A/V Room: Don Cooper's origin story and the White Sox's first ad of 2014

If you have 25 minutes, CSN Chicago's "Inside Look" with Don Cooper is worth your time. If you only have half that amount, start with Part 1 ...

... which covers his Little League and professional baseball career before getting into coaching. Plus, the first bleep happens shortly after the 11-minute mark, and it's a great one.

Part 2 and Part 3 are also recommended. They're not quite as essential since they cover more familiar ground, but it's always fun to hear Cooper spin some yarns.

With the White Sox front office taking its foot off the gas pedal to build up a stronger talent base, the marketing department has dragged its feet on pushing a unified theme for this season. That seems like it could be a marketing crisis of a sort, but then again, it took me a few seconds to remember what the Sox launched last year's campaign with, and everybody's better off forgetting it.

Their first ad of 2014 probably won't be the ship that launched 100 wins, but it's less likely to be recalled with groans.

Still, when you see the ads the Seattle Mariners introduced for this season (and they're coming from a similar place, wins-wise), it makes me wish the Sox's DNA possessed a goofy gene. At least give me something to GIF:

Then again, this season is the last for Paul Konerko, and it's a very Paul Konerko ad. Maybe Brooks Boyer and friends can take it in a different direction if Adam Eaton becomes the team's spirit animal.

(In different times, the perfect slogan after a season like 2013 would be, "It Gets Better," but I can't imagine it being worth the risk of trivializing the other cause.)