Ozzie Guillen: Masking His Opinions As "Truth"

Ozzie, to all of us: "You can't HANDLE the truth!"
(except it's mostly NOT true)


Ozzie Guillen is a punk.

He's a loudmouthed, abrasive, meandering, pugnacious Flavor-of-the-Month whose words are only being paid attention to because his team won the World Series last season.

Let's see who pays attention to Guillen, the Chicago White Sox manager, when his ballclub fails to defend its unexpected championship -- which is a certainty. You read it here first.

Guillen decided to take unmitigated potshots at several of his brethren in a profile done on him by Sports Illustrated, in the February 20 issue. They were acerbic, uncalled-for remarks that did nothing but serve the interests of their source -- who loves nothing more, it seems, than to give writers good copy -- the torpedoes of common decency be damned.

Guillen is one of those guys who professes to tell the truth all the time and then makes you out to be the bozo if you take umbrage with his vitriol.

"People say, 'Ozzie Guillen is a bigmouth, he's so controversial.' No. People don't like it when you tell the truth," Guillen spit at SI writer S.L. Price.

Wrong, Ozzie. People don't like it when you purport to tell the truth, when in fact all you're doing is spouting off outrageous comments because you know that's what reporters -- and bloggers -- eat up. There's a difference between telling "the truth" and giving opinion.

"Why," Guillen wonders, "shouldn't we have the power to say what we think?"

We DO have that power. But we shouldn't abuse it -- masking it as truth when very little of it has any sliver of truth in it at all.

The list of baseball people Guillen skewered in the SI piece reads like a Who's Who: Alex Rodriguez. Joe Torre. Sparky Anderson. Paul Konerko. Tony LaRussa. Lou Piniella. Nomar Garciaparra. Jim Leyland. Mostly it was trash talk -- the words of an ill-informed, brash Napoleon riding the crest of a wave of temporary fame.

The words of a punk.

And there was more:

"People say, 'Joe Torre: genius.' 'Greatest manager ever: Tony LaRussa ... Lou Piniella.' I say they're not good baseball managers. Nobody's a good baseball manager. They talk about Jim Leyland: 'Oh my God, Jim Leyland ...' Jim Leyland quit! Sparky Anderson? Sparky Anderson was horseshit for 10 years with Detroit."

I don't know which ten years Guillen is referring to when it comes to Anderson's run in Detroit, but that's okay -- it's not really about the truth with Ozzie Guillen, as you are quick to discover. I also don't know what Jim Leyland quitting has anything to do with his ability to manage a baseball team. Nor do I see where Guillen simply saying that LaRussa and Piniella aren't good managers makes it so. Ozzie Guillen cries that he is simply telling the truth. But all he is doing is preaching the poisonous Gospel According to Ozzie.

Guillen wasn't close to being done in his remarks to SI's Price.

"The New York Yankees? I could manage that team. Lou Piniella, the best ever? Why don't you win with Tampa Bay?

"Nobody was a good manager. Ever."

"The truth" is that Ozzie Guillen wouldn't last 100 games with the Yankees. There's only a handful of people on this planet who could handle the tempest that is Yankees baseball, and one of them happens to be Joe Torre.

Who is Ozzie Guillen to disrespect the accomplishments of his fellow managers? The coaching fraternity is similar to that of law enforcement: everyone looks out for one another, and respects each other -- at least publicly. Guillen may have gained some temporary notoriety, but probably sacrificed longterm respect. Not that he cares, of course.

Guillen has in fact already issued one apology -- for his volley at third baseman Alex Rodriguez and shortstop/first baseman Nomar Garciaparra. The U.S.-born Rodriguez had been comtemplating playing for the Dominican Republic in next month's World Baseball Classic. Garciaparra will be playing for Mexico.

"Alex was kissing Latino's people's asses. He knew he wasn't going to play for the Dominicans; he's not a Dominican! I hate hypocrites: He's full of shit. The Dominican team doesn't need his ass. It's the same with [Nomar] Garciaparra playing for Mexico. Garciaparra only knows Cancun because he went to visit."

Later, Guillen apologized for taking what he called the "first shot" at Rodriguez. He didn't apologize for anything else, that I'm aware of.

But why apologize, when you hold yourself up as the beacon of truth and are merely exercising your right to state such?

Hiding behind the sanctity of freedom of speech while using that freedom to shoot from the hip and denegrate colleagues -- masking one man's opinion as fact -- is what Ozzie Guillen seems to be good at.

Let's see if anyone pays attention to him this October.