was not a huge surprise.

But if there was ever a more beloved figure wearing a Sox' uniform, I have yet to meet him.

Kusnyer -- or "Cave,'' as he is best known -- is a classic on multiple levels.

He initially signed on as the White Sox' bullpen boss in 1980, Tony La Russa's first full season as manager.

Cave was on staff until 1987, and he returned to the South Side a decade later under Terry Bevington, of all people.

Not only was Cave a living, breathing product of old-school baseball, he was a one-man comedy troupe.

The stories told through the years are numerous, and most are not fit for a family newspaper.

But there are some unforgettable classic Cave tales, such as the one that left Paul Konerko in tears earlier this season. To hear Cave tell it, he was playing minor-league baseball when he witnessed a remarkable feat.

The center fielder on his team, the story goes, caught a foul ball during the game.

The there was the time Cave was catching Nolan Ryan's second career no-hitter. Yes, he lived to humorously tell how he survived a cross-up in signals.

Cave was expecting a curveball, so he had to think quick when Ryan buzzed a 100-mph fastball across the plate.

The exchanges with unruly fans sitting by bullpens on the road, the impressions of egotistical managers like Bobby Valentine, his unique way of overcoming the language barrier with former bullpen catcher Man Soo Lee, they will all be sorely missed.

And so will Art "Cave'' Kusnyer.