Don’t blame the White Sox
Published 12:00 am Friday, March 18, 2016
On Wednesday, Chicago White Sox veteran Adam LaRoche announced he would retire from Major League Baseball after White Sox president Ken Williams asked LaRoche to not bring his son to the clubhouse all the time.
First, let’s look at this from LaRoche’s viewpoint. Here is a dad who just wants to have his son around him, and that is extremely commendable thing. At this point in his career, LaRoche would rather spend time with his family, even if it means hanging up his spikes. For that, I say way to go LaRoche. I’ve got no problem with that and as a matter of fact I think it something he should be proud of.
Now, let’s look at it from Williams’s viewpoint. Here is the president of a business trying to make sure that everything is running as smoothly as possible. Williams pointed out that this wasn’t about LaRoche’s son and that he was not a problem around the clubhouse, but it’s a very slippery precedent to set by allowing someone to bring their child to their job every single day. It’s not like Williams told him to never bring him around, he simply said he doesn’t need to be there 100 percent of the time.
If the White Sox continued to allow LaRoche’s son to come every day, what’s to stop everyone else from doing the same? It could quickly escalate out of control.
Like Williams also states, there aren’t many businesses where you can bring your child to work every day.
So in short, don’t blame the White Sox or Williams because they have not done anything wrong in this particular situation. They are not “evil” as some have said, nor do that hate children. They are running a business and wanted nip something in the bud that they saw could cause problems in the future.
As for LaRoche, he has had a nice career and I will always be a fan. Big props for putting his family first, because $13 million can’t be easy to walk away from.