REINSDORF CAN’T CONTROL COMCAST AND — HOORAY! — IS SELLING THE WHITE SOX

He’s helpless in talks with the conglomerate, meaning Comcast runs the Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks and might force a 121-loss team to Tennessee — where his weak Chicago Sports Network is Nashville-based

     Welcome to Jerry Reinsdorf’s honky tonk, his attempt to perform a sales hoedown with Nashville. Anyone who says this isn’t happening qualifies as a he-gone, put-it-on-the-board fool. If he isn’t serious in discussions with Dave Stewart, who has adjusted his life to bring big baseball to Tennessee, he will anger the former major-league pitcher.

     Which will upset one of Reinsdorf’s biggest friends later in life — Tony La Russa, who loves Stewart — and will upset other members of the Music City Baseball ownership group. That would include Bob Kendrick, who is important on a directors board as the president of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City. Do we really think Reinsdorf, who generally doesn’t care about pissing people off, would sink so low to irritate these folks just to tick off politicians and media in Chicago?

     He wouldn’t have contacted Stewart unless he was desperate. Meaning, he’s such a defeatist in baseball’s multi-billions-or-die mode that he would take less than $2 billion and get lost after four-plus decades. This is what happens when the owner of a 121-loss team is at the mercy of regional sports networks, which are suffering the same industry slop as the White Sox. Back when cable consumers paid whatever price was on the monthly bill, Reinsdorf was among those cashing in with a smirk. Not anymore.

     The television crunch that massacres baseball has resulted in doomed RSNs, leaving Reinsdorf and his new Chicago Sports Network with a weak UHF operation in Indiana that doesn’t have a contract with Comcast. That knocks out a whopping number of potential home/tavern viewers to the largest provider in America’s No. 3 market, people who don’t have time or the wherewithal in 2024 to set up an old-school antenna. Or don’t want to switch to DirecTV, which doesn’t provide enough carriage.

     So the Bulls and Blackhawks start seasons alongside Gomer Pyle and Flintstones reruns, without much of an on-air audience. Of course, the problem is Reinsdorf, who speaks for CHSN in chats with Comcast and drags along son Michael, who runs the basketball team, and Danny Wirtz, who runs the hockey team. Wirtz is not happy that many fans can’t watch Connor Bedard, the town’s second-biggest athlete after Caleb Williams. Does anyone think Reinsdorf, at 88, will give in to Comcast? Never. He makes a call and might cut the deal Stewart wants, which has nothing to do with taking over the White Sox in Chicago and cutting deals with sleazy stadium types.

     Stewart wants Nashville. So did Taylor Swift.

     In most scenarios, we cringe when networks are involved in professional sports. Not in this case, when Comcast can storm Reinsdorf and make sure an awful owner doesn’t benefit via advertising. Worth $162.49 billion in a market capitalization, Comcast is running the damned show in Chicago professional sports beyond the Bears and Cubs, who launched the Marquee Sports Network to avoid the fray. The thought of corporate types controlling Reinsdorf and poisoning him with already incensed fans — beautiful! Who wants to watch the Sox anyway? The Bulls, too, have no built-in audience after they trade Zach LaVine and Lonzo Ball.

     The owner deserving our pity is Wirtz, who has a young superstar worth widespread perusal. “Our goal has been, and continues to be, to ensure that our games are in as many fans’ pockets as possible, in whatever form that can take,” he told the Chicago Sun-Times. “I acknowledge that, as we’re doing this interview, it’s not where we want (it) to be. … Unfortunately, in these cases, it takes two sides to find the value in this.”

     How is that possible when Reinsdorf is front and center? “What used to be more guaranteed media rights has shifted (to where) we’re sort of in control of our revenue based on ad revenue,” Wirtz said. “The model has shifted.”

     The end of NBC Sports Chicago could mean the eventual end of the White Sox on the South Side. The Bulls and Hawks will manage without Jerry, when he leaves, hopefully by Thanksgiving. For now, please understand the Chicago Sports Network is a deal between the Reinsdorfs, Wirtz and a private company called Standard Media. Want the office address?

     Go south through Indiana and Kentucky.

     Stop on Broadway at Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, then head to West End Avenue.

     Nashville.

     ###

     Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.