For Baltimore's Sake...Sell The Orioles, Peter

It's time.

Actually, it's been long beyond time, but Peter Angelos needs to sell the Baltimore Orioles.

He has single handedly killed the sport in Charm City. It's at the point now that he's irked generations of fans so that the sport may never recover in Baltimore.

To get to this low, low point, one must revist the past.

The once proud Birds of Baltimore were the most consistent team in baseball from the mid-1960s through the mid 1990s.

They had the best overall record in baseball during that span, even better then the dreaded Yankees and Red Sox.

The O's were routinely in contention for division titles, claiming six AL championships in a 17 year span, while winning the franchises three World Titles in 1966, 1970 and 1983. 

If you grew up in the '80s, the old seven team AL East Division format was ultra competitive, featuring six of the seven teams winning titles during the decade ('81 Yankees, '82 Brewers, '83 Orioles, '84 Tigers, '85 Blue Jays, '86 Red Sox).

The one team that didn't win a title, the Cleveland Indians, ended up getting their championship thanks to Hollywood in the movie Major League.

If the current wild card set up had been used during this time, the Orioles might have made the playoffs in on six more occassions during the '80s and early '90s.

After the death of Edward Bennet Williams in the late '80s, by the middle of the 1993 season, the Orioles were sold to native Baltimorean Peter Angelos, a trial lawyer who made his money in Asbestos cases in the '80s and '90s.

At the time, the franchise sold for a record $160-$170 million, which seemed outlandish, but really was just the beginning of over-inflation for sports franchises.

The O's had just become the trend setters in the retro ballpark craze by opening Camden Yars in 1992, and were playing for sellout crowds every night.

They had the "Iron Man" and local hero Cal Ripken, up and coming pitchers like Ben McDonald and Mike Mussina, and had the ability to sign any free agent they wanted, such as Rafeal Palmeiro, among others.

They were poised to win and Angelos seemed like a new breed of owner who could push the O's over the top, to compete with the Steinbrenners of the world.

Besides, when Angelos bought the O's, the Yankees were in the middle of a 15 year drought of not winning the division, or making the playoffs (let that sink in for a second. If you grew up in the '80s, you were used to the Yankees sucking every year!).

Angelos purchased the team and the club moved from midtown Baltimore, at 33rd Street, to downtown Baltimore, by the Inner Harbor.

This move made it much easier for people south of town, specfically Washington D.C., to ride into the stadium off of I-95 and gave them easy access to get out. Prior to this, a trip through downtown during rush hour could take up to an extra hour to make it to the north side of town and Memorial Stadium.

Thus, Angelos started catering to the new breed of fan from D.C., for lack of a better term, the Yuppie craze of back in the day, the D.C. lobbyists, lawyers, and politicians who had no loyalty to Baltimore and the O's, but instead came to the games to be seen and because it was the "in" thing to do.

By catering to the transient D.C. crowd, Angelos turned his back on the loyalists who routinely put two million plus fans into Memorial Stadium from Baltimore, Western Maryland, Deleware, the Eastern Shore, and South Central Pennsylvania.

As a result, as time moved on, more groups from this area were squeezed out in a ticket crunch due to the increase in demand from the D.C. area. Angelos' shunning of his core group of fans led to a slow dissolve of the O's fans who would come out to watch baseball and the O's, with or without the bells and whistles of Camden Yards.

By the time that Ripken had retired in 2001, there was no reason for the D.C. elite to keep coming up I-95 to see the Birds as the team was becoming far removed from the 96-97 playoff runs.

Angelos ran off the great Davey Johnson and probably cost Baltimore a World Championship in the process.

No player development from the farm system, coupled with bad free agent signings led to a quick demise, coupled with an incompetent front office that had a revolving door at the managerial and GM position.

Despite the fact that Angelos always claimed territorial rights in D.C., its two seperate markets (see Ravens and Redskins) and Washington were pushing for it's own team, which eventually happened when the Expos became the Nationals.

Thus a younger of generation of fans was lost and now the second generation is on the verge of being lost.

With the consistent demise of Baltimore as a city (they make TV shows about this stuff, Homicide & The Wire) and a loss of population, coupled in with the Nationals taking away millions of potential fans that Angelos catered to for a decade, and throw in a horrible product on the field, the end of baseball in Baltimore could be in the rearview mirror and be closer then it appears.

In all seriousness, I could see the team moving if they keep getting crowds of 9,000-10,000 at Camden Yards. If that keeps up there is no way they can stay and Angelos will be forced to sell or move.

It's a sad time to be an O's fans, with an unthinkable 12 consecutive losing seasons, staring down the barrel of a 13th with a 2-11 start.

1983 has become for the Orioles what 1918 was for the Red Sox.

Angelos just turned down an offer from Cal Ripken to come in and work with the younger players, pro bono, because the Birds are doing so well without him.

The only chance of turning this around, is for Angelos to sell the team, and then Baltimore must rebuild like the Rays, invest in the scouting and player development.

That's a 10 year fix when you start the process, but on the bright side at least we don't waste our time getting our hopes up because the O's suck so bad!

Please Peter Angelos, sell the team (preferably to Cal Ripken) and leave!