DETROIT — The 1962 Mets team photo was featured prominently in the Sun-Times this week, and not for a reason anyone on the 2024 White Sox wanted. But you have to wonder if in another 62 years this year’s Sox team photo will make the rounds if another team threatens to break their record.
And if players like Nicky Lopez who will be associated with the team’s black mark on history will do interviews like 86-year-old old former pitcher Craig Anderson of the ’62 Mets has in recent weeks.
The Sox have rostered a record 63 players this season, seven more than last season’s previous high, and everyone will have a share of the record.
“I’m OK with it,” Lopez said. “It is what it is. Your career is going to go on, whether it’s here next year or somewhere else. The thing about this sport is it takes 26-plus people, it’s not one person.”
Rest assured, Lopez does not accept defeat and is not OK with losing 120-plus games. Responsibility for this disaster of a season reaches well above the players level. Every Sox player, coach, front office and ownership component shares in the infamy. Lopez simply accepts the reality, knowing it was a team loss. So does right-hander Jonathan Cannon, who starts against the Tigers Sunday in the final game of this unforgettably awful season.
“No one wants to be connected to something like that,” Cannon told the Sun-Times Saturday, “but the reality is we’ve all had a piece of it. We’ve all played here and done things that contributed to it one way or another. It is what it is, it stinks, it does. It’s tough.”
Gavin Sheets said the reality of it hit harder than he expected when he watched the Tigers celebrate a playoff-clinching victory while the Sox were dissecting their 121st loss Friday night, a modern day record.
The team had seen it coming, and “I didn’t know how I’d feel,” Sheets said after the 4-1 loss.
“I was definitely more frustrated than I thought I would be when it happened.”
Lopez and other players said the record wasn’t a topic of discussion in the clubhouse in recent weeks. But they learned about the ’62 Mets, some of whom, like Anderson and Jay Hook, who combined to make 48 starts that season, were watching.
“We both said we don’t wish this on any team or any player,” Anderson, who watched Friday’s loss on TV, told the Sun-Times Saturday. “But now I’d say I’m relieved. Now the White Sox are going to have to hope somebody takes it away from them.”
Anderson notes the major difference, that the Mets were an expansion team that was beloved by fans.
“The way the White Sox lost was too drastic,” he said. “They were a solid contender but they gave away the farm and were getting blown out. The [general manager] should be fired.”
Players commented about the extra media attention, though, and the oddity of many in the Guaranteed Rate Field crowds cheering for the Angels to deal the Sox a record-breaking defeat and booing the home team didn’t go unnoticed or sit well.
“Last night after the game we were very well aware of what was going on,” Cannon said. “But the mistake would be not learning from something like this. As many negatives as there have been there are positives to be pulled away.”
Lopez won’t forget it.
“Whether we won 100 or lost like we did this year you can’t take away the dream I had playing in Chicago,” said Lopez, a Naperville Central High School graduate. “Not a lot of people can say they played for their hometown team. I was able to live it, which was pretty special.”