unreported through all of the many victories. In October 1996, Angelos said of manager Davey Johnson: “You couldn’t get him out of Baltimore if you chased him with a pitchfork.”
Now, a year later, Johnson was at all-out war with Peter Angelos on a myriad of issues of control and propriety, which began the previous offseason when the owner fired pitching coach Pat Dobson and installed Ray Miller into Johnson’s clubhouse. It was about to boil over amidst the emotions of a harsh, sudden exit from the postseason. The Orioles were eliminated by Cleveland as the sun faded on Baltimore on Wednesday, October 15. By the next week Johnson was watching the World Series in Florida, stewing and reconsidering the final year of his three-year commitment.
Every day the newspapers buzzed, sports talk radio brewed and the manager and owner feuded openly in the media. Johnson was owed $750,000 on the final year of the deal. In July at the All-Star break, Johnson was quoted as saying: “Basically, I got a three-year contract, but I feel that we’ve got to do it [reach the World Series] in two. If I don’t win, I get fired.”
After the Orioles won the ALDS over Seattle on October 5, Angelos said: “He’s got another year on his contract. There’s no reason to believe the Orioles will dismiss him. The only suggestions Davey Johnson would not be part of the Orioles next year is the one he stated. It never came before me or the front office.”
On October 24, Angelos said: “There is no threat he’s going to lose his job. He has a contract that is binding, and I plan to fulfill the conditions of that contract. One thing is for certain: I have never said that Davey would be fired. I have never said he had to get to the World Series to keep his job. Yet the focus of this is on me. That I don’t understand. None of this has come from Peter Angelos.”
It was clear that Davey Johnson was looking for a contract extension or a divorce and on October 27, Angelos said: “There’s nothing to negotiate. He’s under contract.” The next day Angelos said he was considering firing Johnson because the manager directed second baseman Roberto Alomar to pay a $10,500 fine to a charity that Johnson’s wife supported in the community. Like a lawyer, Angelos was looking for a loophole to fire Johnson without having to pay him in 1998. Johnson, of course, dug in: “I’m not a quitter. I’m a fighter,” he said on October 29.
Finally, on the October 30, the two men spoke via telephone in a 90-minute conversation which was reported to be quite a contentious debate. General manager Pat Gillick, who was clearly in the middle of this feud and had grown accustomed to the drama that surrounded every Orioles decision in this regime, said he was hopeful that Davey Johnson would return for the 1998 season. Behind the scenes, Gillick was feverishly trying to broker a peace treaty amongst the two headstrong and equally bullying men.
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Strangely, 22 months earlier, it was Johnson who was trying to recruit a very reluctant Gillick to come to Baltimore to work for an owner who had quickly established himself as a loose cannon and a tyrant to anyone in upper management of his baseball team.
By now, it was a classic stare down between two stubborn, angry men. Angelos wanted Johnson to publicly apologize for the misappropriation of the charity funds. Johnson was confused by what Angelos’ demands were and was still under contract for $750,000 in 1998 and thought he had done a magnificent job of managing the Orioles.
And every day was a torrent of “bad owner vs. great manager” ideology for sportswriters, fans and people inside MLB. Many sided with Davey Johnson, who was days away from being named the ‘Manager of The Year.’ And Angelos, an MLB owner who had turned his daily meddling, arrogance and public pronouncements into a bizarre art form, was spinning his ridiculous misappropriated charity spin. If Angelos was looking to beat Steinbrenner somewhere, the race to hire and fire as many managers as possible was his in his sight.
The upstart, almost-expansion Florida Marlins were winning the 1997 World Series. Former Orioles castoff Bobby Bonilla hit a Game 7 home run vs. the Cleveland Indians, who were in the middle of yet another painful October exit. And the Orioles – almost certainly the best team all year who didn’t get to the finish line – were suddenly in disarray.
On November 5, all hell broke loose right after Davey Johnson accepted the ‘Manager of The Year’ award. In a press conference with the media, designed to talk about the award, his players and the year in general, Johnson instead he came out blasting Angelos and announcing his departure from the Orioles.
“I had a conversation with Peter Angelos about a week ago and he hadn’t gotten back to me and I want to resolve it one way or the other for the organization,” Johnson told the media. “I sent him a fax and really I don’t know if you have a copy of what I sent to him, but basically I expressed a commitment to the city and the players and my desire to stay in Baltimore. Basically, I left it up to him. If he felt like it was in the best interests of the organization to make a change, I was going to offer my
