The Patron Saint of South Side Baseball

One afternoon in 1987, a man strolled into Comiskey Park, both guns blazing, and before a crowd of 7,947 subtly declared the dawn of a new era on the South Side. He was lanky, he threw bad pitches that batters still went after, his control was questionable, and his velocity was negligible. But he used those to his advantage; where a normal pitcher would be eaten alive with such weakness, this man was able to make batters fear him.

In the first inning of his major league debut, he hit a future Hall of Famer in the arm. The other team – the team that would go on to win the World Series that year, mind you – was held scoreless through 7 innings. The rookie came out and made a statement that would echo through the halls of two Comiskey Parks for the next seven seasons. He had arrived behind much promise from the powers that be and would be but the first marker in the Sox’ greatest era of talent acquisition. He would win awards, flirt with records and dominate All-Star Games before finally, in true South Side fashion, leave for greener pastures after management wouldn’t give him what he was worth. In his wake, all we could do was scratch our heads and wonder what might have been. His time here may have been cut short, but his teachings live on in the annals of our collective fandom.

He would go on to hang out with the biggest band in the world, fight employees of New Orleans bars, start bench-clearing brawls with other teams and give the finger to a crowded Yankee Stadium before finally riding off into the sunset, broken down but not defeated and clad in the discarded uniforms he’d picked up in New York, Cleveland and Anaheim. That man turns 41 today.

Happy birthday then, Mr. Jack McDowell.