Recovering sportswriter Susan Fornoff comes home to Baltimore to talk Oriole Magic, Athletics history and why it matters to fans in Oakland and beyond. And Nestor finally gets to tell some old newspaper tales of her legend and lore at The News American in the 1980s before that creep Dave Kingman showed who the real rats of Major League Baseball were to baseball beat writers.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, baseball, baltimore, years, team, oakland, game, writing, week, covered, kid, sports, women, susan, baseball team, news, live, big, happen, orioles
SPEAKERS
Susan Fornoff, Nestor J. Aparicio
Nestor J. Aparicio 00:01
Welcome home we are wn st am 1570, Towson, Baltimore and Baltimore positive I feel like I need to do the Pac Man thing when I’m promoting the Pac Man Maryland lottery scratch offs we’ll be giving these away twice this week will be a green mount bowl up in Hampstead. Having degree mount station crabcake next door and going to watch the angels take on the Orioles in the four o’clock game. I’ll have these as well at fatally seafood, not the old family seafood, the new one which is about 10 feet away from the old one. It’s in the new market and is brand new. It’s been open all three weeks. We got there on opening day we did the show there. We’re going to be doing the show there each and every Friday live from two of the five, Luke Jones will ride shotgun with me and then the hustle after the NFL Draft. My press credential still under review, maybe they’ll let me and maybe Friday is my big night against the Oakland Athletics. This is such a big week with our 25th anniversary. I’m releasing this crazy documentary, which is just put scores of pictures and images and videos and thoughts and memories and people into my head literally it’s almost a this is your life. It is kind of situation and how all of this happen. And people get connected to me. And this guest is pretty special because I’ve only had around one other time. She sort of was the precursor to my sort of guiding light for feminine sports journalism, which was Molly Dunham, Molly Glassman, who was my boss 35 years ago and my colleague before that at the news, American and it’s sports. First, I’m finding all these pictures of Mike Marlo and all of Chris sang and all of these people from back in my youth and there was always one name that kept coming up in our newsroom and they were like seriously foreign officers and foreign off. And any woman that will come into the space to write. And I don’t know if she’s the Jackie Robinson, she certainly is of Baltimore sports journalism, from the female side of things. But she went on to do amazing things and wrote baseball and covered baseball. But her whole background is in Baltimore. And when her book came out, and it was all about Kingman in the rat, and that’s sort of the famous part of this. But I read the book because I had heard so much about Susan Ford off and it is a pleasure to have you on now in the golf world hanging in Denver. But I reached out to you and you probably don’t even know what when I was a kid how badly I wanted your gig that I wanted to get a job in the San Jose Mercury News of the Oakland Tribune of the San Francisco Chronicle in the green pages examiner. Like I just wanted to be a baseball I wanted to be Ken Rosenthal’s all I wanted to be and you were idolized you from afar, honestly, because you were like a Baltimore person and everybody admired you. So I don’t want to make it too big on you. But like you were in the eight years I spent in newspaper journalism at Ford 92 You were doing some pretty amazing things covering baseball out in the Bay Area. Wow.
Susan Fornoff 02:55
Thank you so much. What a beautiful introduction. I really appreciate that. And let’s thank the University of Maryland’s journalism program because that’s where I got my start and it’s still going strong a little different than it was back in my day and please don’t don’t date us anymore with like 50 years ago this gives
Nestor J. Aparicio 03:16
wisdom it’s actually changed for you because so you know, I was gonna shave for you but I know you know, I speak and let the wisdom grow in your and I’m working at the final edges of this crazy document and we’re releasing it five away on Thursday before the draft have added enjoy it. A lot of our friends and local Baltimore people Jean Jacques from Dundalk. You know, just local voices Keith Brewer, but it brought me to you and the reason it brought me to you is the A’s right? The A’s are coming in, we’re going to be families, we’re doing this thing. The A’s were the first team I ever hated. And I had to text my son who’s in my childhood home and say, did you find that helmets maybe in the shed that I have with pop back because I had an Oakland A’s helmet might and I didn’t like the A’s but I collected the helmets. But my eye was there. You know, when Palmer and catfish and 7370 456 years old, I was at the game with my dad, I still have the score card, the whole deal. But what the Oakland A’s that ride has been for all of these years and what the rides been here for the last 30 years now Cal is back and you’re apparently coming back to Baltimore this week. But the Oakland A’s brought me to you and going through this stuff. And I’m like, Who could tell me about the A’s. And I think of you because of the book and 30 years ago, I read the book. And I mean, you’ve been disassociated for quite some time from the Oakland A’s but I you know, I think of those stories and what could have should have been there and how it’s like it’s the biggest fire show in sports right now. I think you know,
Susan Fornoff 04:45
I mean, I realized that I’m a little disconnected but after I finished my time as a baseball writer for the A’s I became a baseball fan again, you know, and it’s it’s hard to be a baseball fan when you’re a baseball writer. But I live near the Colosseum. And I would go hop on BART, and it would take you right up to the Coliseum. And I’d go to games and I just loved it. And I, I really admired what the yeas did and tried to do in those days until they got this current owner. I’m trying to catch up a little bit on what’s happened there. And it’s just terrible.
Nestor J. Aparicio 05:26
When’s the last time you live there? It’s
Susan Fornoff 05:28
been eight years I’ve been in Colorado eight years. So I was living in Oakland on Jack London Square on the waterfront before I came here, so I don’t think they had I don’t think they were so terrible that I mean, it’s at the point now where I feel the only way the fans can make a statement is to really not spend any more of their money to support that man who, who owns the team. So I you know, I wouldn’t be going to games now. I don’t think watching on the television, maybe. But yeah, it’s it’s really sad. And did you see the article Dan Moore wrote, and
Nestor J. Aparicio 06:07
I invited Dan Oh, Dan came on last year to he was on 22 because he did a piece on Camden Yards changing. I mean, this was the view from where I lived for 19 years. I’m a kid from Dundalk, who lived on the 23rd floor looking at Camden Yards and he wrote this piece about how he changed it. So that this is before Robin was just about to come up. John still owns the team. It’s a mess. But I mean, I want to go back to to, I’m doing this is your life from my life later this week with this crazy documentary. You wrote a book about some things but your background I know you’re saber nerd it up and you’re really you’re still baseball oriented in so many ways from all of your life. But your background not much different than mine in a lot of ways my dad worked at Bethlem steel, your family domino’s sugar if you were a kid, you know, probably taking the bus over and seeing really good. I mean, on the front of your, your bio, the second paragraph, Luis Aparicio. His name’s there, right. He’s the reason I exist here in America. And he brought his cousin here I am all these years later. So I we have this background of loving baseball and then being sports writers in baseball, I did free the birds, Peter threw me out 18 years ago, I’m trying to get back in not trying. But I mean, trying to lift the city, which is what this thing was supposed to be from the very beginning. But you come in at a very different way. 10 years before me with just a beautiful story of how you made a career against all odds really?
Susan Fornoff 07:31
Well, did you know that the news American interviewed three women for the job? And the first two turned it down? Really? That’s how I got hired there. Yes.
07:45
Who turned it down?
Susan Fornoff 07:46
I don’t know. But the news American was in decline. And I guess, you know, a woman with experience in the business probably wouldn’t want to go there. You know, the men, they did hire some excellent, you know, some excellent male writers who they maybe they gave them a lot more money. I think I was making $225 a week.
Nestor J. Aparicio 08:12
Yeah. I mean, like I My first job was a news American to I mean, that’s why I said we have a lot more common they made even you realize 1984 I made $3.33 An hour under the table, to basically get Stan Rapoport, pizza, bread and stuff like that, you know, on the desk over there. And Stedman and statments featured in my documentaries, anything you wanna say about John, because I’d love to hear what what where you come from being a kid in the 60s, maybe reading a newspaper and wanting to be one of those men primarily, not primarily only at that point, writing and getting a foot in the door because the news American offered that to me. And you I mean, you mentioned the mental school right away. Mark Hyman was literally one of the first humans I saw in the newsroom the first night to Chris bike it toward me around on South Street in the news, American. I have my first badge, my visitor badge. I’m featuring in the document like so. It’s such a huge part of my life, but I don’t rock your world to.
Susan Fornoff 09:06
Oh, I think I have a box of souvenirs somewhere. I know I have. I got Reggie Jackson to autograph the scorecard I kept for the last game that he ever played. But not that Reggie was one of my favorites, but he was a jerk to
Nestor J. Aparicio 09:23
me which said Patterson 88 and Memorial Stadium. I’ll never ever forget what Philly yo yeah Donostia came out of the bullpen and yet he popped up with two guys on and it was a Saturday afternoon game and kubek and Jared Garagiola were there and he he was not in the right frame of mind that day to approach
Susan Fornoff 09:45
I never saw Reggie like that. No, I’m just joking.
Nestor J. Aparicio 09:49
Soft love Reggie. Now come on. So how did you come at it? Give everybody your book. I really do. I want to hear your story because I don’t really know it.
Susan Fornoff 09:59
Well, so Oh. So the news American hired me like three weeks before I graduated from Maryland, because fortunately these other two women turned down the job. And at the time now look, Sandy McKee was already at the Baltimore Evening Sun. So I was not a trailblazer in Baltimore. I had role models and that he couldn’t birdie was at the Washington Star. And so, you know, I What year is this? Susan 1979. I graduated from Maryland. Wow,
Nestor J. Aparicio 10:30
you’re right into the middle Oriole magic. Wow. Yes,
Susan Fornoff 10:34
I was. And so I knew that there were opportunities for women. And it was the time when I like to say everybody wanted to have one. They all wanted to have one woman in the sports department. So that’s what the news American set out to do. And so they gave me the job and you know, there was this lovely man covering perhaps at the time Jack Gibbons, you probably know him,
Nestor J. Aparicio 11:05
Jack gave me my spot in life. Jack was the one who hired me and changed my life. I’ve you know, I owe it all to Jack Evans. Literally all of it. Jack
Susan Fornoff 11:13
was covering high schools and our preps sports and the other writers were angry. The other people on the staff were angry. And they were angry at me. They weren’t angry at the people who hired me they were angry at me because I came in and was doing sidebars on the Orioles and sidebars on the Colts and I was doing Maryland games and things that maybe, you know, they they viewed that as more elevated than what Jack was doing. They they thought somebody brand new should come in and do props. And I can’t blame them for that. And
Nestor J. Aparicio 11:49
that psychology was very much the same when I started in 84. I mean, I worked my way up, right. And I got to cover one Skipjacks game and there may be a bullet skate, you know, like, and as I look at what I did, I they must have really loved me because I got to do lots of stuff that I cannot believe I look at my age, my byline I’m like I was 19 doing that you’ll be kidding me. But that’s the opportunity that existed then that maybe doesn’t exist anymore in the same way. But certainly you were a trailblazer that had it and now and then by the way, you had to go talk to Eddie Murray right after the game and and deal with baseball, male baseball player. We’ll get the kingdom in we’ll have to get to that. But you’re but in 79 You’re doing Oriole sidebars on to senseis. Dennis Martinez Lowenstein, that was my favorite team in the world. Right. That’s my that was my team. I was 11 years old. So you went to a lot of those games and 79
Susan Fornoff 12:43
I did. 7980 81 was you know, and I think my I did get to take my dad to a World Series game against pirates. So
Nestor J. Aparicio 12:56
Don Stan house is coming on the show this week. You were being able to actually stop doing old school with all of you right? I’m trying to find everybody that still living and willing and able to tell stories and a guy named John Miller not that John Miller different John Miller with an age from the Wall Street Journal’s writing a book on Earl Weaver and on his on his life and legacy, I probably should put him in touch with you. What What would you tell that little boy in me the little Aparicio that love Kiko Garcia and Gary Rennick, he was my favorite player and wore the mask after the grow in him in the beginning of the year, that 7980 81 Team begat and they’re still trying to eat off of that, and to that team was trying to eat off a Brooks in the teams that you knew in 6970 71. But you know, as well, as I do, though, those there were a lot of empty seats was not a well to do franchise. Even when you went out to Oakland, it was still sort of falling apart and the Colts left while you you know, like, we didn’t have football. It’s a different thing. You’re going to come back to Baltimore this week, in a way that I guess it brings us to the Oakland story of it sort of falling apart there in every conceivable way, from the NBA to the Raiders back and forth to now the A’s.
Susan Fornoff 14:09
Well, the difference is the Baltimore somehow keeps it going. You know, and Oakland hasn’t been able to Oakland and Oakland has a lot of problems like just like Baltimore does. And they have a great fan base. I think they’re very similar to Baltimore that way. But you know, the fans don’t have the power, as you know. And if you got a bad owner, and I don’t think Baltimore has the slightest idea of a bad owner ever since. Mr. Irsay left town. I
Nestor J. Aparicio 14:45
don’t know Angelo’s man. You know, I’ve lived here a long time isn’t this. As I told Mr. Rubinstein’s representative when I was applying for my reapplying for my press credentials after owning a radio station for 25 years. There’s a lot of trauma here. Watch Rahm here, Mike Flanagan was my friend. You know, there’s a lot of trauma here. So, you know, in addition to all of that, and the power of the media to be usurped and bought off and threatened in so many ways is at the core of my being, that’s the fire of John Steadman and Jack Gibbons and quite frankly, you that, you know, I don’t want rats on my desk either. I want to do my job. So I would, I would vehemently disagree on the Angelo’s thing, but I saw people portray him in the media as somebody who saved the team when the stadium was already built, and somebody that didn’t punch down, he really did he punch down often.
Susan Fornoff 15:40
I’m sorry, well, no,
Nestor J. Aparicio 15:41
it’s not even like that. It’s it’s more, I mean, ask anybody and ask anybody ever did business with him? That’s just a me thing. It wasn’t. And I didn’t take it personally. But I do think that there is a difference between trying to move the team and trying to wonder and just make as much money as you can. Because he did. I mean, I did the math for John angelos, they made a million dollars a week, for every week, they own the franchise a million dollar in profit, in addition to the profit they took, so they bought it for 29 million in cash and cashed out at 1,000,000,007. With that come some obligation to not leave the city high and dry, you know?
Susan Fornoff 16:19
Yes. I mean, I’m just so tired of hearing crying from multibillionaires, that cities that are struggling are supposed to build a stadium for them. I just, you know, right. I mean, I saw when I was in Oakland, we went from Charlie Finley to the Haas family. And they were just wonderful community oriented owners who wanted to have a good team and they did spend money and the fans spent money in return. So I don’t know. I don’t know.
Nestor J. Aparicio 16:53
Yeah. And I guess this is sports. We love it. Right? I mean, we still talk about it. And you said you’re coming back to Baltimore this week, you’re going to a ballgame. I’m
Susan Fornoff 17:02
going to new a ballgame. See, once a fan like
Nestor J. Aparicio 17:05
a I mean, it really isn’t. It’s like a mafia once you’re in you can’t get out. And you know, my last name is aparece. It wouldn’t matter how much Angela study tortured me, I wasn’t going anywhere, which was the whole point. As a journalist, I’m not going anywhere. I was taught well, but But what’s happened here is the the opposite of Oakland, and maybe 15 years from now they’re thriving in Las Vegas. And it’s all forgotten. Because that that can that can happen. I mean, it can happen with any franchise, I was down in Tampa and a Tampa lightning or the toast of the town there. They still can’t figure out baseball, and they can only figure out football when they win. Some towns are that way, Baltimore and you know, your native and come from the sports side of putting the paper out every day. And I’ve been doing this for 32 years, every day in my life, coming on the radio talking about sports teams here. Even we only have one of them. This is a miracle thing where the state just gives each team $600 million and says fix it up charge people more put a perimeter around that. Like that’s not really go it’s not even going on to Kansas City.
Susan Fornoff 18:12
I just hope I know there’s a little bit of a movement in Oakland to you know, to make force the A’s to do what art modell did leave them. The Oakland A’s. The idea of the Oakland A’s the trademark the uniforms, the records, you know, he we left the Cleveland Browns to the cleat to Cleveland. When the Ravens came here came to Baltimore, I’m wearing my purple by the way. I’m also a Ravens fan. But I I don’t I don’t think Major League Baseball will do it. You know, Oakland would like you know, Oakland deserves a baseball team. And maybe they’ll get a baseball team. And and maybe they’ll be better off. You know, maybe it’s not just Las Vegas in 15 years that we’re talking about. You know, but but I think the the Oakland A’s the green and gold should should stay with the city.
Nestor J. Aparicio 19:13
You’re a fan of the A’s Right? Like you you fell in love with the team after you covered them. You became a person who bought a ticket and won two games. I sent you a motion in this in the way that you know I’m emotional about everything from a journalist side but I still have my Baltimore Colts belt buckle over here from when I was a boy doing this crazy documentary finding the two or three pictures where I’m wearing my colts at as opposed to Oriole stuff that I had on when I was a little boy but you know you felt this with the Colts as a young journalist in town I was at the news American the night had happened and 84 I just started there was two months into it. And and we suffered all of that. It really is. It’s a weird thing that all these years later, later in your life, you’re still falling With another team, even as an adult, and this crap goes on and to your point, Major League Baseball, I go back to when I was syndicated 25 years ago is contraction. You know, I had Jesse The Body Ventura on trying to keep the twins from Minnesota because they were going to contract them. And I think about the icky shows of San Diego and Miami and fire sales 30 years ago, I Lords of the Realm and all the problems with management. And to your point, billionaire owners, you’ve always the Lords of the Realm that have controlled the game, that through all of this, it still generates so much money if they don’t send us the games on TV. If you’re a massive, but you get you’re heartbroken by this ace thing, probably because you live there and it’s breaking the hearts of the people in the same way that the Colts thing did here. We don’t feel it 3000 miles away. We’re like, Oh, it’s just the A’s. There’s I mean, there’s a lot of people out there that love that baseball team. I want the playoff games out there. I saw it. You
Susan Fornoff 20:53
know I? Well, yes. I mean, I think I think I was we were traumatized. By the way the Colts left Baltimore, I don’t ever want that to happen to another city. And I think most of us felt for the Cleveland fans. You know, we were happy to get a team. But we felt bad that we took the browns. And if you look you can kind of see just behind me there’s 90s
21:21
Yeah, then there’s Brooks right there that lives on your on your mantelpiece?
Susan Fornoff 21:28
Yes. The
Nestor J. Aparicio 21:29
right guest and Susan Florin off, I knew I reached to the right person. And
Susan Fornoff 21:34
now you can’t see but also in another corner, I have this Sports Illustrated cover. Probably won’t have one of those again, of the nuggets holding their championship trophy. Last year, I became a pro basketball fan now because I married a guy who is a huge fan, and he’s a member of the Denver stiffs.com community. And we actually, we covered a game together last week. Boy, was that a trip to legit game? Yes, they played when they played the Timberwolves and it was an eight o’clock start here. And we know we’re not night owls. So we had to stay up and write the recap together, that it really brought back memories of you know, writing on deadline.
Nestor J. Aparicio 22:23
Like writing on a trash ad is there and avid couplers there’s nothing like those memories. These kids will never understand Mark Hyman can teach him things I’ll never teach him couplers about
Susan Fornoff 22:32
now we have to embed Twitter. I mean, there’s all kinds of things in the, you know, finding the elevators statistic, all the statistics and oh, so but it was a it was pretty fun. He had never done that before and to watch somebody go through it.
Nestor J. Aparicio 22:50
I told Luke this week, I said if they give me my press pass back, I’m gonna have to speak a whole different language about launch angle and spin rate with these young kids. Because they all it’s all they know. It’s all the it’s all they’re taught. And it’s the measurements by which they grow which. And I look Luke and I did spring training last month and we drove from Sarasota to Fort Myers and here and there, and I’m always regaling him and I shaved some of those days so I don’t look nearly as old as I am. And I tell him the story said we drove through Lakeland and I said, I met Sparky Anderson over there I sat in the dugout and told Sparky Anderson who I was and he said you’re related to related a Louis you sit right here you stay as long as you want to young man, you know so like, I just give them the Sparky stuff but man you bash brothers, you covered some really sort of legendary team steroids just leaking in and you know, Tom Boswell’s writing about it, and he’s getting Yeah, well. You’re the only one maybe. Yeah, um, you know, I guess for all the years of covering baseball and stuff. Do you have any special fondness for it that did keep you with it in some ways. I mean, I mentioned people the one thing about getting thrown out the last 18 years. I’m glad I didn’t meet any more Dave kingman’s or Rafeal. Paul marrows are Curt Schilling’s, I didn’t need to meet any more of those kinds of people, but I really missed the mike bordick types and the people that I kept F kept with me the rest of my life. You know, and I guess a lifetime later, you figure out who the people really were friends and people you keep around, but I loved baseball so much. I had a press pass for 22 years, I hung out in that same little mezzanine press box eaten those crab cakes that were fried up there. I had Rick Vaughn on a couple of weeks ago and Charles Steinberg telling old stories and we lost literally Keno and I feel tied to it in so many ways. But right here right now, this baseball team in Baltimore, it’s really it feels like the beginning of some sort of renaissance that I’m, I’m hoping to, you know, capture and write about and do sidebars and notes and do all of that stuff you columns 18 inches never longer according Steadman but can’t get it done in that amount of time. You don’t have enough to say
Susan Fornoff 25:07
he’s good. Well, I
25:08
say Well, look, where are you now?
Susan Fornoff 25:18
Look at our baseball team. You know, and two years ago, only two years ago, I remember doing a Facebook posts like during the baseball season saying where’s this? My three teams? Baltimore Orioles? Oakland A’s, Colorado Rockies.
Nestor J. Aparicio 25:37
Wow. I mean, a lot of losing.
Susan Fornoff 25:39
It was bad. It was really bad. So So last year, we got the you know, we had the Orioles last few years really. But, you know, we got the Orioles to come around and and is so fun. But people here. I mean, things are getting bad here. But Coors Field is such a wonderful place to go to a game and there really are baseball fans here. They just like to go to the park and watch baseball and, and that’s me, you know, and I’m telling my husband, we got to go to a baseball game. I don’t really want to go to a baseball game. So
Nestor J. Aparicio 26:10
well. It’s a foot of snow out there last week and you can’t play baseball net.
Susan Fornoff 26:13
Oh, can you change the color of the ball for just one day? Well, hey, Finley,
Nestor J. Aparicio 26:18
try. Come on. Now you covered that team. I saw the orange baseballs back in the day. My dad bought one at a baseball digest that told Barry bloom that last month. So there’s there’s all sorts of trickery. But for you coming back to Baltimore, what what do you look at from 3000 miles away or 2000 miles away now, with a team you love a team? You’re covered? Your hometown, the whole deal? We haven’t. I mean, I can’t Luke. Luke was born the first week of October of 1983. So you know, he literally was he has no memory recollection of anything regarding a World Series here.
26:52
Oh,
Susan Fornoff 26:55
well, that would be exciting to have a World Series in Baltimore, I think. So my mom, my mom, Romain, she’s 89 now. And she’s in a retirement community. And she watches every oil game. So I just have to call her to find out what’s going on. In fact, she got dinged on her subscription, her cable subscription. She has to pay $20 more a month now to watch the oils. But we said Mom, you’re a big fan, you got to pay, you’re going to do it. So she’s doing it. But so she fills me in on things I don’t you know, I can’t say I know all the players and but I try to watch when I can. And I like what baseball has done in the last few years to try to speed the game up and try to I think it’s just fine to tweak some things. I’m not one of those people who say, well, it was that way 100 years ago. You know,
Nestor J. Aparicio 27:55
GH is what you’re saying? Um, yes,
Susan Fornoff 27:57
I like the D Ah, I don’t want to watch pitchers hit. I’m sorry. But yes, so, um, but I’m also I think sports can have a wonderful impact in a community and in a city. And I think, you know, you’re talking about the teens 9079 1980 81 I remember what else was happening at that time. And Baltimore did have a renaissance. That was when harborplace came. That was after, you know, because I was at the news American and there was this, you know, empty land across the street from us on price Street, and then all of a sudden here comes hardware place.
Nestor J. Aparicio 28:40
You watch that get built right from the front? Yes. parked in front of that when you were a culprit? Yes.
Susan Fornoff 28:45
Yeah, we used to have parking, parking places, but But um, so. Um, I don’t think it’s a coincidence. That all happened at the same time. And, you know, I think I would love to see the Orioles. And this is one of the things I’m kind of curious about. I’m curious to go to a game. I’m curious to see what it feels like to be in the city. I’m usually out in Taos in the Towson area when I visit my mom Parkville, Towson. So, um, you know, I’m wishing and wishing for that. You know, I am wishing I see baseball is bigger than just a game on the field. You know, Major League Baseball, and so you know, I I’m hoping I’m hopeful. You’re
Nestor J. Aparicio 29:31
taking your mom to the game is she well enough. She’s
Susan Fornoff 29:33
well enough. I sent her to a game last year. I wasn’t there. But we got to take your game this
Nestor J. Aparicio 29:40
week and I’ll go with you and your mom do a game I’ll help you um, I lost my mom a few years ago. One of my favorite pictures is me taking over a game having a beer and a hotdog with her. You got to take her to a game. Yeah, for sure. You know, especially she’s got to see Jackson Holliday, Gunner Henderson and Adly Rodney. They’re all going to the Hall of Fame. Susan, we know that Yes. Whoa, wow.
Susan Fornoff 29:58
That’s a lot of Hall. Favorite yeah
Nestor J. Aparicio 30:00
i know i mean that’s that’s the kind of expectation we have around here all of a sudden no because it seems really really good. Susan I’ve been doing this since I was like really young. I’ve never seen a team this good this is this is the best Orioles team that there’s that there’s been here it since Baylor and Grich and the Oracle way begat that. Nearly 70s teams that you
Susan Fornoff 30:21
guys yeah, very tough division. Yankees come
Nestor J. Aparicio 30:24
to town Monday. That’s so next week. She was in foreign office here. She is a writer, journalist. She’s involved in the golf world. I haven’t even asked her. But more than that. She’s one of us. She is a Baltimorean who escaped to a life of writing about baseball and writing about sports. She’s now in the Denver Colorado area, but spent a long long time in the Oakland area which is why I reached her we’re going to be fade these on Friday when the A’s come to town. From two until five doing live radio. I’ll have the Pac Man scratch off the movie comes out 25th anniversary no one listens. everyone hears with tributes to people like Mike Marlo and Bob NASCAR and Jack Gibbons and Molly Dunham and Larry Harris and all these people, Bernie Nicklaus and Jeff Gordon, and all these people that I work with, at the news, American and at the evening sun in the Baltimore Sun. And Susan and I never worked with, she didn’t even know I was alive, probably. But her name came up all the time in the baseball circles. The Kingman rat thing sort of, you know, I guess when something like that happens, and you write about it in your book. It really is, to me a case study of how inside baseball always was and I’ve been thrown out for 18 years, so I can’t speak to it. At this point. I’ve only been treated poorly. And I’ve told him and that’s pretty obvious anybody’s ever listened to hear how I’ve been treated. But the part about being on the inside when I saw people like you ahead of me doing that work. I sort of knew Reggie Jackson was going to be a jerk. And if it wasn’t him, it was going to be somebody else. And I spent enough time around Phil Jackman and people that had covered the game and I’ve been in hockey locker rooms and all that stuff. But it’s I’m always 1617 years of age, but baseball always had a reputation of they’re the worst guys they are make the most money they are entitled they like all of that followed baseball players. I mean, there’s a term we always use. If you show someone up or don’t give them proper respect. You say he big league me he big league me that’s a baseball reference, right? So we all know what none of us like to be big league. But big league is what big leaguers do because they’re in the big leagues. And covering baseball, I didn’t find it to be I was never particularly treated badly by players or this or that. Individually, they heard something on the radio, they thought or this or that. I found that I found myself more on the inside than the outside once I got on the inside. But it was tough. And it would have been way tougher if I would have been a female way tougher. If I didn’t know the game. Well wait, wait easier if I had spoken some Spanish that would help me. You know when I think about, what, two years ago, but all these years later, I’m the king been saying for you. And the worst things, the intimidation, all of that. I’m sorry for you, I want to apologize for you. Because I saw that I saw how women were treated to I mean, the words like whoa, that they would use and anytime a woman was in the locker room, the conversations changed, things changed. I spent a lot of time in baseball lockers a lot of time. So I always felt bad that it was that way. But much like racism in the South. I didn’t know what to do about it.
Susan Fornoff 33:29
There was yeah, there was a lot of that. I mean, I remember that everybody knows the rat story that came in, but then it hit his 400th homerun, we were in Seattle, and we were right on deadline. It was a Saturday night, you know, the biggest audience that you have is a Sunday morning paper. And so we were all feeling a lot of pressure to get down there and get some quotes from came in. And I remember we’re standing in a circle. And the PR guy brought him over. And he looked as he said, if she’s here, I’m not talking. And I think it was my second year on the beat. I don’t know, we had had some problems. And I looked at everybody else. And they just looked at me, like waiting for me to leave. And so I threw my hands up and I laughed. Now if I had to do it over again, I I would have just asked a really good question. I would have stayed right where it was. But, and I’d like to think that if we all had it to do over again, that several people would have spoken up and said, you know, don’t be an asshole Dave or, you know, if you know if she’s got to leave I’d have to leave or whatever. You know, and I when new university.
Nestor J. Aparicio 34:41
Jake is one of the men to say we’re all leaving. Yeah, that’s all it would take. You know. So I’m very very intimately familiar. My memoirs will include 2006 When, you know, I took every media member in the city to lunch and told them I was doing this free to birds thing and then I got thrown out and then I’m saying a word because Peter was there was a fealty here. And then when massing came along and the media started to shrink, and there ain’t no more newspapers no more, and a new evening saw new more. And then the Baltimore Sun shrunk and it’s still shrinking and the banners shrine, but really, we’re in a different you and I are way old school but you know, the modern websites for the team websites and that is an interesting angle where there’s no criticism at all. I remember when art modell came to town, Kevin Byrne, and he and this is when arts kicking the dogs and you know, I think he still may call me calling him the Browns for a minute. I remember sitting in his office when first time I met him, and he said young man never be afraid to criticize me. If all you do is praise me They’ll never believe a word you say. And that’s pretty good art. But that’s literally word for word what he said to me. And that’s not the way modern sports is. And I don’t know what Mr. Rubenstein believes. I don’t know what the goof out in Oakland believes is going to happen with Sacramento and Vegas. I keep going back to the fact that Major League Baseball allowed the Expos to do this which begat the Nationals which begat the massive wars, which begat Angelo’s kid getting 1,000,000,007 He’s dad, mom, the kids have the money. But Mr. Rubenstein has like a blank slate here and Cal Ripken on his team and Kurt Schmoke. And like all these people, and even people like you want to be reinvigorated on behalf of your mother. You know what I mean? Like, hurry when we got a win. It’s been a long time. Right? And that’s part of the baseball you know, hope right? There’s finally hope here. And that’s a beautiful thing. I mean, even I’m bought in Susan. And I’m curmudgeonly. I’m Jackman come back to life here. You know,
Susan Fornoff 36:44
hey, you know, my mom, she’s probably playing pickleball or tennis right now. So let’s No, I mean, she could wait a while, but I don’t really want her to have she’s
Nestor J. Aparicio 36:52
playing pickleball she’s well enough for you to bring to the game on Sunday, because it’s gonna be 80 degrees to come on. She’s nice,
Susan Fornoff 36:58
nice. The hardest thing I haven’t figured it out. And maybe you could tell me when we’re off the air is when you bring someone who really doesn’t want to walk or several blocks Park several blocks away or whatever. So I mean, that’s one of the issues with a downtown Stadium. The parking is really inconvenient and difficult for older people just to
Nestor J. Aparicio 37:21
watch. Hey, you know this, you’re doing real journalism now. And I would say at the heart of this, and I want you to talk off before I leave, but people asked me and this documentary is coming out how to get sideways. Adam Jones once asked me, what do you do to piss the old man off so much? And I think what happened is I got this radio station 25 years ago, in 1998. The Ravens got real good real quick. And the orals got bad real quick and awful. I mean, just doing awful things to people not paying bills just being awful, awful people, not just in the Lords of the Realm baseball sense, but not good citizens, not good with businesses in different ways. And not good with things like like your issue, which is Susan calls from Parkville and says, I want to take my mom to the game. Hey, nasty. I called down to the Orioles, I want to take my mom’s nobody got back to me. Nobody cares. There’s nobody there, they’re gonna lose anyway, tickets are too much. And now it’s crime, obviously, right? And safety and public safety and all of that. Miss pricing and $14 beers and all the other things that go along with it. But I became their complaint department in the way that a cranky newspaper writer would become a complaint department for whatever bullpen issues. The lineup whatever you bitch about as a columnist or a writer, in regard to covering the team, my radio station became, you know, I had I had a cold hot dog and a warm beer or, you know, like, and I’m like, call fan assistance, you know what I mean? But there is a point where I hear you and feel you that there has to be something on the website to say, I need to drop off my 90 sub because they had 102 year old woman throwing out the first pitch last week. They gotta have a department for that. I just know under team Angelo’s none of that was real functional for a long, long time. And you know, in a lot of ways, and I’m really hoping that you and your mom get to go to a game because it’s special. You know that I only tell you that. Yeah,
Susan Fornoff 39:16
that sounds good. $14 beers, though. Oh, cheese. Here
Nestor J. Aparicio 39:20
we go. You know, I saw Springsteen at Syracuse the other night, tell everybody about your golfing because I like I have such again, I begin all of this, you’re a superstar to me, because you sort of laid the path for lots of things I saw and did in writing and how I’ve had my own rats delivered to my own, you know, to my side of the fence over all of these years of doing this, and the public doesn’t know care what I get all of that but there comes a point when doing your job on their behalf. Even if they don’t understand you still want the chance to do that. You left all that and like golf, right? Like give me you’ve written books and you’ve written fun books. I don’t want to use the S word the four letter S word but you can No,
Susan Fornoff 40:00
that’s okay. That’s, that’s quiet now, I will say, somebody will have to look that one up on Susan foreknowledge.com, I guess. But um, I am retired, I don’t want to, I don’t want anyone telling me really what to do anymore and what when to do it. And, you know, I’m pretty much out of that I’m finished working for people. But I do work for clients. And so my main client right now is the Colorado Golf Association, which is a nonprofit. And all these people started playing golf and the last since 2020. And they’re mostly adults, it’s not a junior golf growth. So my mission is to bring them in. And so I really, I created this character called Molly Mulligan. She thinks every golf should be fun for everyone. And so I write a column dear Molly, I don’t talk to people about their swings or the rules, but as a kid, and just having a better time, birdie juice, can you bring birdie juice on the golf course? You know, things like that. So I’m really enjoying it. I write three articles a month for them. And also, I do want to
Nestor J. Aparicio 41:17
tell you that right, birdie, I’m gonna have to google birdie juice. Right.
Susan Fornoff 41:21
Okay, we should always have something to Google after we interview someone.
Nestor J. Aparicio 41:26
The learning part of this? It’s the extended learning. It’s not Yeah,
Susan Fornoff 41:29
well, hopefully you don’t have to google Nelly Korda because I just want to give a shout out there. It’s really exciting what is happening and women golf. I know she was under a lot of pressure yesterday to tie the record held by Nancy Lopez and Annika Sorenstam. But now we’re going to have somebody going for six. And that is going to be something else. So I just want to raise the consciousness a little bit about about her. She’s, she seems to have great character and a great family. And she’s just she’s a fierce competitor. And I’m excited to watch women’s golf right now.
Nestor J. Aparicio 42:09
Well, you’re the women’s golf and Caitlin Clark’s the biggest story and women’s pay in equity. And we’re still 30 years removed from you know, Team USA and the soccer side. We you know, I I don’t The Mary Tyler Moore it but I mean, we measure how far we’ve come that we don’t pay enough respect to people like you that were first ones to get there, which is where I go back to giving you the Jackie Robinson praise for all of that is that it’s very, very normal to have pretty young ladies running around baseball teams. It’s preferred, quite frankly, to old people like me that may have been around it’s all marble and your play. And you know, where seven before Jackson holiday. But I would just say that it’s so normalized to some degree, Title Nine. All of that is when we see something like, oh, Caitlin Clark only makes how much in the WNBA and she’s making like that we it becomes a talking point at this point. It’s no longer Well, she’s not allowed to play. You’re can’t play. We’re not Saudi Arabia. Right, you know?
Susan Fornoff 43:04
Well, that’s good. You know, when I was when I was a journalist, people said, Don’t you feel responsible to try to cover women’s sports? And I said, No, nobody’s interested in women’s sports. Nobody’s nobody goes to women’s sports. I want to cover the big stuff, you know, but now women’s sports is the big stuff and I would love to cover it. Well,
Nestor J. Aparicio 43:26
I covered women’s tennis back in the 80s when Annika won here in Baltimore. She won the open in Baltimore, maybe 8889. Somewhere in there. Maybe when it Billy rock? Ah, no, it was before bully rock was built. No. Um, trust me on this. I got. My wife does have a memory like Mary Lou Hamer, which is a compliment, which is why I remember your awesomeness sousaphone off once covered baseball then the Orioles and the Oakland A’s. And I called her about the Oakland A’s and we meandered and everything including why she take her mom back to the ballpark. Thank you for your time and your leadership as I would say if we were at some networking event, but certainly, you know everything in the newspaper age and era as when John Eisenberg comes on and he’s coming on again this week because he found all these old Oriole days, we always talk about the golden age of newspaper and sports writing, right. The sun is set.
Susan Fornoff 44:27
I don’t but I don’t think we’re finished with good sports journalism. So keep it up.
Nestor J. Aparicio 44:32
We’ll go good. I’ll get more climbing on and we’ll have a back and forth about all that Sears afford off of Maryland off Baltimore off Dominos sugar and all that good stuff now out of Denver you can find her to sit for and off.com and you can also find her books she’s written them I would recommend them. Even if I didn’t say one on the air you can go find that part of life as well. I am Nestor we are wn st am 1570, Towson Baltimore. And I hope to see you get into Pac Man scratch off with us, Dan have faith he’s having a Proper homecoming crabcake down at the new Lexington market can I have one of those please absolutely see you Friday
