on the field. And last place is what the franchise has earned in every measurable way in the industry and sport as well. And clearly amongst any credible players in the sport they’re in last place when it comes to choosing a city and franchise to play their baseball.
But Angelos and his group are winning in the only place that really matters – the bottom line profit of the franchise, which is so extraordinary in the tens of millions of dollars that they don’t even want you to know. The amount of money that’s being stolen from the people of Baltimore and Maryland via the MASN deal is frightening, really, when you consider that it’s been a legal theft. And then add in the slashing of the annual payroll while the puppet master Andy MacPhail has the audacity to say that the Yankees and Red Sox are too profitable to compete with each year in AL East while his ownership lines its pockets with more than $50 million in cash every Christmas while the team rots in the cellar of the standings.
If the Marlins and Pirates are printing money and being “bad” on the field is the new “good” in profit margin then only imagine the depths of profits that the Nationals and Orioles are throwing off while the teams flounder – as predicted by Angelos to me at The Barn in 1997, a self-fulfilling prophecy if there ever were one.
But for the Orange Kool Aid drinkers who somehow blame ME for the failings of the Orioles, the real picture will never be clear. If after 14 years of this garbage you’re still defending it even knowing that Angelos Sr. has once again banished his offspring from the Greek castle and at 81 years old is running his law firm AND the entire business and baseball operations of the Baltimore Orioles – well, then, I suppose I’ll just say that I pray for you.
How in the world the president of the baseball team and the network could just stop working last spring and it not go reported by the local media is beyond “fishy.” If Dick Cass suddenly stopped showing up in Owings Mills, I’d think that would rate a headline?
Someone under the “media employ” of Peter G. Angelos actually opined this week in a web headline: “Can Showalter be a factor in recruitment of free agents?” Not to be a complete wise-ass but it’s freaking Christmas and the Orioles haven’t even signed a B-list free agent, let alone seriously courted an A-list addition in a season when they once again finished in last place.
If Showalter were a TRUE recruiting factor, someone like Zach Greinke, Adrian Beltre, Carl Crawford, Cliff Lee or Adrian Gonzalez would be wearing an orange cap down at The Warehouse. Instead, the Orioles are unlikely to even sign Adrian Adonis or Adrienne Barbeau this offseason of another cold winter in last place.
Like all of his predecessors, Showalter has been a complete ghost this offseason while billboards are up and typical “buy season tickets” propaganda continues to fill the air.
And the “journalists” at all of the Orioles partner companies in the media are opining that somehow the Orioles free agency “splurge” has been a success
