5 days after showing off his best cutter, Sale takes on Wrigley

SHARE 5 days after showing off his best cutter, Sale takes on Wrigley
screen_shot_2016_07_28_at_12_14_10_am.png

will the joke be on Chris Sale or the Cubs Thursday?

When word of Chris Sale’s uniform-slashing tantrum Saturday night filtered through the Cubs’ clubhouse Sunday morning, some were privately rooting for a throwback-jersey event on his scheduled day to pitch this week, just to see what would happen.

One joke making the rounds that morning went like this:

“You know what the White Sox did with all the other throwback jerseys that didn’t get cut, right?”

“No, what?”

“They put them on Sale.”

Even manager Joe Maddon got in the act when he mentioned in one of his answers to the media that morning how something “cuts across the fabric of what you’re trying to do, no pun intended.”

Then he spent several seconds regaining his composure before completing his answer.

Sox officials were said to not be amused.

All of which leads to Sale’s start Thursday at Wrigley Field, where he returns from a five-game suspension for destroying those throwback unis in the clubhouse Saturday night – and where he can expect the first, and maybe the worst, of what’s expected to be two months of boisterous jersey-related catcalls from grandstand cutups.

“Yeah, people may crack on it for a little while,” Cubs pitcher Joe Nathan said of what he expects Thursday night, “and the fans will probably give it to him a little bit here and there. But I think that would just die down. I would imagine.”

For what it’s worth, Sale got sympathy from some in the Cubs’ clubhouse.

“To be honest, those uniforms are brutal,” veteran Ben Zobrist said of the White Sox’ ugly, 1976, big-collared jerseys. “Who would want to wear a collar on their game uniform? Especially if it’s a pitcher that’s throwing and every motion they’re going to feel something different.

“I wouldn’t have cut up the jerseys over it, but I understand that he wouldn’t want to wear that pitching.”

Said Nathan: “I guess they were really uncomfortable. That’s all I can say.”

Heyward struggles

As Jason Heyward’s season-long struggles at the plate near August, the $184 million outfielder took his daily batting cage work with hitting coach John Mallee into the sun Wednesday for another intense session a few hours before the game.

“This guy’s hit into some bad luck,” said Maddon, who said the goal is to get him to hit the ball into the air more. “Yeah, there’s been some ground balls. But he’s had a lot of well struck balls that have been caught, and with that goes your confidence.”

Heyward is 4-for-28 over the past week after a 1-for-3 Wednesday, his season average at .229

Star gazing

Among the luminaries attending Wednesday’s Cubs-Sox game at Wrigley were just-retired Bear Peanut Tillman (doing stretch duties), Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh (first pitch), former Sox manager Ozzie Guillen and actor Gabrielle Union (and her husband, Dwyane Wade).

Guillen, who routinely ripped the disrepair, “rats as big as pigs,” and outdated “amenities” at Wrigley Field ran into Cubs chairman Tom Ricketts before the game.

“He said look what you made me do here,” Guillen said, gesturing to the video boards and other updates.

Talked out

Ricketts, by the way, wasn’t as talkative with media, declining an interview request.

“I think we’ve talked enough this week,” said Ricketts, whose talking to Chicago baseball media this week consisted of a prepared statement about looking into Aroldis Chapman’s domestic-violence past before signing off on Monday’s trade.


The Latest
Illinois has the most operating nuclear reactors among all the states, but it’s been crickets from public officials on the potential weakening of nuclear oversight.
Woman no longer wants to be with man who pays no rent and asks for gambling money.
Chicago has so much riding on this casino’s success. Mayor Johnson says he’s not worried, but Bally’s $800 million financing hurdle is just the latest glitch in the project’s bumpy road.
Enbridge’s Line 5 oil and gas pipeline trespasses through sovereign tribal lands, is an environmental disaster waiting to happen, Ben Jealous writes.
A long primary campaign season reaches its crescendo Tuesday. Here’s a final look at the top races on the ballot.