Monday, January 31, 2011

The White Era Fades To Black

I’m not going to make a really big deal out of this.  For one, I don’t really know all the details, and it might not all be over yet.  But also because, selfishly, it doesn’t really affect me all that much.  But it is noteworthy that the Royals have parted ways with Frank White.  Frank is no longer on the team’s payroll.  The official reason is that he couldn’t come to terms with the Royals, after they asked him to take a pay cut.

The GREAT news (which was also part of the problem, apparently) is that Frank will continue to call Royals’ games on TV as a part of the Fox Sports broadcast team.  It’s actually his commitment to Fox that made the Royals back away from Frank—they complained that his responsibility to the network caused him to miss too many of the public appearances he’s required to make as a part of his contract.

Bulldog Bob on 610 sports in Kansas City was pretty fired up about all of this on his morning show today.  His take is that there’s NO WAY the Royals can afford to part ways with either of their two historic “Faces of the Ball Club,” which are Frank White and George Brett.

Here’s where the selfish side of me comes in.  From my perspective, am I really going to see Frank White representing the Royals any less than he was as their employee?  I mean, I haven’t yet attended Fantasy Camp or the “Fats with Bats” day (or whatever they call it when they let old guys take BP inside The K), or any of the other opportunities one would have to get up close and personal with Frank in his “I work for the Royals” duties (although I did attend a Wranglers game when he was managing, and he was extremely cool in shooting the breeze with fans on the 3rd base side).

No, when I’ve seen Frank for the last couple of years, it’s been in my nightly DVRing of the Royals’ broadcast.  He does about 2/3 of the games or so, give or take.  He’s done a lot more in the past couple of years than he’s expected, do to the vocal tragedies experienced by Paul Splittorff.  He has been and will continue to be one of the faces of the Royals to me, and to the DOZENS of pathetic fans like myself who refuse to miss a televised game (I kid.  I’m sure there are HUNDREDS watching, not dozens).
In a way, I think this was part of the Royals’ plan.  They know we’re all going to watch Frank’s work and continue to see him as a Royal for life.  From their perspective, what more do they get out of the deal by paying him in excess of whatever Fox is sending his way?

It’s still a little tough to swallow that Frank isn’t on the Royals’ payroll for the first time in 40 years or so.  I remember Frank telling stories of how he actually worked on the construction crew when The K was being built—he actually helped mold concrete forms and poor supports.  He LITERALLY built the Royals’ franchise with his own two hands.  You can’t THINK Royals without thinking of Frank White—I even made it a point to be at the then-Royals Stadium for Frank’s last home game.  This does represent a little bit of a “moving on.”

But as a pathetic fan, I am all-in for our future, and whatever the Royals’ reasons were for letting Frank walk, I will give them the benefit of the doubt.  That is, as long as this latest rebuilding process doesn’t land us flat on our faces, as the rest have these past 25+ years.

1 comment:

  1. Let me caveat my own post, here. When I first heard of this story, the radio announcer said a teaser of something like, "An all-time Royals great is OUT. Details coming up." My first thought was Cookie Rojas had said he was gay (with a name like "Cookie," you never know). THEN they started talking about Frank. And I was like, "No. No way. NO WAY!!! Frank rode the baloney pony????!!!!"

    I was almost relieved when I heard he had merely quit/was fired from the organization.

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