Lincicome: About an American Pope and his White Sox hat

The dumbing down of America is best represented by the baseball cap, once worn as a practical sun shield but now resting on the noggins of presidents and pizza deliverers, not always easy to tell apart.

Yet to see a ball cap perched on the head of the Pope is still startling, although to be honest the hat is an improvement over the formal pointy headdress and even the little white beanie worn on less formal occasions.

That’s what comes of an American pontiff, I suppose, whose wardrobe also now includes a 20-year-old shirt autographed by Ozzie and the others, the White Sox winners of yore, the yore getting yorier year by year.

So there he was, Leo XIV, photo-oping a Sox cap, black with the vertical lettering, the interlocking misspelling, declaring his allegiance to a sports team likely unfamiliar to the bulk of his flock.

It is a little hard to tell whether the Pope is a flat brim or curved brim wearer, but from the photo available it seems he goes more for the traditional curve. Flat brims are more modern, I guess, but dumb looking. At least he didn’t wear it backwards, which is dated and dumber.

There is a whole school of proper cap shaping, some requiring steam (and gloves for safety) but for those of us who have worn caps for some time (and never with neckties) we need only our practiced knowledge of how to bend and mold the bill. That’s the first thing we do when handed a new cap. We roll the bill in from both sides, unflatten it just like Willie and Ernie did.

My first baseball cap, as a Little League catcher who had to wear it backwards, I shaped by moistening the bill, bending it around a baseball, securing it with a rubber band and leaving it to set overnight. I suppose the Pope has someone to do that for him.

It is unlikely that the present Pope thought he would become the prop of a moribund bunch like the Sox, but he is not shying away from it. The Sox are his team and have been since he was little Bobby Prevost from Dolton.

Sports fandom does demand a certain careless idiocy. This is often seen on T-shirts and painted faces, not that Leo is one. Idiot, I mean.

I do not imagine we will see his holiness with lamp black under his eyes or dangling a hygiene defying mouthguard from some secret fold. Yet, the journey to folly begins with a single doff.

Leo’s predecessor in the job, Francis of Argentina, was a supporter of a soccer team called San Lorenzo, sort of the White Sox of Buenos Aires, a team with stadium issues and spotty success.

Let’s just say that having the Pope on your side might not hurt, but it doesn’t always help.

This brings me to the most recent Pope-Sox interaction, a brief meeting between his holiness and his presumptuousness, Justin Ishiba, the eventual new Reinsdorf.

Ishiba will one day run the White Sox, or “steward” them, to use his word. How and when this all comes about has been agreed to, a commitment legal and real enough for Ishiba to imply a new stadium is coming, the Sox are staying in Chicago and Pope Leo may throw out the first pitch.

That’s the invitation anyhow, although how Ishiba can make the offer seems a bit pushy, like counting your chickens before they are blessed, or opening the door before the barn is built.

Lord knows (no message intended) that the White Sox can use all the pushing they can get. Whether they get, never mind need, a new stadium is a question of taxes, or of deep pockets or of pipe dreams. Whether Ishiba is Hickey or hope, we shall see.

But here’s the thing. The Pope has been promised. A new stadium. First pitch. Fingers uncrossed.

Well, why not? Baseball is not embarrassed to use silly mascots, gambling signage, military flyovers and pink or camo trimmings supporting causes both worthwhile and overbearing. Anthems and prayers signify loyalty and reverence,

Why not a few kind thoughts from afar, maybe a silent benediction? Hats off to White Sox and their fans. Bless ‘em all. They need it.