Remembering, with a shudder, the last time there was no major-league baseball
Major-league baseball has only been shut down a few days, but the memories are already flooding back.
Nightmares will probably follow.
I remember — all too well — what is was like the last time there was no baseball when there was supposed to be baseball.
I'll never forget that day in Oakland when the regular season ended due to the player's strike.
That was Aug. 10, 1994. After the first-place White Sox beat the A's 2-1, Gene Lamont strolled into the cramped manager's office at the Coliseum completely naked, pulled up a chair and took a few questions from the media.
Lamont didn't have many answers, and he couldn't have possibly known how low the game would sink.
Play did not resume for 232 days, the longest work stoppage in major-league history, and there was no shortage of bizarre happenings during the down time.
The 1994 season was my first on the White Sox beat, and it started with the international media mobbing a rookie named Michael Jordan when spring training opened in Sarasota, Fla.
Remember that name.
Since Jordan played the '94 season at Class AA Birmingham and wasn't on the Sox's major-league roster, he reported to spring training in 1995 with players still on strike.
Instead of getting himself ready to play, say the upcoming season at Class AAA and maybe join the White Sox after the all-star break, Jordan was viewed as a huge drawing card as major-league clubs decided to launch the '95 season with replacement players.
That didn't fly with Air Jordan, and he bolted White Sox camp on March 2.
When I talked to former Sox GM Ron Schueler about a week later, he gave me quite a scoop — Jordan was finished playing baseball and returning to the NBA with the Bulls.
As for the rest of the White Sox's replacement team that spring, it was quite the mess.
Even though he had been out of baseball for four years, Dennis “Oil Can” Boyd was the de facto ace, and he wasn't lacking confidence.
Talking to Boyd one day, I asked him for his thoughts about sticking with the Sox after the strike and slotting in behind Alex Fernandez, Wilson Alvarez, Jason Bere and Jim Abbott in the rotation.
“I don't know about that,” Boyd said in between drags off his cigarette. “I've never been a fifth starter before.”
Pete Rose Jr. was also a part of the White Sox's “replacement” team in the spring of 1995, and he knew it was only because of his name and potential to draw fans.
I also remember there was a surfer from California in camp and a washed-up catcher named Barry Lyons.
I remember standing out in front of the Sox's training complex in Sarasota one morning and watching a beat-up station wagon with Michigan plates pull up. A bunch of haggard kids piled out and asked where they should go for tryouts.
Fortunately, the strike ended on April 2, the regular major leaguers showed up for an abbreviated spring training and the regular season started 24 days later.
It turned out to be a terrible season for the White Sox. Lamont was fired on June 2 after an 11-20 start and the estimable Terry Bevington took over as manager.
Just like now, it was a pretty terrible time.
The critical difference is greed caused the last baseball stoppage.
What we're dealing with now is a completely different ballgame.
Stay healthy.