A trademark blunder

With fans ready to bolt after a stomach-turning sweep by the Cubs, the White Sox should be signing Mark Buehrle, not dealing him

If they had even a smidgen of public-relations sense, for just once in their lives, the White Sox would have summoned Mark Buehrle to the big man's office Sunday. They'd have asked him to name his terms, drawn up the paperwork, signed him to a contract extension, lit a match and joined him in burning a ceremonial white flag.

And if his truck still was stuck on Interstate 55, the result of putting diesel fuel into a tank that accepts only regular fuel, they should have sent a limo. This would have been the perfect way to counteract the gloom swallowing the franchise, the shame of being swept at home by the Cubs in a Crosstown Beatdown, the suffocating reality that the impotent Sox have lost 22 of 27 games and are about to watch fans avoid U.S. Cellular Field the way people run from Pacman Jones in strip joints.

But on a day when some paying customers wore paper bags, the Sox, naturally, took their usual p.r.-blunder route. They didn't deny a Sun-Times story that Buehrle will be on the trade market for all comers, including the title-minded Boston Red Sox, which smacks of another form of surrender for a franchise that has perfected the art of quitting. I've conceded all along that the Sox might as well trade Buehrle because I had no faith Jerry Reinsdorf and Ken Williams would come to their senses, meet his demands in a symbolic commitment to the future and declare they would spend freely this offseason to remain competitive in a roughhouse division.

Turns out I was right. The chairman and general manager would rather cut the cord on a durable pitcher who is having an excellent season -- and not pay the $70 million he might command in the free-agent marketplace -- rather than retain the popular, 28-year-old lefty as a long-term cornerstone. Buehrle, who pitched a no-hitter in what seems an eternity ago, is one of those rubber-armed freaks who could succeed on guile and cunning into his 40s. He should be the exception to the Reinsdorf rule nixing four- and five-year deals for pitchers, a rule that generally has served the organization well. You can sign Buehrle for five years, a fair expectation for established hurlers in today's market, and he likely won't suffer the same injuries and performance breakdowns that have befallen other big-name Sox castaways.

Unfortunately, management soured on Buehrle last year, when he rejected a three-year extension offer for a reported $33 million and was spotted wearing the cap of his hometown team, the Cardinals, during a postseason game in St.Louis. That didn't sit well with Reinsdorf, who mentioned Buehrle's Cardinals fetish in a remark to MLB.com about ''the madness that is in the market today.'' Instead of signing the deal on Sox terms during a down season, Buehrle gambled he might hit the jackpot this year. Talk about cashing in a lottery ticket. In a market that yielded seven years and $126 million for Barry Zito, five years and $55 million for Gil Meche and four years and $40 million for Ted Lilly, Buehrle is looking at gold.

And the Sox, here in America's third-largest market, don't want to ante up.

Will Buehrle be traded?

''Not today,'' Williams said cryptically.

How hard will it be to trade someone who is performing well?

''The thought of trading people that helped you win a World Series two years ago makes my stomach turn,'' he told reporters. ''But baseball, sports in general, is such that you're going to have a certain amount of turnover -- whether it's performance, age, contract status. You've got to play the hand you're dealt at a particular time.''

How soon?

''Something's got to happen,'' he said. ''I'm getting tired of watching this.''

Once again, the Sox are misdirecting their anger. When they've encountered hard times before, the organizational instinct has been to slash payroll, go young, curl up in a ball and go home. But all White Flag inclinations should have expired in 2005, when a championship led to unprecedented attendance figures the last 2½ years. Reinsdorf owes it to the fans to reinvest those huge profits into the future product and spend, spend, spend.

Instead, he and Williams are dumping the beloved Buehrle. All I know is, they'd better make a serious -- and I said SERIOUS -- run at Alex Rodriguez, Carlos Zambrano and other marquee free agents. Or else they're back to running a shell game on the South Side, which will be snuffed out quickly by discriminating Sox fans. If talk radio means anything, the natives are no happier about the Buehrle decision than they were about two previous p.r. blunders. Remember when Reinsdorf spearheaded the labor impasse that stonewalled a potentially glorious 1994 season? Remember when management quit on the 1997 season in late July with the Sox only 3½ games out? This franchise is arrogant enough to think it can weather another storm.

I might suggest a lot of folks, figuring they've seen the one and only holy grail, will go away and never come back.

So the Sox find themselves at another crossroads. Last time they were deep in doo-doo, Williams miraculously climbed from the muck and pieced together a historic roster. Can he do it again? The Buehrle deal must be a killer that yields dividends for years, whether it's getting loads of hot prospects from the Red Sox, a player like Corey Hart from the Brewers or promising goods from other interested teams. Jermaine Dye, too, should command a decent return. Same goes for Tadahito Iguchi, Scott Podsednik, Jose Contreras and others.

But just make sure you're swinging for the fence in free agency. Another Kids Can Play campaign will bring out the vomit bags.

The good news is that Buehrle, at least, has a fine chance of participating in October baseball again. That's more than others can say on the South Side, where DVDs from 2005 will have to suffice for what could be a long coma.