Tim Anderson is coming back to Rate Field on Thursday for a celebration that feels a lot more complete than the brief stop he made there with the Angels earlier this year.
That earlier visit brought a warm reception, but Anderson said it didn’t land the same way. This one does. He announced his retirement on Aug. 10 via Zoom after a career that ran from 2016-25, and now the White Sox are honoring him in the middle of their Return of the Southside ballpark program.
For Anderson, the day is about family, memory and finally getting to stand on the other side of a baseball life he once lived at full speed.
“Yeah, I like this life,” Anderson said during a 15-minute phone conversation. “It’s more chill, more quiet, more peaceful. But I mean, that’s just a part of anybody that retires.
“This is good. This is cool. I also get to network, be around and get to be hands-on, and I get to go just be a real businessman.”
That’s a different rhythm for a player who once became one of the most electric figures in the game. Anderson played 991 major league games, and 895 of them came in a White Sox uniform.
He was an AL All-Star in 2021 and started at shortstop for the AL All-Stars in 2022. His .335 average in 2019 won him an American League batting title.
His White Sox run also included one of the defining moments of the rebuild: the “stalk-off” home run at the Field of Dreams game to beat the Yankees on Aug. 12, 2021, in Dyersville, Iowa.
Anderson was direct when talking about what he meant in Chicago and what he believed he showed as a player.
“Was I a good player? I think I was a great player throughout my era,” Anderson said.
“Of course, when I was bad, I was bad. But when I was doing things, I was great.
It was good. It was different.
“Winning the batting title, not too many people, especially being on the South Side, being a Black guy that did win that. That’s very inspirational to a kid on the South Side, a guy who looked like him.
“Just a lot of different stuff and a lot of different things that were motivation for the kids in that community and for the culture,” Anderson added. “A lot of different things that a lot of people got to see. Baseball was different, for sure, when I was playing.”
His rise came fast, and so did the fall. The bat flips that made him a national talking point also helped turn him into a showman the White Sox and their fans embraced.
Then came the injuries: a left hand issue in 2022 and a left knee sprain in 2023. Anderson never got back to the level that made him such a force.
His final comeback came with the Angels, where he played 31 games and logged 90 plate appearances in 2025. It started with the team opening the season on the road in Chicago, and he received a welcome back at Rate Field. But he made it clear that this week’s tribute carries the real weight.
“I was there with the Angels, but it didn’t feel right,” Anderson said with a laugh, adding he would have preferred to spend his career with the White Sox. “Being on the other side, it just didn’t feel right.
“They also don’t do this type of stuff for everybody. I’m understanding what’s going on.
I’m going to soak it all in and I'm excited to be back on the South Side for sure. It’s definitely cool.”
He’ll have plenty of people around him for it. Anderson said his wife, Bria, his children, his mom and dad, his mother-in-law, his brother and his brother’s kids will be there. The kids are 10, 7, 3 and 2.
“A lot of people weren’t there to see this journey for real, because I had a lot of life things going on behind baseball with life and family,” Anderson said. “They weren’t there when I opened that door.
“Throughout time we corrected, cleaned up and understood some things about what’s going on in life. At least they get to be there to close the chapter with me.”
White Sox family members will also be on hand, along with people from Youth Guidance and McCartin Boys and Girls Club, two groups Anderson and Bria worked with while he was playing. Fans will be there too, celebrating a former shortstop who left a big imprint on the South Side.
Anderson also said he has talked with his friend and former big leaguer Niko Goodrum about “pushing the game forward” through a youth baseball initiative. He laughed when he promised a strike on his ceremonial first pitch, the same kind of confidence that once showed up in his long throws from the outfield grass.
It’s a different version of Anderson now - quieter, steadier, more open about the life around the game. But Thursday will be about the version White Sox fans remember best, and about letting that chapter close the right way.
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