Marty Conway and Nestor reconnect on the magic of Orioles baseball bringing more Marylanders back downtown and making this run of success more sustainable and attractive to the fan base.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
baltimore, years, sports, team, city, major league baseball, lamar, people, marty, settled, baseball, players, happening, playing, orioles, business, sign, pay, big, money
SPEAKERS
Marty Conway, Nestor Aparicio
Nestor Aparicio 00:01
Welcome back, WN S T tassel Baltimore. Baltimore positive we are positively into a beautiful, beautiful springtime here. Not just because like you know concerts are happening, bikinis beach plans this that Fourth of July holidays all that, but the Oreos are relevant again and we’re gonna be up at fallston on Tuesday, the 23rd when the Maryland crab cakes were presented by our friends at the Maryland lottery, I’ll be giving these away we had a lot of winners last week and fate Lee’s and some other spots are friends with their nation. 866 90 nation making me where the Fun Bucket hat that it’s not orange, right. I’ve told Dennis I can’t get rid of this blue. I need orange stuff around here. Because Orange is the new purple. Marty Conway joins us now he is our defending champion and sports business professor insider one time or real executive as well as Texas Rangers in Major League Baseball, as well as Professor Conway of all good things sports and business at Georgetown. Marty Yeah, dude, I think the last time we got together Lamar was still like on the field throw on the football and season and I don’t even remember I mean, I got banned by the NFL thrown out and Cincinnati didn’t cover the playoffs. The ICD the Oriole started playing and they started playing well. They signed Lamar or you missed the whole marathon. I didn’t get one word at a you won the Lamar Athan.
8
Marty Conway 01:25
In fact I think maybe one of the last times I don’t know if it was the last time we talked about was Baltimore not getting a host city World Cup. Remember that we absolutely right and so just yesterday day before whenever it’s been some of the local New York’s and others are now unveiling their FIFA has unveiled their 2026 logo. New York, New Jersey has talked about Thurs. And so what soon right?
Nestor Aparicio 01:49
It’s sooner than you think. Right? Yeah. So
Marty Conway 01:51
it’s a year from a year ago, we were talking about missing out on getting one of those cities. And now it’s the salt is coming into the woman’s to see some of these other cities getting ready to host which is you know, it’s three years out, but it’s gonna go quick for sure. Yeah. Well,
Nestor Aparicio 02:08
8you know, there’s so much to talk about in regards to money and where it’s going. And I’ve been to a lot of concerts lately since I’ve sort of gotten thrown out of sports and walk the streets and people ask me why. And I say why don’t you ask them. But it is a fascinating time to see people coming back to the ballpark to see be at Janet Jackson downtown and not be able to get into a Anita Baker not be able to get into Bruce Springsteen, the Eagles is to all of this Lizzo all of these things that are happening since the last time we talked and man, I put Baltimore positive together five, six years ago, the city’s on fire Trump’s running the country mayor is going to prison like all of this stuff happening. And when I went, I there was traffic Thursday night where I went to a cocktail party at the center club, and everybody was bitching about the traffic and I’m like, I live down here. During the plague. Traffic isn’t good, good. Good. There was traffic in Baltimore Thursday. And you know what caused it? The baseball game went out. Yeah.
Marty Conway 03:08
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, you’re right, good, as we say good problems to have. Right. So you’re complaining about traffic? That means that some of the things that have come together quite nicely, so but yeah, look, it’s been it’s been a long three to five years for the baseball rebuild, and for a lot of other things happening. So if you can wait long enough things will things will come around look, in 2019, the Washington Nationals won that won the World Series and 2023. You know, they’re in the rebuild process. The Royals are almost in the in the inverse. They were competitive in 2016 2017. And then started their rebuild process through the pandemic. So if you can stick around long enough, you can see the changes in sports for sure. It’s it’s
Nestor Aparicio 03:53
really delicate, right? When you see the Kansas City Royals, and nobody goes, and the pirates went for a week and a half, and then they come here and they turn it back into the pirates and where the Orioles are, and I want to take it. I’m Adam, have you on often. Let’s deep dive this because people are coming up to me, I went to an event with Mike Elias, Mike Elias has sent me emails now like that, you know, these are competent people. And I see the internet, baseball nerds and bird Landia and the people that don’t just cheer for the team, but they sort of were the bird head, even through 108 losses, but even those people who are true believers and have always been true believers in the Angelo’s family, which I mean it really takes a reach given what we all know, but where John is in running this thing. Now, the machines rolling right they got a bird bath. I’d love to hear your I mean, this was the stuff used to do Milk the Cow day trying to figure out ways to create a Wild Bill Hagee to create something that feels like inertia that get people back to the ballpark. Marty I have spent the last two weeks of this program look up and down Baltimore positive go out and check it of doing nothing but talking to people. My clients, my friends, Leonard Raskin, Dennis, Colossus went two days in a row. Everybody’s trying to get back down there. I almost went on Thursday afternoon, but I had a lunch appointment. We both sat and watched the game and Nacho mom is in Towson, you know, Otani hits the home run to start the game. But Otani being in and I just, I feel like there’s a little Renaissance happening here. And then I asked you the question and the grown ups in the room, are they ready for this? And I mean, are they? Are they ready to start spending money on players and being really serious about being a franchise? Again?
Marty Conway 05:42
Yeah, yeah, no, that’s an open question. There are two questions. First of all, for me, and that is, when you go through a rebuild like this, whether it’s in Baltimore, or you know, pick another city. Washington’s trying to go through that rebuild right now. What is the opportunity cost and the collateral damage of that? Right, one of the things that we don’t know, because we don’t measure and we don’t talk about how much did that cost? Really, right, which is lack of fans for three, four years. Obviously, some of that was pandemic induced, as well, which causes city to I want to bring really costly that’s really, really costly, right to the How much did you not take in that you could have and all these different things.
8Nestor Aparicio 06:23
Swift left $200 million in Nashville this week, and I saw in regard to hotels, the hotel people got together and said, Let’s Let’s do 10 nights are her you know, so when things make a city come to life, yeah. Janet Jackson, I, I’ve been down there, and I’ve been feeling it lately. And I live down there. And I had to leave because it just it left me.
Marty Conway 06:43
Yeah. And so that’s a that’s a part of it. So it’s good to see what the other side is for sure. And you’re right. These organizations, the sports teams have always been part of the economic engine, whether you like it or not, whether you don’t want to vote for tax increases, or new stadium dollars, or different things like that, they are proven to be a part of the economic engine of the cities that they’re in, and you live and die with that, right, you live and die with how well they’re doing and when they’re not doing well, and what those collateral issues are in the, you know, half a mile around the stadium areas. Look, they’re trying to build the southern end of Camden Yards, right, putting in the Horseshoe Casino and the Paramount Theater coming and top off and all those others right to do that. So it’s really important for these areas to be connected. And I And I’ve said before, I think in the next iteration of Oriole Park, with a new lease that should be signed, hopefully soon, that allows for them to collect start to collect the $600 million that’s been allocated to the baseball stadium. What is that going to happen? I think it’s going to close that gap between the baseball stadium and the football stadium. I think parking lot A is something that becomes redevelopment for commercial redevelopment, so that there’s something going on there more than just five o’clock at night, getting ready for the baseball game, Sunday afternoons, whatever it is, that property is crucial to the development of downtown that that section over there. So most less than harborplace. I think less because they’re just less area overall. But I think it’s important that that end of central city downtown, be part of the redevelopment.
Nestor Aparicio 08:26
Through this you were part of the original vision where the Canton Club was going to be open 365 or the walkway was going to be a Christmas Lovers Lane. It was going to be Hershey candy lane. They were good. They were going to be vendors, we were going to like that was the vision for you and Janet Marie, and all of you 30 years ago, right? Yeah,
Marty Conway 08:47
8but you’re right, but you can’t do it yourself, the team isn’t going to be able to do it yourself. You need developers, you need teams of people like that, who have the professional experience in developing entertainment districts, parks, recreation, all those specific areas. Because as I said that the ballpark itself is just that economic engine at 90 times a year or maybe other things as well. But you’re right Camden station on the north part, parking lot a on the south part and those areas, they have to be built so that it’s almost like a barbell for me. You have the east side of east of the harbor, west of the harbor, and ultimately the center city that have to become consistently alive. And I think that, like I said, I think the next step is for the team to strike a lease deal with the state which I’m confident they’ll do now that Wes Moore is the governor. They didn’t really want to have anything to do with Larry Hogan in that experience. And I think they will come up with something that involves developers and other third parties that can put money in and understand what the return is 360 plus days a year from getting people downtown and being a part of it. You can’t just have pie buckets where the casino is, and pickles pub and other areas that has to be contiguous, so that people feel comfortable being down there on a regular Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday night in the summer or early fall to be a part of it. So I think that’s what likely happens next. And I hope we’re all around to see the other side of it.
Nestor Aparicio 10:17
Marty Conway is here he is the good professor at Georgetown University schooling us taking us to school like Ric Flair on all things. Business and sports and city. Westmoreland John, you brought that up and whatever that marriage is going to be in their flight down to Atlanta and all the Preakness dalliances, you know, being done in the business being done in the corporate tense and like all of that this week, but behind all of this is the sturdy mass and money that you and I brought up forever that nobody in the public understands that I’ve written about for 17 years now going back to the original sin and the summer 2005. And the government and, and and tax issues and move moving issues and TV issues and territorial issues, and and all that that was baked into moving a franchise, right? And here we are two decades later, Peter still alive, the thing still in play? And really this is it, we should talk about that before we talk about anything, right, NASA,
Marty Conway 11:22
it’s central to what’s going on that the dollars there are so large, again, I think we’re at 10 or 11 years now of litigation, either pre litigation are actually being in in various courts around New York, which is central to it, we now know that there’s an initial judgment from Major League Baseball, which has been the process itself has been reaffirmed by the courts of New York, which says that the massive entity owes the NATs somewhere in the range of $100 million from a five year period, going back to 2012 to 17. That’s been that’s been affirmed and confirmed, hasn’t been paid. We don’t know what that circumstance will be. It also sets up the next five years, which is there’s going to be debate about that as well as to how much the nationals are owed over and above what the current contract says. So in my rough math, I think you could be anywhere between 100 and $150 million total that this is in dispute over that has to be settled. It has to be settled so that the Nationals can the learner family can sell the team and move on from Major League Baseball, and it has to be settled on the Orioles front. Because if they’re interested in either getting limited partners or selling the team, you have to know what those cash flows are. So it is so central to the future of both of those teams, not not just in terms of selling the team, but what are your cash flows so that you can invest in players, long term contracts. Those are the sorts it has to get settled, whether it’s through the courts or through negotiation, because it is central to the future of two teams in Major League Baseball, which is why I think Commissioner Rob Manfred, will soon urge the parties to really get a settlement talks together so that both franchises can look at their future with much more certainty than they can right now.
Nestor Aparicio 13:16
Is there any chance that John’s not as elegant as his old man on this money? That comes to mean, he’s clearly convinced it’s his money? And he doesn’t want to share it? Right. I mean, like, I don’t think there’s any doubt about that. They’ve gone well, he went after his brother long and hard, right. So I mean, as a guy that wants to dig in, I would say Fair enough. And, look, man, they’re winning now. And I keep going back to that, that the magic elixir is nobody cares about any of this as long as mountcastle It’s a little tonight and and Rodrigo straightens out and and they’re playing baseball here in October, if that’s happening, all of this gets even cloudier to my way of thinking.
8Marty Conway 13:53
So I don’t know if it’s so much a question of Duggan. Look, I think what just happened in the New York Supreme Court, the highest court of the state, is they determined in a six zero unanimous decision. That said the process that Major League Baseball followed was constitutional. There is not a due process claim that the Masson or the Royals have on that process, what they didn’t what they weren’t able to do was to say, here’s how you should settle your monetary dispute. They’ve essentially said from a process standpoint, you’re no longer going to be coming into the New York court system and looking for relief on process now should the Masson
Nestor Aparicio 14:33
tradition, isn’t it? Yeah, I mean, every fight Angelo’s has ever been in? It’s been I’m not paying the bill until the Supreme Court tells me to write lady would like
Marty Conway 14:42
the philosophy has been always about they would much rather pay lawyers than pay plaintiffs. Right. Which is to say, we will always take this to the bar, this court of appeal that we can and then perhaps there’s some other judicial opportunity, but I think what’s crystallizing here now is that unless they choose to refile this in a different venue, maybe in Maryland, or wherever they think they would have a different venue, the process now shifts to, how do we settle how much we owe? How do we finally determine it? And then when is it paid? Because look, at the end of the day, if either of those two teams want to change, either ownership, or frankly, even bring in limited partner investors, which is something that maybe the Orioles would like to consider, you’re not going to be able to do it until one of your largest three revenue streams, which is local media has been determined, and then determine who’s going to pay the legal fees once these things are final. So as I said, I think this is the year probably, that it should be settled. If it’s not, then I think Major League Baseball is going to have some real issues with the leadership of both teams, and really forced some sort of financial settlement. Because the national learners want to sell they want to move on, majorly, baseball wants that transaction to happen, ultimately, especially if they have buyers lined up is it seems like they do. So that’s why I think it’s so central. But anything can happen because they could find another court that could find another venue that maybe seemed favorable to them to make a different type of argument. But the due process argument in New York is over. And now it’s on to something else, whatever that is.
Nestor Aparicio 16:23
8Marty Conway and I go down various paths. I want to stay with this. I mean, I want to hear I want to get some more fun out to you before it’s over with but you start peeling back the onion to Major League Baseball and thinking all right, Rob, Manfred desk is only so big. He’s always had the ability to sort of settle this at some way by getting the other owners to sort of gang up on Peter, but they’re all afraid of it. Right. And this has been going on for two decades, they’ve allowed this to happen. They’ve allowed learner to get screwed in front of everybody, they lent learner money as I remembered 75 million or they gave me they fronted some money a bunch of years ago to just cool it down a little bit. But the A’s are on fire and moving to Las Vegas, and the rays are on fire and they’re on the field and off the field. Right? I mean, that’s it’s an issue, right? And above all, above everything Kansas City, places where they can’t give tickets away anymore. Salaries out of control, you know, where’s where Shohei Ohtani gonna wind up because it’s in ain’t gonna be the Anaheim Angels of Los Angeles and Disneyland so all and he’s gonna give five $600 million is gonna be an amazing amount of money tied into him, especially if the Dodgers or the Giants fighting for maybe the mariners, I don’t know. But all of these problems really go back to not just Masson it goes back to the RSN Sinclair. Like they have a real, they love them some bam, and they love them some MLB Network and they love themselves some team website. But now all of a sudden, you can’t find the game. Nobody can make money, everybody’s broke. I mean, I’m assuming John’s holding his pockets open and saying I don’t have any money. And I’m thinking you’ve known for 18 years, you had to put two, three $400 million aside because these people were gonna come to get you. But they don’t have this relief in Cincinnati, or some of these places where nobody can find the games they can’t get the games on. And these entities are, are broke, right? And it’s hard to say how could you be broke if you’re a regional sports network, but they’re broke?
Marty Conway 18:20
They are over you mentioned. So for Rob man for Priority A through F I would say is is Oakland Vegas, Oakland Vegas, Oakland Vegas, that has to be determined because I think it’s pretty clear. I’m going to recommend a book to people that I’ve just recently started reading by good friend Andy Dolan’s, who was a longtime Major League Baseball and NBA and NFL he’s worked at every, every league, he partnered with another colleague to read a book called Goodbye, Oakland. And it’s an excellent now it’s not just about a team leaving potentially Oakland. It’s how teams and Kansas City and other places have eventually left. I think there’s some segments on Baltimore. It’s about how the relationship between teams and their cities and what can go right and what can go wrong. So I’m going to give a shout out to Andy here for good by Oakland, you can get it on amazon.com. And you should think about having him on your show. We’d love to do that. But he he’s probably the most person in the know about it. But to your other point, churning below the system print churning below everything that’s going on in the field is these issues with local television deals. You mentioned Valley sports, the regional sports network that covers about 15 Major League Baseball teams. And you take into account two things. Number one, last quarter, there were more than two and a half million people, families homes who cut their cable cord. It was the biggest reduction on a quarterly basis that has happened over the last 10 years. 10 years ago, eight years ago, you and I were talking about 85% of US households had cable access. Now it’s below 60% That’s what concerns Major League Baseball, the NHL and the NBA does not concern the NFL, they’re not concerned with that. And so you have these declining revenue six situations that are now running counter to what the players want, which is an Ohtani contract, and Adley rutschman contract, whoever it is to do so
Nestor Aparicio 20:19
big 10 network issue, and like all the rest of it, that goes down the line, it’s an MTV issue. It’s an issue for everybody, right. And
Marty Conway 20:26
so you cannot sign these folks unless you have a certainty of your future revenue streams, and have a very good understanding. When people were signing up to cable and taking regional sports networks, including medicine, you could project that to the future. And I’m sure they did that. Now that these revenues are going in the other direction, you have to start thinking about what am I cutting? What am I going to get other revenues from other places because I can assure you, even though there are 20 or 25,000 people at the gate for an Orioles game on any given weeknight, and maybe 35,000 for a weekend, that’s nice to have, but it’s not going to get you where you need to get to and you need, you need national TV money, you need regional local TV money, and you need corporate sponsorship. Those are the kinds of dollars that get you to the places where the Dodgers and the Yankees and the Cubs and other organizations like that can get to
8Nestor Aparicio 21:17
Marty Galloway is our guest if you turn it on and 5070 obviously out on the pod of always teaching the lessons of sports and business and life to the sometimes young people, sometimes old people like me, at Georgetown University. I guess the last thing on the baseball piece is to take it back to Baltimore and your heart and soul and my heart and soul and saying they’re coming back. What what do you need to see from the team? I mean, on the field, I think they’re gonna win, they’re gonna be fun. Then there’s the commitment of money to sign real players when the time comes, or to buy a pitcher. or dare I say, and I brought this up. If Otani sells tickets, why wouldn’t you go buy him? I mean, what why is it that they baseball’s created the sport where like, we’re not even allowed to have like, the best toys, we’re not allowed to do that. And we don’t even talk about it around here. The last 30 years is and I said we were the ones that bought Alomar and key. And David Well, we bought all sorts of players back in the day and played the game. And we played, we played baseball in October, as I remembered, this was a hell of a price to pay to lose all these years. But to hit it with rutschman to hit it with Anderson and Couser. And looks like holidays coming all these guys are coming, that they are a dynasty until Mike Mr. Marcos and you know, that whole group in Kansas City, it just goes away? How do you build something that’s sustainable here, as you’re doing this, because that’s over the hill for me. I don’t know if there’s a parade or not. But I know that there’s a fire going on right now for the first time in a long time. And it’s only been a handful of times in 30 years, where they can start something again and have even their biggest critic me say, hmm, maybe they’re maybe they’re turning the corner. But then I see who’s sitting at the top chair? And I say I don’t I don’t know they’re doing squirt in the outfield? I don’t people are digging it, I guess what? What’s the next best idea? Marty?
Marty Conway 23:10
Yeah, so you’re right, that’s it’s a great idea. It’s, you know, the bird bath or again, the best things come from the fans themselves. And it’s organic. So it’s fantastic to hear that. But look, there’s just a couple of ways that you can grow your roster, you know, cost your roster price, the price and players. And that is, in the past, I think some of that came from the owners own pocket himself, he was able to put some money for to the team, the team probably paid it back in terms of loans, whatever it was, or you can use your talent pipeline of mine, current players and minor league players to trade them for players that are currently established. Now, again, I just want to stress that I think that the salary levels in Baltimore are going to be modest for the next few years, because you don’t have these bigger revenue streams out there that are dependable. If your television revenue is going in the other direction quickly now, with declining subscribers to pay television number one and mass and number two, then you have to get these revenues from other sources. And it’s going to have to be generating more out of your ballpark. I think the investments that they’re going to get from the state in both stadiums are going to be coming over the next five or six years. It’s not going to come in the next one or two years, maybe small things and will Adley
Nestor Aparicio 24:30
rutschman be here and be a part of that. You know what I mean? Like that? Because Lamar is gonna be here. We found that out, right?
Marty Conway 24:36
8Yep. And the same thing with Machado they had to make that decision that didn’t think they could afford a $30 million a year player in Baltimore, which they they probably can’t at this point because you don’t have enough of that revenue stack to do it. So that that’s going to be the challenge for this market until there is other equity into the franchise again, maybe it’s a complete sale. Maybe it’s some limited partners that come in And then provide new cash, whatever that is. There is going to be some events upcoming for the Orioles in the next one to two years that revolve around money coming into the franchise. However it comes in comes in completely or comes in in pieces, that’s going to have to number one probably pay that mass and bill or number two finance additional opportunities in the stadium finance a bigger and bolder roster. Because you’re right, you can get to a certain level with what you have 85 Maybe 90 wins, but to get 90 101 or 100 and plus wins. That’s going to take a much larger payroll, either paying your current players in the future or getting players quickly pitchers who can get you over the hump.
Nestor Aparicio 25:45
Marty on the Ravens. I mean, it’s all it’s all we talked about in January, February, March, April, even when the baseball season started it was a Lamar Athan around here right on up to the draft right. As it plays out. And as everything happened the way it happened. It’s been such a strange circumstance, right? It’s so sort of engraving like and I think Lamar won the negotiation from where I’m sitting, being that he didn’t play two years in a row and there was no market for him at all. Nobody picked up the phone and call them. This is a I guess a I don’t want to say shotgun marriage, but a little bit of neither one of them had anywhere to go. And the Ravens didn’t want to fight with him anymore. And they need him. I mean, clearly on the field. They there was no Taylor Hi, Nikki coming to save them. At any point. This is a fascinating Kumbaya, yawn bringing everybody together and Odell Beckham and safe I mean, they’ve done all they need to do to sell their tickets by hope. We have a chance. And it’s it’s been fascinating to watch them operate here in the offseason.
Marty Conway 26:53
Yeah, look, I think a lot of this just is when you get into the sports business, one of the things you need to know is understand the business of the business that you’re in. And there’s the playing season, and then there’s the business season, right. And sometimes they overlap to certain extent, right. You know, you might be negotiating, prior to a five year extension, whatever it is, but this, I think, what’s transpired in in our community over the last two years around that it’s just the business of football, like it literally is it visits. And specifically when you have a quarterback, you haven’t really had this quarterback situation from a business standpoint, you know, until going back to the Joe Flacco period, right, when he had an 80 leverage that yeah, when he was able to leverage that. So look, there was a lot of hubbub about it, a lot of speculation around the fact that he didn’t have an agent. But if you look at there’s two, three or four players now that have more recently signed, they don’t have an agent. I mean, it’s not literally people will tell you it’s not necessarily rocket science, when you have slotting you know, your first five years that you have your that you’re playing, or maybe look, Jalen hertz signs. And so the next guy signs for a little more than that, now that Lamar has signed. The next is Justin Herbert. And then after that is Joe burrow, it just sort of it’s the way the business of the sport rolls out. It’s not rocket science. And so Baltimore was in that washing machine for a couple of years, it’s come, it’s gone. And now the focus goes back to the rest of the roster on the field, what can happen. So when you’re in the quarterback market, whether it’s in Baltimore, or Philadelphia, or Cincinnati, or wherever it is, this is the churn that you’re going to see. And then eventually it settles, which it has done now. And now it’s on to, you know, the rest of the roster and what’s going to come on the field this fall. So I view it just as the business of the business that you’re in, and it’s not comfortable at times, like I said, it feels like a washing machine for a year or two. But you know, Hope springs eternal and I think that’s where we are right now.
Nestor Aparicio 28:55
Did it the way you thought it was gonna Did you always think Lamar?
8Marty Conway 28:59
Yeah, it did. Because look, I think the way that the NFL is structured, players sign with their existing teams way more often than not, unless you see a Kirk Cousins, somebody that played it out onto the tag for two years, wanted to move on to do it. The way that the NFL business is structured, it keeps players where they are, for the most part, particularly quarterbacks. And it’s very sequential. Like, here’s the deal that Jalen hertz got. Here’s the deal that Lamar Jackson stepped into the next deal, like I said, will be Justin Herbert, Joe burrows waiting for that deal to sign so he can then go to his team and say, Well, here’s the latest deal. It’s kind of the way it works in the NFL. And a lot of it has to do with what year you were born based on how much you make versus how good you are, because 20 years ago, there were probably players that are much better than the guys today. But they just were born a little too early. And in the age of free agency. That’s the way it works. Here’s Marty
Nestor Aparicio 29:54
Conway. He does all things sports and business. We did Oreos, we did ravens, we did regional TV. Do we leave anything out here? I mean, it is quite sports is alive again, right? I mean I I sense that I feel that and and what sports is I drove down to see seal in DC down anthem and I hadn’t been down there, you know in a plague right and a little bit, oh my god like sports builds the city’s and does this stuff. And then I look here in Baltimore and say maybe we’re on the verge of something because of the prosperity that’s at least perceived the real I mean, this shouldn’t be the only summer the Orioles are relevant and can get 30 or 40,000 people downtown couple times a week.
Marty Conway 30:35
And that’s why you go after events like the World Cup where you go after events like the NFL Draft, or wherever it is, they are proven to draw. They’re proven to be force multipliers for revenue in cities and communities like that. And I know the economists that are using on the other side of the arguments that I have, will tell you that it doesn’t generate full time jobs, and it doesn’t you know, it’s replacement income and substitution factors and all those things. Teach that stuff literally, right. But at the end of the day, it’s about the emotion, people in sports people invest their emotions far sooner than they invest their money. And so if it’s the next Taylor Swift tour, or whatever it is that they can generate here in the community, they need to do that, because that’s really what turns communities around, it gets a lot of energy, it gets a lot of emotion. It gets a lot of national branding, all those different things. So that is why investment in sports generally turns out to be the right investment. But sometimes it takes a while. You have to have patience. And then there’s that churning. Sometimes it goes on but if you just sort of sit back and let it play through, usually end up in a better place.
Nestor Aparicio 31:41
8Well Marty for this year in this week was Shohei. Otani with the with the Kentucky Derby winner in town, right. And whatever that entails a relevant baseball team going to play the New York Yankees sitting above them. It’s top of the standings, right? Like all of this stuff is happening but the the arena to where that roster looks like Madison Square Garden like Baltimore has never seen a six month period where Michael Jackson sister comes to town and Lizzo and the biggest stars in Blink 182. And, you know, and then my washed up friends like Bryan Adams and Jojo. And like everything that’s happening Adam Sandler Chris Rock at the Hippodrome. I mean, there’s there, there’s some this has been a different kind of year for Baltimore to some degree. And I mean, it’s not even Fourth of July, but I do feel some, some rebound and some of the stuff we talked about 567 years ago, you say it takes that pipeline. Well, it feels like it’s kind of the baseball team coming along at this time is really helpful for all for all of the above.
Marty Conway 32:43
Oh, for certainly for the, again, for that part of town for the west side of central downtown, which had been sort of uneven and everything was happening on East Harbor East to do that Trump’s
Nestor Aparicio 32:53
been having big shows,
Marty Conway 32:55
right, the, you know, the new arena, they’re having shows and they’re just brings a vibrant student. And like I said, it’s sort of that barbell in the city, where you have, you know, East Harbor East West of the harbor, central harbor district. It just has to all balance out for this to work and it looks like you know, it’s showing, like you said earlier, green shoots and signs. All right, Marty
Nestor Aparicio 33:17
commies gotta get out of here. I gotta get out of here because I gotta get the fallston on Tuesday, the 23rd Oh, we’re gonna be there courtesy of our friends at the Maryland lottery. I’ll be wearing my window nation wacky hat fallston and this is an award winning restaurant. This is Restaurant Association of Maryland says chef of the year so we’ll be there two to five and fallston all brought to you by the Maryland lottery and our friends at window nation. I am Nestor. We are wn st am 1570, Towson Baltimore. We never stopped talking concerts and fallen in summer and baseball and horse racing. Stay with us.
