Kenny Williams Sends Warm Wishes North

Many Cubs fans have long felt that White Sox fans spend more time worrying about what's going on over on the north side than they do about their own team. It's a bunch of crap, really. Trust me when I say I've never cared more about anything the Cubs are doing than I have the White Sox.

I follow the Cubs. I watch them occasionally, but what I don't do is care. If the White Sox are in the middle of a losing streak, I actually forget that the Cubs even exist, and instead center all my attention on figuring out what's wrong.

Most other Sox fans I know are the same way. Hell, most of them probably couldn't even name ten players on the Cubs roster. Unfortunately for us, the White Sox have a manager and a general manager who have never been shy about their feelings towards the north siders, and they sure as hell aren't helping kill the stereotype.

Kenny Williams fired the latest salvo when he was asked about the difference between the two organizations.

''It is so different,'' Williams said. ''You might as well build a border, a Great Wall of China on Madison, because we are so different. We might as well be in two different cities.

''The unfortunate thing for me is it's a shame that a certain segment of Chicago refused to enjoy a baseball championship being brought to their city. The only thing I can say is, 'Happy anniversary.'''

Williams is of course referring to the fact that this season marks the 100th anniversary of the Cubs last World Series title. Still, what he's saying isn't completely true. A lot of my Cubs fans friends expressed congratulations to me when the White Sox won the World Series in 2005. Silvio was even there with me, the only Cubs fan amongst our group that night, as the Sox won the thing.

He wasn't peeing his pants in delight, doing cartwheels down the street, or drinking champagne straight from the bottle, but he wasn't kicking rocks or throwing things either.

This is the one thing about these "rivalry weeks" between the Cubs and Sox that absolutely drives me crazy. Believe it or not, Chicago media, but the fans of the two teams actually get along. I don't know any Sox fan that doesn't have Cub fan friends, and I don't know any Cub fan who isn't friends with more than a few Sox fans.

Yet the only thing that's covered by the Chicago media during these weeks are features that highlight the "difference" between the two sides, and it's as though they're trying to drive a wall between us.

Listen, I have friends who are Republicans and Democrats. They get along fine. I have friends that are Muslim, and friends who are Jewish. They get along. White Sox fans and Cubs fans get along all the time, as when it comes down to the most basic fact, they're one and the same.

They're just baseball fans who happen to root for teams in different colored uniforms. That's it. Stop trying to make it into anything different.