On the North Side, Sammy Sosa runs out to right field–sprints out to right field–as the conquering hero.
Cheers rain down, heart taps back at you.
He is the man.
On the South Side, where Sosa used to play, he jogs out to right field–shallow right field–as the enemy.
There might be some cheers in this divided crosstown crowd, but there is a whole lot of bad noise.
He is the target.
“It’s pretty rough, but it’s OK,” Sosa said before the Cubs’ 5-4 loss Saturday to the White Sox at Comiskey Park. “When we play the Sox, that’s the only rough time.
“They say anything to give you no mercy. They say things like they hate you for real.”
Spend some time in the right-field area and you learn they say a lot of things out there, things you can’t print in this newspaper. They make an awful lot of hand gestures that you can’t describe as well. And they get there early to do it.
Fans lined up outside Gate 2 before 9 a.m. Saturday to get into the Bullpen Sports Bar in right field. By the time people were let in at 10:15 a.m., the lined stretch around to the scoreboard in center field.
“Last year I had a sign that said `Sammy Sosa [stinks],”‘ said Rob Piszczek, 26, a Sox season ticket-holder who was wearing a Sox jersey in the sports bar area, “but security took it.”
Sosa, a player who thrives on adoration as he gets loudly booed during every at-bat in Comiskey, hears some of the taunts, if not all. While making four straight warmup throws before the bottom of the third inning, Sosa zeroes in on Piszczek, who is yelling at the Cubs right fielder at the sports bar fence.
Piszczek stops talking and waves at Sosa, who looks over his shoulder and waves back. Piszczek then makes an obscene gesture, prompting Sosa to kick his leg backward in disgust, if not anger.
“Supposedly it’s a free country,” Sosa said of the abuse. “But that’s OK. I don’t want to say nothing. I just want to play baseball. I don’t want to make them mad.”
When asked to compare the treatment he gets in Comiskey to what he experiences in, say, notorious towns such as New York or Philadelphia, Sosa said, “The Yankees fans are pretty rough.”
Yankees fans? But Sosa hasn’t played in Yankee Stadium since 1991 before the Sox traded him to the Cubs in the deal for George Bell.
“Yankees fans are rough,” Sosa said again.
They must be if Sosa can remember it 11 years later.
“I have a good memory,” Sosa said. “Now I think people in New York appreciate what I do. I wouldn’t expect that treatment from Yankees fans now.”
In Comiskey it’s not just Sosa who gets it from Sox fans. It’s whichever Cub happens by.
As starter Mark Prior walked out to warm up in the Cubs’ bullpen, which is conveniently located next to the Bullpen Sports Bar, a woman yelled, “Nice pantyhose, Prior,” no doubt because of his high-stocking look.
As reliever Kyle Farnsworth headed to the bullpen, a man yelled, “Farnsworth [stinks],” no doubt just because.
But Sosa, the former Sox who got his game together as a Cub to become the greatest home-run hitter in the game over the last five seasons, is the main event for venomous Sox fans the way opposing outfielders get assaulted by Wrigley Field’s bleacher bums.
“It’s always like that when the Sox play the Cubs,” said Sosa, who has been hearing it from his former fans since interleague play began in 1997. “It’s an enjoyable atmosphere.”
Sosa did hear cheers Saturday, after his single in the third, for instance. But he really brought out the big sound that Comiskey can make when he struck out to end the game with the tying run on third and the go-ahead run on first.
“I don’t blame them,” Sosa said. “You just deal with that. Nobody feels sorry for you.”
