Ozzie: I've never come close to fighting Sox GM

Let's rehash this story one more time.

Before officially hiring him in November of 2003, White Sox general manager Kenny Williams and Ozzie Guillen were having dinner at a restaurant near O'Hare International Airport right before Williams hired Guillen as manager in November of 2003.

And that hiring came after their first argument.

"I hired this guy after an argument we had, OK?" Williams said. "I pushed a button. I pushed a button on purpose. I told him straight out, 'You've got a heck of a sales job if you think I'm going to hire you and put you in charge of the Chicago White Sox. You've got a (heck) of a sales job.'

"And then he proceeded to turn eyes in the restaurant by telling me, 'Well what the (heck) did you bring me up here for?' and went on from there."

It's kept going and going, the love-hate relationship between Williams and Guillen, who were Sox teammates from 1986-88.

And now, according to a story in Friday's Sun-Times, the two almost exchanged punches Tuesday after Ozney Guillen - Ozzie's youngest son - dropped to the 22nd round of the draft before the White Sox selected him.

Ozney Guillen won't sign with the Sox and will instead attend the University of South Florida on a baseball scholarship.

Williams apparently didn't appreciate Ozzie Guillen making a crack about the relatively paltry signing bonus a 22nd-round pick receives.

"Nah, 22nd round," Ozzie said. "I give my kid 50 grand just to go to school. I got 50 grand in my pocket to send my kid to go to Niketown. Or buy something. I don't need the money."

That comment reportedly led to a near fight between Guillen and Williams, but the former said no blows were ever exchanged.

Via e-mail Friday, Williams said: "People making more of it than it is. We just want to win."

Said Guillen: "The funny thing about it is, I'm out of shape to fight anyone. The last time I fight I was 10 years old. There were a couple talks, nothing out of - first of all, I don't fight. I don't think we, or anyone, can go out there and resolve any problem fighting. We just talked about it, and that situation happened a couple days ago and that's it."

Do Guillen and Williams get along?

"Professionally, very good," the manager said. "I don't think we have any problem. Our thing with the ballclub is fine. We talk about the team the way every general manager and manager does. We go from there and everything else is out of proportion."

The strained relationship between Guillen and Williams has been making headlines since the third week of spring training, and Ozzie's middle son Oney was in the middle of that controversy over his negative tweets about the White Sox.

It's been a bizarre sideshow, but every Sox player seems oblivious to any controversy.

"I'm pretty focused on what I have to do each day and I don't let a lot of stuff creep in on what I have to do and what gets me ready to play," captain Paul Konerko said. "It's unfortunate that stuff happens, but I'm sure they'll settle it. They've had other differences before. I don't know even know what happened. I just heard they got into a little beef about something. Again, for me, that fits in that category where every two weeks, three weeks, something happens, whether it's between those two or somebody. That's just kind of the way we do it around here."