On White Sox’ manager, Bears-Giants, Northwestern’s planned digs

Somebody has to manage the White Sox next season, but will it be a member of the “family”? Will it be yet another former South Sider for chairman Jerry Reinsdorf to look at lovingly and say, “I always knew you were the one”?

Let’s be honest: Bringing in a skipper without Sox ties wouldn’t be the worst way to go. And there’s a decent chance it’ll go down like that this offseason. But in this week’s “Polling Place,” your home for Sun-Times sports polls on Twitter, we’re focusing on the family because, well, sometimes it’s fun to just lean back from the dinner table and watch everyone else argue.

So, pick a skipper for 2023: Miguel Cairo, Tony La Russa, Ozzie Guillen or A.J. Pierzynski?

“I choose the guillotine,” @bigballerbro commented.

We also asked about Sunday’s Bears-Giants game. Who’s going to win?

“Bear down!” @KurtisArndt wrote. “I haven’t lost faith in Justin Fields and won’t any time soon.”

Finally, we asked about Northwestern’s plans to build a state-of-the-art football stadium by 2026. Will you be there with purple bells on?

On to the polls:

Poll No. 1: Pick one of these guys (yes, you have to) to manage the White Sox in 2023:

Upshot: Looks like Ozzie’s the man. Nobody will have to tell him that, of course. “The only guy to win it all on the South Side in the last 100 years,” @JeffreyCanalia pointed out. What about Pierzynski, the only man of the four who hasn’t done the job before? “Absolutely A.J.,” @RonaldVoigt4 offered. “He knows baseball inside and out. And if effort is lacking, I would love to see these lollygaggers meeting A.J. on the dugout steps.”

Poll No. 2: The 2-1 Bears visit the 2-1 Giants on Sunday. Who wins?

Upshot: Did voters forget about Giants running back Saquon Barkley? Or maybe they’re too stricken with Khalil Herbert fever to care. Two blah teams with subpar offenses and quarterbacks who get chased around unmercifully go at it, and it’s kind of hilarious to realize that one of these teams is going to wake up 3-1 on Monday.

Poll No. 3: Will a state-of-the-art Northwestern football stadium make you more interested in the Wildcats?

Upshot: As @RLins12 put it, “The lesson from this poll is the only thing that makes fans show up at NU is winning a bunch.” @WildcatReport called the results “depressing, but not surprising — Chicago sports fans will come once to check it out and then probably won’t come back.” Clearly, the powers that be in Evanston have higher hopes than that.

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