Ozzie Guillen vs. Jay Mariotti. We Think We Know What Set Him Off.
By Jason McIntyre
Which brings us to WNBA-lovin’ White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen. Perhaps it’s the Detroit Tigers inability to lose games on the road, but for the second time in two weeks, Guillen flipped out, going all John Rocker on Mariotti: “What a piece of shit he is, fuckin’ fag.”
Today, Mariotti responds:
"I’m told the Blizzard of Oz, in one of his tiresome rants, referred to me as a “fag” Tuesday night, among other niceties. … I also know it places me on an extraordinarily long list of people the Blizzard has dissed or launched into, including Magglio (“Venezuelan [bleep]”) Ordonez, Buck Showalter, Phil Garner, Sean Tracey, the Los Angeles Angels, every American League umpire, the reporter he threatened to rub out last winter and, by not showing up at the White House for a ceremony, the President of the United States."
Pressed by heavy media coverage – and likely the organization – Ozzie offered a half-assed apology where he tweaked his original comments: “[Mariotti] is a piece of garbage, he always has been garbage and always will be garbage.”
What set Ozzie off? Maybe someone sent him this link, which chronicled all of Mariotti’s errors and his smearing of the White Sox last season (when they won the World Series). This is just brilliant work, and although it’s extremely difficult to select a favorite, this one’s ours:
"April 7 [2005] –(The Sox are) Winning Lucky. Groovy as Sox life seems right now, let me assure you that this is no formula for a division title. …(Jerry Reinsdorf ) and (Ken) Williams have concocted this “new way” of baseball that actually is a euphemism for payroll-crunching. April 18 [2005] — I stand by my story that the Twins are better… .The Sox are a work in progress; the Twins are the polished product…. Are the Sox ready? I think not."
It’s why we love blogs, and we implore you to read it.
Sensitivity the issue, Guillen the problem (Chicago Sun-Times)
Guillen crosses line with latest slur (Chicago Sun-Times)
Jay Marriotti Year in Review (Change of Subject)
Guillen apologizes–but not to columnist (Chicago Tribune)