Ozzie Guillen in better times here with the White Sox

I love Ozzie Guillen, and I’m not afraid to say so publicly. Even so, in a news conference that lasted almost an hour today in Miami, where he’s now managing the Marlins, Guillen was the first to admit that “I love Fidel Castro” was “a very stupid comment” to make to Time magazine.

Opening in Spanish with “Buenos dias”—and in full damage control while being ever sincere—Guillen said he was “very embarrassed, very sad” about the hurt his comments caused in Miami’s Cuban-American community. “I was thinking in Spanish, and I said it wrong in English,” he explained.