Now that folks are coming back to Camden Yards and downtown is more active, Nestor Aparicio and Dennis Koulatsos share notes on the heartbeat of Baltimore and how it percolates better when the Orioles are winning, full of hope and (hopefully) bringing 30,000 people back to the city.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
baltimore, orioles, oyster, games, years, good, baseball, play, new york, ravens, crab, places, channel, irrelevant, week, talking, philadelphia, put, bird, tickets
SPEAKERS
Nestor Aparicio, Dennis Koulatsos
Dennis Koulatsos 00:01
Welcome back. My next guest says the globe trotting Nestor J Aparicio that went out where this man is going to turn up. He He does great things that crab picture his pictures are over walls of fine dining establishments as my better half found out the
Nestor Aparicio 00:18
other day. Hold on, hold on, hold on. You’re not gonna give me an introduction like that word. My picture isn’t on the wall anywhere. I’m not on the wall or costus I’m not on my knee. Geez, I’m not on the wall. Any of the places that I have been holding meetings like the Fonz since 1985.
Dennis Koulatsos 00:35
I sent you the picture. I cannot make this up. You and I recognize Governor Hogan.
Nestor Aparicio 00:40
I always wanted to be on the wall of Captain Harvey’s and Dundalk. I’m not gonna lie. But that never happened. You know,
Dennis Koulatsos 00:45
I’ve had several cheese steaks on Capitol Harvey SWAT in my lifetime. But yeah, you’re, you’re like you’re everywhere.
Nestor Aparicio 00:51
Um, I’m in New York right now, which is it looks like I’m in Baltimore. But I have bad lighting. I have Manhattan lighting. It’s my wife’s birthday. I’m a big seal fan. And certainly, I’ve always been a seal fan. I’ve just never seen ceiling concert since 1999. He went out on a tour for the first time. And he was so people ask me what’s the best concert you’ve ever seen? You go to a lot of concerts. And I’m like, you know, they’re all good. They’re all worthwhile and some of them are better than others. And then sometimes you see something it’s a little transcendent. You’re like, alright, like, when I see Springsteen and I go to see him multiple times. It’s you know, I like Austin, Texas. And I want to go see it or I like New York and I want to see it but to see see a little Wednesday nights my wife’s birthday week we had kind of it was an easy getaway for us with a long weekend and sweet and and the Orioles were in New York too. So nasty. Nestor was on the Hill and the Orioles got right with him after after the rainstorm. So the one thing I’ll say about being in New York and you know after the plague, because there’s so much cities have deteriorated and a lot of places in the world, not just in America. New York’s not just rising again. It’s $400 a night to get a room in New York. There were Yankee fans, just everywhere. You know, I found myself at Moynihan Hall. And there were people in Oreos gear. I know some folks ran bus trips up here again, the heartbeat of baseball back in our city to go to a city where everybody’s wearing a Yankee hat or a Mets hat or when you go to Boston everybody had well, maybe not as much lately, but there was a period of time and a period of time in our town. We’re in the early 90s. Everybody had the orange theologically correct Oriole hat and wore it as a true source of civic pride. And I feel like there’s some pride coming back in the Baltimore, there’s some I could put an Oriole hat on and walk the streets of New York today and not have people say, hey, they haven’t won since 1983. Right. So so when you come to cities and travel a little bit you feel I feel sports and I feel the culture come to me when I go to places and when I go to places and I when I’m in Houston about 10 weeks ago and everybody’s got Astros stuff on you know, you realize what the team has done in the community and the impact it’s made. And certainly the Ravens have made that kind of impact in Baltimore where they have been for most of our adulthood this ubiquitous everything purple means a purple bird and and you know, to see New York come to life with sports in the summertime. It’s awesome. See people on the train headed to Yankee Stadium,
Dennis Koulatsos 03:24
saw good stuff you just reminded me I did a segment with our good friend Bruce Posner and of course he’s the ultimate term fan. Trip analyst but he had a black and white, the old school Orioles hats and so even a guy like Bruce is rocking the bird these days and lots like about these birds not so much Tuesday night when Felix Batista led up homerun against the Aaron judge on Owen to count that left us with a sour taste. But the Orioles come back for the 19th time they’ve come back 19 times not stripped of the 32 wins. This team was not even June. It’s not even, not even June. This team is resilient. They’re valid. They’re relative irrelevant. Rather. They’re not going anywhere. They’re fun to watch. And the momentum continues to build for these Baltimore Orioles.
Nestor Aparicio 04:09
You’ve had a radio show here for a decade for over a decade now. About them. When they sucked and they were irrelevant and they went away I would you hung in there with them. You I wouldn’t force you to say one day. Yeah, they and I and again people would say to me like I did free the birds I’m rereleasing the Peter principles. I want people to know what happened. Why I’m estranged 17 years from going to games giving these creeps money and like talking about it on the radio that way. I’m happy to re earth what John Angeles did to me 70 It’s funny the bird squirt area that you know, I was assaulted by the bird in 2006 after they didn’t pay my pay the bill. So it’s been 20 years of angst, but there was no Ever point when I wrote any of my maps and series when he was, we still is keeping the money away from the Nationals, all of the things that happen how Buck show Walter just exited. And there was nothing here that was scorched earth when Buck show Walter left here, right. So including Matt Wieters knees, right. So, of course, you know, according to the flagship all these years they could do no wrong when they’re losing 100 games all I kept saying is there’s something here that is significant. It’s important. It was important to the community enough that when my parents were alive and your parents, we they funded building a stadium so that we could have baseball downtown, have great baseball downs and have the Yankees come every year in the Red Sox game every year and have a chance to win a World Series. And this starts to feel like they’re they’re going to play postseason baseball this year, and maybe for a little while until they then have to manage it financially. Right. And that’s either John paying players bringing players in. I mean, they’ve already got decisions to make in six or eight weeks, right as to whether they’re going to throw 10 $20 million into the kitty this year, to chase a couple of ballplayers that may help them pieces that allies needs in October. So there’s a long way to go in whether they really have invested in the community and invested in the franchise. I mean, they’re still fighting with the Nationals and their own partners about the money. Couple 100 million dollars. But this is go time on the field. None of that. Anybody nobody’s gonna talk about any of that. They’re going to talk about how we played did we win last night? We went in tomorrow night. And that’s that’s what the baseball season should be. We haven’t had that kind of season around here since 2016.
Dennis Koulatsos 06:47
No, it’s great. It’s great to see the enthusiasm was great to see people going back downtown again, supporting the Orioles supporting all the local businesses around the stadium or whatnot. So the seven Fridays rising with the Baltimore Orioles, to the point where the Ravens news sets kind of subsided. Lamar Jackson has showed up. So
Nestor Aparicio 07:04
that’s what the Ravens news, right? I mean, the Ravens want to hold press conferences where nobody says anything. And they all go away and they get their paycheck. Like they like they’re the opposite. But then they put out these warm, fuzzy things trying to sell the seats the church still took for me. Right. So they have a video that they released this week. That’s, you know, Baltimore, you know, that season tickets are available. You know, they they showed Lamar and his cars talking about how happy is it he gets $73 million. The Orioles meanwhile, are put a product on the field. And they have all of these things at the higher level and Major League Baseball like the city connect, right. And by the way, like like, like he gets involved in. And I guess it’s a topic of conversation for a minute a half right? Like you and me talking about the Oilers throwbacks coming back in the NFL, on the Tennessee Titans. I mean, I don’t care what jerseys they were. But backup what you say you are, you’re gonna put a video out about how much the team means to the community. Dude, I’m old enough to remember when the word Baltimore was not allowed to be mentioned around the franchise. And where I had hosts who you support it on this radio station for eight years, campaigning to get Baltimore back on the road jerseys and ownership would refuse to put the word Baltimore on it. So it is rich with irony that I had here and fought, got thrown out, you know, complete everything that’s happened to me for sitting on a radio station in Baltimore, actually in Towson, but in Baltimore and saying maybe the Orioles should have the word Baltimore on the road jerseys, like 29 other road teams, and now all of a sudden it’s sort of like it’s standard operating.
Dennis Koulatsos 08:44
It’s the thing to do a decade later, right.
Nestor Aparicio 08:47
But it was always the thing to Baltimore never left my chest. I know but I
Dennis Koulatsos 08:51
do remember you railing against him for not having Baltimore honor uniformed, and all of a sudden, it’s the cheat sheet thing to do. Right. And that was one
Nestor Aparicio 08:58
of the key points of them throwing me out. Yeah, it was one of the key points of them throwing me out. So I have a sense of humor about it. People think that I’m bitter I’m like, I’m in New York City having delicious muffins. See and seal I’m not bitter. I’m glad they’re better. I’m glad they’re better for you. For me. My kid texted me about the Orioles now every you know people are into it. And it’s May and Dennis I know what that ride feels like I went on it every summer of my life. The first 35 years of my life, right like where every summer was Spring Training opening day when we play in when’s the road trip? What do they play in New York? Let’s have a road trip. Hey, do they play in San Diego or LA are they played at Wrigley Field? Let’s go have a trip. Let’s let’s let’s see that they’re relevant. Hey, you’ve never been to Fenway Park let’s go to Fenway Park, it’s awesome. You should go to Fenway Park and see a game and then there’s the thing where like my pal Dennis and his girl and my My wife and I we tickets and Sunday afternoon and hey, let’s go down to the ballgame. The twins are in town. You know, Rodriguez is pitching. The Dennis has got corporates, let’s let’s go put a hat on and put some suntan lotion and go out there and spend too much on beer and popcorn the way we did it see last night, so the mojo of going to games. There was traffic last Thursday, Dennis during your show? Oh, no, I heard about it. I had I had a happy hour downtown. There was traffic. And I’m like, good. I lived downtown. 19 years. I begged for traffic. Right. So me. Yeah. And so I’m excited about all of it and to be in New York when the Orioles are playing in New York and to see Orioles gear and to see it be relevant again. I’ve prayed long and hard for an outcome like this then.
Dennis Koulatsos 10:45
Yeah, no question about it. We even our organization has jumped on the ship. They’ve become a sponsor. And we have a Masson rep. Now we’re getting some tickets, some complex, I saw
Nestor Aparicio 10:55
your ad, I saw a crystal first I was just reading the Whitemarsh thing. And I’m like, I don’t know why that is. And then I see who’s Baltimore fort security, but I’m like, look at that. Like you’re just stepping,
Dennis Koulatsos 11:06
stepping up buck. You know, we had a conversation said, Hey, what do you think? And I said, Look, everybody loves a winner. Everybody wants to jump on the bandwagon. So why not? Let’s do it. If it makes sense. Let’s do it. And it’s good because people are tuning in, people are watching. That’s where the eyeballs are. So I think it’s more business to put the advertising there. You know, I
Nestor Aparicio 11:23
remember when Elias came here and the team was was torched, obviously the Brady Anderson thing, and we talked about the Houston Astros, and the Astros had just won, but I was on the radio. I mean, John McLean’s, one of my dear friends, you know, John covered the Oilers for years and the venerable he’s a Hall of Famer, you know, but he loves baseball, and anytime I bring John McClane on he loves baseball so much that he and his wife are moving to Maryland. And they’re going to go to nationals in Orioles games, they want to live somewhere where they can go to, to American and national league games, like seriously, we live in a Napoles area, and he’s lived in Texas, Waco, Texas his whole life. And I remember him 12 years ago to East Come on with me five times a year, all of my career right. And I remember him coming on and the Orioles were irrelevant. At the time. This is 1213 1415 in that range. And we were talking football talking about Joe Flacco the ravens are winning Super Bowls, right. So I mean, he’s a venerable football guest the very source guy, but we would get into baseball and he’d say to me, the faster the Astros are so bad they got zero ratings zero no one that there is zero that’s how irrelevant they are in our community. And I and then they cheat bank trash cans get players get my little dude from Venezuela today and they win right and I put I remember them having a zero in Houston’s a big market Houston to number three for market in America. I mean, there’s 8 million people to live in Houston. It’s huge. Right? And to get to zero, and then to go down there now and see everybody wearing a Julio Cruz throwback, right. Your Jose Cruz throwback Julio Cruz play for the mirrors. But are the Nolan Ryan Jr. Richard thing. So for the Orioles to have a zero rating? It was zero my house? I mean, we haven’t watched them in yet. We didn’t have cable television last summer. You know, I will admit that when we move we didn’t get cable television because I didn’t need it until we got cable television installed on the Sunday that the Ravens played. And I was thrown out at the Meadowlands seven months ago. Because we needed to get it because I needed to have a Ravens game. So the fact that we got cable TV, I’m really really heartened that every night, my my wife talks into the remote she’s like, massive, and she puts it on in the friggin nationals are playing the Padres. And she’s like, why can’t they just put the damn games on one channel and leave? Right? Do you do the same thing? Do you get a master one or master two?
Dennis Koulatsos 13:58
I don’t use the voice thing. I just I do it manually. I use the guide I use the voice and when I’m when I’m on YouTube when I want to find something in YouTube what I should probably start doing that.
Nestor Aparicio 14:08
I was fit to be tied on Friday night when you couldn’t find the game. Apple plus you see that? You know, Friday night you couldn’t get the game unless you had Apple plus really?
Dennis Koulatsos 14:17
That’s too much for me. Growing up with three channels and the one on UHF 45 that came in fuzzy
Nestor Aparicio 14:27
my family couldn’t even afford super TV remember that when they put they put the little thing on the toaster? Never even heard of that? Yeah, never TV was like 8080 was before home team sports. People are gonna know I’m gonna mention super TV. You mentioned some old timers Bruce Postel remember super TV, but it was like channel 50 Something something and we never we couldn’t afford it. I’m a parent of a TED Patterson put the games my dad had they do the math on it. My dad’s like 12 hours a month. Well, you and I get the bus. We’ll go to ball games for that. Stop cheating a Coney Island hop I’ll get some hot dogs up there not chili dog. My dad
8Dennis Koulatsos 15:02
brought in the screen one time. And he put it on in front of the black and white TV set and it was color. So it had a blue for the sky and green for the grass. And he was. That was
Nestor Aparicio 15:13
our first it looks like one of those colorize the Gilligan’s Island episode. Yeah,
Dennis Koulatsos 15:17
it was really bad. It was, it was really bad because it wasn’t always relevant. You know, you’re showing the scene from a city and there’s buildings and there’s no grass, but everything’s green on the bottom and you got this blue sky up top. But that was that was it.
Nestor Aparicio 15:30
I want to see that. I want to know who manufactures that
Dennis Koulatsos 15:33
classic man Classic Talk about rose colored glasses. Right saints we did do you remember
Nestor Aparicio 15:37
the little we had to put the antenna on the roof. And you’d have the little Turner and the Turner thing. And the antenna would move on the roof. And then like all of a sudden channel 17 from Philadelphia will come in. Dennis, you’ll appreciate this. The only reason I ever moved that little antenna was because Championship Wrestling was on what time four o’clock, four o’clock on a Saturday, one o’clock channel 45. California a little known fact. And any one of my Philadelphia friends were of the right age Howard askin type. So remember this Championship Wrestling came on in Philadelphia at five o’clock on channel 17. And so when the wrestling ended, I could move the tower. I’m talking 1979 8081 Before cable TV happened, right? You’d move the tower, and then at 20 After Vince would be there with Ivan Putski. And Putski be saying Philadelphia, I love you we’re coming to the spectrum. And I’m taking on Putera and I’m going to show you and Greg the hammer would come out and yeah, so the Philadelphia wrestling I used to have to get the little antenna but that’s how hard I had to work to get my wrestling to get my television to get my sports and now I have to figure out whether it’ll match and one or two it’s it’s it’s a it’s a it’s a first world problem. It really is it’s a fitness
Dennis Koulatsos 16:57
but this streaming thing you know between Hulu and I don’t know you name it Paramount I mean, HBO Max you’re trying to find it you don’t forget them you gotta you gotta you gotta look everywhere just to find what you’re looking for. But like you said these are first world problems and but we have we have good problems here in Baltimore. Now other sports franchises both are trending up and
Nestor Aparicio 17:18
I don’t need any channels besides mass and mass and to just figure out which ones are relevant which ones irrelevant in which one has the coolest commercial
Dennis Koulatsos 17:25
The nice thing is to one night like there’s not a whole lot going on and baseball is there it’s not it’s not that of you anymore. It was before and and the past by the third or fourth inning that were done. Now they’ve just never out of it. You got to watch must see TV
Nestor Aparicio 17:40
every night. Every night. There’s a different star. That’s the magic. Oh, baseball,
Dennis Koulatsos 17:46
you know, the URL can use a man like you put the there’s only so smart.
Nestor Aparicio 17:51
I can’t even sing the song. I wouldn’t even help them sell tickets. Oh, I would actually buy tickets. Understood. If you see Mr. Angelo’s tell him to pay the bill from 2004. And, you know, and I don’t need an analogy for the bird squirt thing. Two tickets out there for the Dodgers game, you know, in a hot day. I’ll get squirted. It’s all good. Hey, hey, look, I’m I’m for what’s good for the city. Anybody that knows me knows that. And there was never a point where 100 losses and an empty city was good for our city. So everything that’s happened here and I and people come up to me I was up in. I was in Bel Air. I was doing the crabcake tour in fallston. Great place, by the way, the local, the local, I would tell you take your girl there but you got to get a reservation because it’s like, it’s tough to get in. But it’s behind the Waffle House behind the Dunkin Donuts right across the street from the rural farms. I felt a little dirty get the chicken sandwich they’re being looked at and I could see rural farms. And I mean, the chicken sandwich wasn’t great chicken sandwich. Had a great crab cake there as well. When I’m up there and people are talking to me like I’m in Fosston I’ve been watching the games on TV. I haven’t been down to the city yet. I’m like, what are you waiting for? You know you love the Orioles? Right? I mean, like you want to get in on this. Go down there and see Adley plays he got her play, you know, but there are people north of mountain road that act like Baltimore might as well be you know, Bimini like you have to have a boat to get there on a helicopter or something. But the arena and the amount of time that I’ve been downtown, I had a happy hour to Senator club last week. I mean, my wife and I were like, man, we live downtown. Thanks to be easier. We’re downtown four days a week. And we haven’t even gotten to the Orioles game. I want opening day. But I want to get to some games that they’re coming. Well, we can. You know, I’m just trying to pick the right time in the right space to do it. And I got some concerts I want to do this summer a little bit travel built in. But more than anything, it’s our 25th anniversary. I know you know this. I’ve been working really hard this week on the oyster tour. It’s our 25th anniversary on August 3, we’re going to do 25 oysters in 25 days in September, which is going to be the pennant race. I’m trying to like get a list of places with gray The oyster things oyster stew, oyster soup oysters, whatever. If they do a Rockefeller that’s interesting if they fry an oyster that’s interesting. And then I’ve had my friend Marty Gary, I talked to him about the bay and the significance of oysters. And then like even the oyster beds over like chicken tank, Assa t over and over on the Eastern Shore, but the culture, the way they’re growing farms, they’ve, they’ve made man made oyster farms, in addition to natural oysters. And I’m gonna learn about the industry because I don’t know much about I’ve learned a lot about crabs the last couple of years. I mean, I knew a lot about crabs from having sponsors like the barn and where they come from, and Texas and North Carolina and offseason and all that kind of stuff. But But oysters are something I don’t know a whole lot about. It’s like they eat them.
Dennis Koulatsos 20:49
I can’t wait to see the content that know that the one of your videos, but how to either kind of break opened up Maryland crab and eat it the steamed crab that went viral. And perhaps you can have the same success with some of your oyster stories. One
Nestor Aparicio 21:01
of the viral videos that maybe you haven’t seen that’s amazing for this time of year when you’re eating crab cakes, and we’re in the crab season is I went down to to the eastern shore to one of the pickers in Cumberland and a great guy named Jack took me through Clayton. Click jam Clayton, if you ever see jam Clayton on on crab meat, that’s Maryland crab meat that comes right out of Cambridge. And I went down to their facility and I watched the ladies and they’re all from Mexico. So I can I can say Mexican ladies, they’re literally they’re Mexican, some central American, but mainly Mexican. They come every year. Mothers teach daughters, it’s a 90 day gig, they can make enough money to help feed their family for the year. But this is a this is not something that kids in Cumberland can come and do for $10 an hour. You know what I mean? Like it’s not it’s a skill set. And I shot a video of that it’s kind of like 40 or 50,000 views. Just seeing the women pick the crabs and we’ve all picked the crab but not professionally. I do it for I do it for fun, not professionally. But when when you eat a crab cake from anywhere, understand that a machine did not pick that meat. Yeah, ever, ever, that there’s no way. And I’ve talked to the people to University of Maryland about robotics, right? And stem. There’s no way to create a machine that can pick a crab the right way. Because every crab is constructed differently.
Dennis Koulatsos 22:24
Well, that’s a good thing. It saves jobs. So it should be left to people not not to, to AI.
Nestor Aparicio 22:29
Yeah, I’m finding that I’m studying this AI stuff. I’m seeing these scary, scary, especially with my voice being all over the place. Somebody would call you and pretend they’re me and tell you are in trouble or like crazy. Like, there’s some really freaky stuff happened with AI and I haven’t talked about it a lot. Mike Rosenfeld are going to do a little more on that 60 minutes piece last week really kind of freaked me out a little bit, but and I think the idea is, we should be freaked out by it a little bit. So hey, man, enjoy the games. This weekend. I’m enjoying New York and it’s always good to visit with you. By Monday, we’ll be in first place. I can say that every week now because we’re close enough that I can say next week we’ll be in first place.
Dennis Koulatsos 23:10
Well, we’re walking them down walking down to raise Nestor as always, I appreciate your time. Your your intellect and your thoughts.
Nestor Aparicio 23:17
Appreciate you in crabcake this weekend, go to ballgame. Take care of Baltimore.
Dennis Koulatsos 23:21
Very close. Baltimore positive himself, Mr. J appreciate here in 1570 Am wn St. We’ll take a quick break and come back right after this.
