After months of speculation, it looks like the long rumored divorce between Ozzie Guillen and the Chicago White Sox is official:
Monday night ended the eight-year run of Ozzie Guillen managing the White Sox after the say-anything skipper met with board chairman Jerry Reinsdorf at the United Center earlier in the day. The meeting lasted about a half hour and ended with the two men who have enjoyed a father-and-son relationship saying a tearful goodbye. The Sun-Times learned before the game against the Blue Jays that Guillen and Reinsdorf agreed to part ways, with a trade to the Florida Marlins still in the works.
And, yes, as the quote above suggests, Guillen won’t be single for long as the Miami Marlins and their horrible new logo are waiting with open arms for the manager they have coveted for so long. Yeah, that should work out well.
But before we delve into the impending disaster in Miami, let’s not overlook the end of Ozzie’s time in Chicago. While it sounds as if his tenure is going to end on relatively amicable terms, his days on the South Side were not without their trials and tribulations.
Guillen will go down in the White Sox history books as a legend because he skippered the White Sox to their first World Series since 1917, but even with that feather in his cap, his simultaneously entertaining and caustic personality caused a rift between him and general manager Kenny Williams. Williams and Guillen did their best to coexist despite their differences, but the honeymoon phase of that long-awaited World Series had long since ended. Now, Guillen has become a victim of “what have you done for me lately (besides give me a PR-induced headache)” syndrome after a wildly disappointing year for the ChiSox. Sure, Kenny Williams put together the massively underachieving and flawed roster, but Guillen is the one who runs his mouth all the time, thus drawing unwanted attention to the mess he was trying to manage.
That kind of brutal honesty has made Guillen a bigger-than-life personality but it is something that almost no front office is going to have much patience for, which is why it is almost comical that he is bound for the Marlins bench. I say almost comical because it is more likely to wind up as a tragic decision for everyone involved.
For Ozzie, taking the Marlins job is a no-brainer. Guillen may like to run his mouth, but he is no idiot and that means he isn’t going to turn down a manager’s gig since so few clubs would even be willing to take a risk on him. Even with his World Series win, Guillen’s only other real credential is a division title in 2009 followed by a quick exit in the ALDS, so it isn’t as if he amongst the managerial elite. In a best case scenario, Miami gives him a chance to turn down-and-out franchise into a winner, proving his worth as a manager. In a worst case scenario, he clashes with management and gets canned in a hurry, but even that won’t reflect too poorly on him since that is just what Marlin management does, lest we forget them firing Joe Girardi after he won Manager of the Year.
It might be a no-lose situation for Guillen, it is hard to imagine this being anything but a no-win situation for the Marlins. They’ve already publicly clashed with their own outspoken young outfielder, Logan Morrison, on more than one occasion this year and Guillen makes LoMo seem like a wallflower by comparison. If they can’t muzzle a 24-year old, good luck trying to get Guillen to tone down his candid way of dealing with the media.
As hard as it is to imagine, Guillen is probably only going to be more emboldened once he arrives in Miami. Make no mistake, the Marlins don’t want Guillen because they think he is the right man to mold all of their young talent into a championship caliber team. If he does that, it is just gravy. No, the real reason they want Guillen, and excuse me for being so cynical but the Marlin organization has given me no reason to be anything other than cynical about their motives, is because Ozzie is a recognizable Latino face that they can market to the large Hispanic population of South Florida. That means Guillen is about to become the face of the entire franchise and thus largely above reprimand from management.
In other words, get ready for Ozzie Guillen Uncensored. As fun as that might sound to the standard baseball fan, the thin-skinned leadership of the Marlins aren’t going to enjoy it, not for one second and they will be powerless to do anything to silence Guillen without making themselves look stupid in the process. Of course, they should be used to that by now.
Good luck, Miami, you’re going to need it.
