The best news coming out of Wednesday’s Piedmont Boll Weevil press conference at Lowe’s Motor Speedway had nothing to do with Bruton Smith or the Chicago White Sox.

No, the best news came after the press conference. That’s when Todd Parnell, who has spent his entire 11-year career in the Philadelphia organization, told us he was staying with the Boll Weevils and was jumping on the White Sox bandwagon.

Owner Larry Hedrick and his new partner Smith, he of racing fame, may have the deep pockets but fans have deep feelings for Parnell. He is the face they see day after day after day.

To owners of minor league teams, it’s their business. To Parnell, it’s his life.

And as the Chicago White Sox come on board, he has a new lease on life. Let’s face it, area baseball fans were not too enamored by the prospects of rooting for the Phillies. And they showed their apathy by staying away. This past season’s attendance didn’t reach the numbers set in 1999.

It left the ebullient Parnell down in the dumps with thoughts of moving on crossing his mind.

“A couple of months ago, those thoughts were in my head,” he admitted. “Other teams called me.”

Of course, other teams called him. Parnell had been a magnet for fans in other cities, breaking attendance records wherever he had been before arriving here.

And the guy’s not but 34 years old, for cryin’ out loud.

“But this team means a lot to me,” he said. “In the end, I wasn’t ready to give up and move on.”

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Now, Parnell, the vice-president and general manager, is rejuventated. He considers himself White Sox property now.

“I noticed a listing of the 30 top teams and Philadelphia was 30th and the White Sox were second,” he said. “We did a little bit of a flip-flop today.”

So did his demeanor. Wife Kelly told him Wednesday morning, “You’re not nearly as grumpy as you have been.”

Kelly might be the only person to ever see Parnell disgruntled. At Fieldcrest-Cannon Stadium, he always had his game face on — smiling, shaking hands, pulling the tarp, making sure his sportswriters were fed — you know, the important duties of a general manager.

The game face was on again Wednesday as he saw his owners Hedrick and Smith yuk it up for the surprisingly large contingent of cameras and media types.

Parnell stood in the background enjoying the hoopla as Hedrick and Smith delivered one-liner after one-liner as if it were all scripted by Saturday Night Live writers.

“The way they interacted showed how this process has been,” Parnell said of the Hedrick-Smith partnership.”It hasn’t been real pressurized or high collar. It has been fun. Which has been good for me because quite frankly, the last little while, the fun hasn’t been there.”

Hedrick joked about “tricking, uh, convincing” Smith to buy into the Boll Weevils. He introduced South Atlantic League president John Henry Moss, by saying Moss had a lifetime contract “and was trying to get an extension.” Hedrick said he was from Union Grove, “a place so small, the local hooker’s a virgin.”

And on and on and on. Press conferences tend to turn into “A Night at the Improv” and this was no different. Put a microphone in front of somebody and he thinks he’s Jerry Seinfeld.

Jerry Reinsdorf, the owner of the White Sox, but more famous as the owner of Michael Jordan’s former team, got up to speak after the Hedrick and Rootin’ Tootin’ Bruton Show.

“They told me I’d have to speak after Bruton Smith,” Reinsdorf sighed. “I found out it was after the Marx Brothers.”

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Parnell, the best speaker of anyone in the room (“Iwrote their jokes,” he smiled) simply stood in the background, loving every minute of it.

“It was a pleasure to see how much fun Larry had today,” Parnell said. “He had an absolute blast.”

I guess so. This was a new day for the Boll Weevils. The team has fought an uphill battle since 1995, dealing with everyone from apathetic fans to sourpuss politicians who brought the team here and then badmouthed it to the public. Newton Cohen, for instance, has adamantly opposed the stadium from Day 1. But there he was Wednesday, along with a few other of our illustrious commissioners, holding bats and smiling for the cheesy photo-op.

But a new day brings new hope. With the addition of Smith, the club has plenty of money and perhaps some of the projects surrounding Fieldcrest Cannon, like the once-proposed recreational park, may get done after all.

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Parnell met Smith Wednesday for the first time and found out some Stanly county similarities.

“He’s from Oakboro and I’m from Locust,” Parnell announced, “so we hit it off right away. He said, ‘Do you know where Frog Pond is?’ I told him I used to hang out in Frog Pond.”

Off camera, Smith didn’t seem as thrilled about his partnership as Parnell and Hedrick.

“I’m a businessman,” he said with a stone face and a terse attitude. “OK?”

OK.

And it is OKthat Todd Parnell is remaining here. It is more than OK. He is the hardest working man in baseball (hey, it’s my column, I’ll call him whatever I want. OK?). And because he is the hardest-working man in baseball, he wasn’t a happy camper during the last two months of the season, despite the Boll Weevils having the best record of any team in professional baseball on any level, and despite having a product that rivals anything in this area when it comes to family entertainment.

Parnell’s expertise is in promotions. He is now ready to promote the Chicago White Sox, along with the Boll Weevils. And it should be easy, considering he is already planning things with Winston-Salem Warthog general manager Pete Fisch and Charlotte Knights general manager Tim Newman.

“You’ll see the three of us do a lot of promotions and meeting together with the White Sox in mind,” he said.

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Todd Parnell is pumped. He is ready to get out his black sox, er, socks, and thinks the fans will too, considering how close the three minor league teams are.

“Fans can follow the farm system from team to team, and not only that, but just about everybody gets WGN. So they can watch the White Sox.”

Parnell likes the new attitude.

“We’re not trying to just get by anymore,” he said. “We’re really trying to push everything and become an integral part of everything in this area.”

That is good news for everyone involved. More money. More interest. More upgrading.

And the best news of all?

More Todd Parnell.

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Ronnie Gallagher is the sports editor of the Post.