Jeff Szynal
THIS MUCH I KNOW | White Sox Scoreboard Operator/Team Historian | 46 | Tinley Park
My last name is pronounced Chanel, like the perfume. It's Polish.
I went to Curie High School on the South Side. Graduated in 1979. They had a television production studio there. I had a teacher, John Stevens, who was a great mentor to me. He inspired me to go into television.
(Richard A. Chapman/Sun-Times)
It was my dream to be a broadcaster. But I really don't have the voice for it.
I was one of the last people in Old Comiskey before the wrecking ball hit it. One of the coolest things I got to do was save things from the old park. We saved all of the pinwheels from the original scoreboard.
The White Sox were the first team to make soda in the ballpark during the teens and early '20s.
That's where orange soda was invented. The first time it was manufactured was in Old Comiskey Park. They came in little eight-ounce bottles. Very thick glass with two crossed bats, a baseball in the middle and "W" and "S" for White Sox on them.
I interviewed Charles Comiskey's grandson. His first job was in the soda plant. He said that after a few years of making soda and umpires making bad calls . . . fans began throwing the bottles on the field. Thus came the rule in Major League Baseball that you can't bring bottles or cans in to the stadium.
When they took the park down, I found some of those bottles buried under concrete. They were under the stands on the first-base line. That's where the old bottling plant was.
I found one of Eddie Collins' contracts and one of the contracts experts believed Shoeless Joe Jackson's wife signed. It was in a box buried in a room.
When I say, "That's a home run," my assistant pushes a button that sends an electric charge under the field that illuminates a light behind the scoreboard alerting pyrotechnicians to flip off the safety switch that activates the fireworks. It takes three seconds.
We have it set up for three home runs in a row. That's only happened a few times in our history.
Professional baseball players are just like you and I. Most of them are wonderful people. A couple of my favorites would be Robin Ventura, Greg Hibbard. Currently: Jim Thome, Jermaine Dye, Paul Konerko and Mark Buehrle. They're really great guys.
The worst player I've dealt with? Albert Belle would be at the top of the list. Albert was just a different person. I hope he doesn't come after me now.
Mark Buehrle makes my job difficult. We're allowed a minute and 40 seconds to do our thing between innings. Buehrle wants to go in a minute and five.
We tell the players to give us three or four songs they'd like to hear as they approach the plate or when they're coming in to pitch. It's important to them, it inspires them.
This year, A.J. [Pierzynski] called me during the game and had us change his song. The next two at-bats were hits. Sometimes, it works.
I'm very proud to have my World Series ring. I hope the team wins a couple more because I have three sons -- Nick, Steve and Nathan -- and only one ring.