O'Donnell: Mariotti wants to rumble, Ozzie Guillen and NBCSCH defer
OTHER THAN THEO EPSTEIN'S subtle digs at Joe Maddon, the Chicago division of the heavily asterisked 2020 MLB season has been relatively rhubarb-free.
Luis Robert and the White Sox are sweetness; the Cubs are light - especially anytime Craig Kimbrel is called upon to get anyone out.
That's why it's always helpful to have Jay Mariotti scouring the waterfront, even from his distant Wi-Fi dock near Malibu.
Mariotti - now a columnist at barrettsportsmedia.com - was in full scour this week when a bearded tendril, ahem, made lighthearted mention of the memorable past contretemps between the driven sports pilot light and Ozzie Guillen.
The nostril flaring between Mariotti and Guillen was as good a sustained media-jock feud as anything Chicago has produced in the new millennium.
That Hatfield-and-McCoyin' peaked in June 2006. That was when Guillen - then the Sox manager - responded to yet another print broadside by saying of Mariotti, "What a piece of (expletive) he is," then referred to him using an anti-gay slur.
A quarter-hearted apology followed, as did sensitivity training for Guillen dictated by MLB.
Many foul outs later, the dissonance has never gone away.
So it was no surprise when Thursday's column prompted Mariotti to respond:
"How many sports and media people, from Al Campanis to Ellen DeGeneres, are diminished for life because of slurs and insensitive behavior? But there's Ozzie, still on TV after slurring gays, praising Fidel Castro in Little Havana and shaming himself countless times.
"Is that how desperate and small it is back there, grab a few cheap ratings by winding up the Blizzard of Oz with setup questions?
"Shame on (Jerry) Reinsdorf, Mr. Diversity, for enabling it. Shame on the Chicago media, or what is left of it, for putting up with it."
Guillen - a vastly underrated baseball mind - contentedly continues as a contributor to NBCSCH's White Sox coverage.
Through an NBCSCH spokesman, both he and Kevin Cross - vice president and general manager of the regional sports network - declined to comment.
And in a market long lacking a signature downtown sports columnist, the drivel runs dry.
ONE YEAR AGO, Matt Mescher was one of a number of Iowa residents who were voicing acute displeasure over the makeover of their bucolic countryside for the MLB/Fox "Field of Dreams" game.
Now, even with the White Sox-Cardinals dream screamer canceled for this season, stoic reality is the order of the corn stalks.
"I was only surprised at how long it took MLB to cancel it," said Mescher, whose six acres is approximately 1,000 feet from home plate of the steroided "field."
"When they canceled the All-Star Game, that was it for this game this year.
"But they'll be back. And in my opinion, and in the hopes of a whole lot of officials and businessmen around (Dyersville), MLB's going to make this an annual thing for years to come."
Mescher had no plans to look out his window to watch the curious undertaking - he leaves for an annual fishing trip to the north woods on Sunday.
STREET-BEATIN': The trench warfare for that Waukegan casino license grows more intense and goes far beyond the scope of "Bunker Bill" Carstanjen, Neil Bluhm and other associates of Churchill Downs Inc. (Jason Grotto wrote a tremendously textured background story; Google "propublica waukegan casino.") ...
In an incredibly intense weekend of televised major sports, CBS needs those fickle Bay Area winds to hold for a fitting prime-time crescendo to The PGA (Sunday, 2-8 p.m.). Tiger Woods did his part early with seasoned, resourceful play - kind of like Michael Jordan as a Washington Wizard. ...
Early backstage chatter at Halas Hall featured Bears players talking about their updated "Madden 21" ratings. Khalil Mack (97) tops with Mitch Trubisky (72) barely edging Nick Foles (71). (St. Viator's very own Cole Kmet debuts as a "70"; hopefully he'll be an "89" before too long.) ...
NBC's Mike Milbury, John Forslund and Brian Boucher have had the advantage of working NHL "Bubble East" games from Scotiabank Arena in Toronto and it sounds like it. ...
From the NBA's "Goofy Bubble," ESPN's Doris Burke and Mark Jones have not opened well. Both almost seem to have the "self-edit" circuitry turned too high. ...
Larry King white bread-or-rye q. of the day: Who's the best working analyst in Chicago sports - Eddie Olczyk, Tom Thayer or Steve Stone? (For greatest insight from fewest words, it's "Edzo" in a runaway; Thayer and Stone would both have villas in Marrakesh if paid by the word.) ...
And trainer Larry "High Strike" Rivelli - asked about his career-best five-win day at Arlington Park on Thursday - deadpanned: "What did Babe Ruth say? I'll hit 'em and you count 'em."
• Jim O'Donnell's Sports & Media column appears Thursday and Sunday. Reach him at jimodonnelldh@yahoo.com.