Say it ain’t so Joe
The Chicago White Sox most recently made it to the World Series in 1959, and they most recently won in 1917. But the most notorious Chicago squad was the 1919 “Black Sox,” the team immortalized to our generation in the movie “Field of Dreams.”
As one version of the story goes, the White Sox players were upset with owner Charles Comiskey for reneging on promises of pay raises and bonuses.
The Chicago White Sox most recently made it to the World Series in 1959, and they most recently won in 1917. But the most notorious Chicago squad was the 1919 “Black Sox,” the team immortalized to our generation in the movie “Field of Dreams.”
As one version of the story goes, the White Sox players were upset with owner Charles Comiskey for reneging on promises of pay raises and bonuses.
So first baseman Chick Gandil of the heavily favored White Sox approached a gambler about fixing the series for $100,000, a hefty sum for the day.
The White Sox lost four of the first five games in the nine-game series, but the gamblers who orchestrated the fix had not paid the players involved yet.
The White Sox won the next two games, before gamblers threatened Game 8 starting pitcher Claude “Lefty” Williams.
So the White Sox threw the game and Major League Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis tossed them out of the league.
“Shoeless” Joe Jackson supposedly turned down up to $20,000 to be part of the scheme despite knowing the fix was in with or without his involvement.
One of the White Sox’s fans, a kid, ran up to Jackson as the news broke about the banishment and said, “Say it ain’t so Joe. Say it ain’t so.”
Joe just shook his head and walked away.