With three decades of local baseball tyranny and the Angelos family close to departure downtown, Bill Cole and Nestor discuss ways that David Rubenstein and the new Orioles ownership group can deodorize the brand – and the real reasons to buy a baseball team if you’re a billionaire.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
orioles, baseball, years, people, game, baltimore, point, rubenstein, talk, play, football, literally, rubinstein, team, treated, day, put, love, ravens, community
SPEAKERS
Nestor J. Aparicio, Bill Cole
Nestor J. Aparicio 00:00
Hey, welcome home we are wn St. Am 5070 tasks in Baltimore, Baltimore positive we are going to be taking the Maryland crabcakes or out on the road in April doing a lot of really cool stuff in April like because March has been like I don’t say quiet in February after you lose an AFC Championship game at home. And after you have this generational move that we’re gonna have new baseball ownership and I might be eating a hotdog next to my employee in the Orioles pressbox at some point, I’ve just been sort of taking stock and all of this and getting ready for opening day. And to be really honest, the Ravens free agency whether it’s going going to Pittsburgh or whether it’s there again, we come in here. It’s a little bit better than the Lamar Athan was for me last year. But these are the good times Luke and I are headed down to Sarasota. We’re going to be doing some spring training stuff Luke’s gonna be chasing the NFL owners meetings I’m gonna be waving across the pool to Chad steel, but I’ll be there doing my job whether they allow me to or not we’re gonna be Florida for a little while and then we’re gonna come back and there’s going to be opening day we have all sorts of fun things for April including bank lease Fridays, we’re going to be live you ain’t live anymore nasty. Two to five. I’m gonna be live with Luke Jones each and every Friday that the Orioles are home. We’re gonna be out of faith lease, the all of that brought to you by the Maryland lottery you’ll have scratch offs, fresh ones to give away our friends at weathernation are gonna be there 866 90 nation they do doors. There’s a rumor about that. I’ll be telling you more about that. As well as Jiffy Lube and our newest sponsor, Liberty pure solutions keeping the water clean here so that I can keep the engine clean. This guy provides me with a coal roofing mug. In it is the royal farms coffee. I don’t put fried chicken in my mug. I’m a little weird like that. The weather has broken we’ve had a couple of nice days here. Lucas and I are going to be poolside and Sarasota and Fort Myers sunning ourselves. Next week and Bilko it’s been men do too long. Where do you bet? What do you mean? Are you doing like insurance things in San Diego and stuff? I mean, what are you doing?
Bill Cole 01:56
Yeah, no, I don’t know. We’ve been trying to dodge raindrops and help people fix their roofs and build solar arrays in the meantime. So we’ve been
Nestor J. Aparicio 02:04
doing can I give a shout out to Joe?
Bill Cole 02:08
We’re gonna get him in you hooked up on here some point? He’s, he’s wonderful.
Nestor J. Aparicio 02:13
luxmi Joey Oh,
Bill Cole 02:14
he just loves to like, you know, now he gets entry to the backyard. So he’s just like, Hey, Bill, what about this? And what about that? And what about so that
Nestor J. Aparicio 02:23
was, Joe’s were welcome to my years. You know,
Bill Cole 02:26
he’s wonderful like that.
Nestor J. Aparicio 02:28
What if you bought a radio station? I remember that conversation he and I had back in 97. So, Bill Cole does roofing. He’s sort of backstage, especially when the documentary comes out later in the month sort of one of my real friends in the real world who sort of came forth and forged all of this Baltimore positive stuff. Um, dude, I I get there’s more people following us than ever. I promise you that like I get people texting me Mike, bro hard text me about some Rob Harville has said on my airwaves. And I’m like, What are you talking about? He’s like, I’m listening to your show. You’re talking about me? I’m like, oh, yeah, maybe I mentioned you the other day. I don’t know. But so it’s been a little while for you and me. And we haven’t really we haven’t been together for like a drink. We got together Christmas time. You mean Mike Rosenfeld. We went over to Nacho Mama’s we had some you know, some beverages it was it was beautiful. But like that’s the last time like we’ve talked, I think you’ve been on the show once or twice. It was all ravens championship game. And like all of that. Yeah, this Oriole thing with the tectonic plates shifting and me having done free to birds. And through I’m doing this documentary of going through all these pictures in my childhood and my father and my mother. And I’ve laughed, and I’ve cried my wife’s illness and like all this crap. But I literally don’t. I have never spent a minute since 2006. really believing that anybody else would own the team or that I could feel differently about it or be treated differently. And the thing that keeps coming to me and I say it out loud. If it makes you turn me off and go listen to Jason lock and for bitch about something fine. I have I don’t ever remember going down there and having a good feeling. And I looked out the window with this 365 days a year for 19 years like I don’t Mike Flanagan was nice to me and would bring me in and then I would be mistreated when I’m in there. I think if I give them any advice at all, be nice to me. Be nice to everybody. Because there is there’s trauma, literally trauma in my life like real life trauma for me. And for a lot of people not just losing or the price of things or bad things are coming down to the ballpark or however you would feel about the team or you would love John Miller, whatever it was that turned you on it. It’s imperative that the coal family and daughters that don’t know box scores, maybe go down there at some point in the next five years. And like it, I think it’s really important for the city bill, we talked about a lot of things, but I want to wind you up on new ownership today, brother.
Bill Cole 04:59
You too I think the benefit that David Rubenstein has is, well, one the bar is really low. Right? Like, like our expectation from the owner of the Orioles isn’t very high. You know, we don’t we don’t have this expectation of them being amazed like I
Nestor J. Aparicio 05:20
heard the Haitian government’s getting taken over again by thugs. And we look at this and say, Yeah, that’s the way it is in Haiti. You know what I mean? No, like Syria, not just, that’s the way the Orioles are. And I wrote books on this and every decision they ever made, including the board on third and thinks he had a triple punk, sitting in front of people, a Martin Luther King day writing a check and acting like you can’t ask him questions. I mean, literally, the Kevin Brown incident last summer, they threw their broadcaster off for nothing for a month, and expect everybody like this happened. But my last experience was being mistreated by a man who’s in public relations with the Texas Rangers for 40 years, who had to deny me a press credential knowing it’s wrong in the name of the Angelo’s family that was my last experience four and a half months ago and and like they were getting eliminated and swept in a playoff game. Like I like, it can’t be worse. It’s got to be to your point. It’s got to be better. But I’m like, everybody’s got a star like I don’t know why you Why did you stop going dude, like you met me. You’re about to blather on my documentary about our friendship and this and that, like you are real Oreo guy. Like when I met you 30 years ago, man.
Bill Cole 06:34
My my Oriole fandom is born out of an innate civic pride. Like, I don’t really love the game of baseball, I go to baseball, because they’re our hometown teams. So I wrote for them. When I was a kid, I like baseball cards. So like that, that made a connection. And then there’s a wonderful social aspect to baseball, from a business networking or family time or you know, like, it’s just an easy thing to go to. Whereas taking your family to the Ravens game is sort of a different experience. Baseball. I think other than the anxiety that people have around trying to park and then get into the stadium once they’re in the stadium. It’s a very pleasant, you know, like, three hours to spend time with your family or friends or co workers or
Nestor J. Aparicio 07:31
toto concert when they’re playing a soft song you could talk during a baseball game, right? Like literally like I mean that sincerely don’t try to network with me at toto or to John Mayer So you know like literally I think it’s a different my wife and I don’t go to Bryan Adams to network we go there to like be with Bryan Adams. You know, when you go to a baseball game, like you can still see if it’s a slider you can you can still stay with the game and have a peanut in the beer while we talk about your kids family vacation life real issues, insurance, whatever we need to talk about,
Bill Cole 08:04
right? And footballs not miss that dude,
Nestor J. Aparicio 08:06
you’re getting your you’re getting me moist.
Bill Cole 08:09
Yeah, no, like football is not that way to make
Nestor J. Aparicio 08:11
the move to move back downtown is what you’re gonna understand.
Bill Cole 08:16
Football is not in that way. Right? It’s a much more talk to me.
Nestor J. Aparicio 08:20
It’s third down man. Like just you know,
Bill Cole 08:23
you’re you’re part of the game, right? We’re trying to be loud and cause false starts at it like that, you know, there’s obligations put on the fans, and there’s a lot more drinkin. And it’s just gets a lot more out of control. But I think the thing about David Rubenstein is if you think about the exposure and experiences he has had, like, he has such a wide breadth of knowledge of like, things that work and things that don’t work. Bureaucratic government issues, but private enterprise, you know, success or challenges. And, you know, he’s just seen a lot. So
Nestor J. Aparicio 09:10
is this a Gilbert to Detroit? You know, you’ve spent a lot of time in Detroit. I’m gonna talk to Roosevelt about this too, because he’s got a whole wing out in Detroit as well. You have been apart and they pull back the curtain on what you do because you run around the country with a bunch of do gooders for the city. You don’t brag about this, and I don’t know why y’all don’t talk about it more. You put a little thing up on LinkedIn that you went with the mayor and a couple of county executives to Bemidji to see like what they’re doing. Richmond apparently is next on the agenda but you go to these other cities, Austin, Texas and say what are they doing there? To me the Gilbert thing in Detroit I don’t want to put that on Rubinstein but if he comes on my show, and I don’t even know what that’s like, like if his PR guy says of course he’s gonna come on the show. We will do a crabcake fade Lee’s what they do you want to do it? We’ll stop by we We We bought the Orioles we want you to you’re in this thing’s Aparicio like we can’t believe they treated you like garbage because they did like, like, if that happens, I would talk to him about the city. I wouldn’t even talk to him about who the centerfielder is or whether you know what what are they gonna start holidays clock I like I would talk to Elias about that if they would let me write like, you know, I talked to you about rubes and stuff. You know,
Bill Cole 10:26
my hope is that Rubinstein lets Elias do the baseball thing. Because Rubinstein is so focused on what the Orioles are, as a
Nestor J. Aparicio 10:38
community member, like literally quinoa. Lions doesn’t
Bill Cole 10:41
have to worry about it. Yeah, he lives didn’t have to worry about it. The Detroit thing is very different. Detroit is in a different place than Baltimore. Like
Nestor J. Aparicio 10:53
20 years ago, was it so good. I went to Detroit, I spent spent a lot of time in Detroit. I, I was in Detroit recently. Like I’ve seen it go from despair and awful, to better, better. I don’t know what else to say better. Yeah,
Bill Cole 11:11
this, I don’t think we have enough time to unpack that. But
Nestor J. Aparicio 11:16
I think Gilbert came in there to make it better. And 20 years later, at least he is a billionaire can look at it and say I made a difference. I dent a dent will do port Covington spelt down there, right? That’s gonna make a dent here. Like whether we believe it or not, at some point, it’s going to come to life. I believe that.
Bill Cole 11:36
I honestly and this is probably not fair. And he might get mad at me for saying this. But like, Marc Anthony Thomas, right. Let’s see. What’s the name of that
Nestor J. Aparicio 11:51
Greater Baltimore committee?
Bill Cole 11:53
JVC. Yeah, he has the opportunity to get us over the hump like, like our city, our people, David Rubenstein included all of us. Like, we are going to make this good in spite of anything like Dara tower cranes, in spite of anything, there. We’re building stuff. We’re doing great stuff. We’re winning AFC championship football, we do all these things, in spite of whatever friction is in front of us. That’s part of the grit of Baltimore. That’s who we are. So we’re going to do that. The question is, are we able to take away one or two of the friction items that really set us loose? Try? It’s not just Yeah, I mean, yes. But it’s not just
Nestor J. Aparicio 12:41
poverty. Let’s start with that. Yes. Okay. Poverty,
Bill Cole 12:45
which bleeds into the education system, which bleeds into crime, which believe in
Nestor J. Aparicio 12:49
Rubenstein understands a lot of these things. And as said, I’m taking my $2 billion as a seven year old guy from here and buying the baseball team, not just to have a parade. I mean, at this, we didn’t bring Bloomberg in for this. There’s just no way like, this is all part of the greater part of the harbor and the city and the infrastructure and the literally the soul of the city. That’s the word I’m using the soul of the city.
Bill Cole 13:14
Yes. No, I think it’s shy away from
Nestor J. Aparicio 13:17
that. He’s not gonna run off to Nashville and boots and be a punk. You don’t I’m saying like, that’s not I don’t think he’s here for that. I don’t think he’s here to run from people like, like me, I think he’s here to run toward people like me that know people like you, you know what I mean? Like, literally,
Bill Cole 13:33
he is he is a unicorn, in the sense of like, he has really solid government bureaucratic understanding of how they do business and how you get things done. But that he has the entire private equity Carlyle Group, you know, where he sees private enterprise, and how they get stuff done. Getting those two to work well together, is a real skill set. And he has that. And
Nestor J. Aparicio 14:01
in order to run Schafer had that in order to get things done here 50 years ago, from the inside and being elected. And in retrospect, he pushed things through he that may or may not have been on the, you know, totally on the up and up for the betterment of the people. And he’d say, I did it because it was the right thing to do for the city. And
Bill Cole 14:19
in the absence of social media, you could do that today, there’s a lot more transparency on the Inner Harbor project, doesn’t mean there’s less corruption or it isn’t take a different form, or there aren’t different interests or different motives, all that stuff has to be managed. All I’m saying is is if Rubenstein had experience with a company who nailed the marketing of releasing a new product at one point, you know, he learned about that he saw what works and what doesn’t, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that if you completely disregard your customer You’re gonna have a problem. So just the mere fact that he, he has all these experiences, and he knows that we’re going to treat the customer at least acknowledged that they exist, because that’s what i’ve what I felt like was there was, it got so far away from the customer, because of all the TV crap and just all the crap that had gone on with the Orioles that they’re just we’re so far away from trying to connect with 45,000 people every night. They’d like it just it was there was no coming back, right? Like now now I’m digging my heels in. And I’m just gonna
Nestor J. Aparicio 15:38
quit on them. Yeah, I mean, you quit on them. And I’m sure you weren’t pleased with how they treated me 20 years ago, or how they treat anybody or how they treated John Miller or just in a general sense, it never felt like a community organization. Like it felt like a scam. Because it was because there was nobody in front of it ever. And I and I was far too close to it. Far too close to it to be, the thing that I can tell you is I can tell you the truth. Like I can tell you the truth. I was I was close to it. I lived down there for 20 years, my employees in there. I’ve had an employee in there embedded in there every minute of every day from the beginning, including myself until they threw me out for telling the truth. So like, that’s the way it was right? And I even fathom it’s the way it’s I keep saying Castro’s Cuba, I keep saying like, will there be a day when Putin is not running Russia? I don’t know. We don’t We can’t feel that right now. Right? You can’t feel that Haiti can be a demand, democracy and stable, right? Like you just don’t feel like that could ever happen in this lifetime. I think that’s where I got with the oracles. And I think that’s gonna change quickly to your point, but how to deodorize that, and how to put a face on it, you know, and change it dramatically. Because when pachadi came in to take over from Adele. And by the way, I watched the video he and I talked in like 12 years ago, he’s actually talked about a lot of these things with me a steeper shot he did in Florida, that it was a quiet transition, not rocking the boat not firing Ozzy. And in this case, you don’t have to do anything with the baseball side, the mike ly sides, like he’s not touching any of that he’s not firing managers not hiring players. He’s not signing free agents, maybe give some money to get us a pitcher in July to get us over the hump. Or maybe maybe it’s $200 million for Henderson or for whoever it’s going to be holiday burns, whoever they’re going to sign. But there’s a point in all of this, where I’m wondering when you buy something for $2 billion, and you’re a public figure, and you’re coming home to save the day, and people like me smart people like me, to give myself credit for this. Thank you, Gilbert. Think that you’re not just buying a baseball team, that I’m not going to be asking you about the centerfielder I’m not going to ask you Jerry Coleman questions. I’m going to be finding out like what’s, what’s the real play here? I mean, what’s the play isn’t like, going out and swinging a bat and taking pictures like patting your ego? If that’s the play The you’re probably not gonna be much better than Peter. If this is about David Rubenstein, then yeah, I would think this is about taking his, all of this, that life experience that that he’s acquired since being at City College and all of this wealth, and all of this, this life experience. I mean, just knowledge, wisdom, and saying, How can I make the world a better place? Not how can I make a baseball team, get a parade? And I just I can’t fathom that. He’s only that into that. You know what I mean? Right. The
Bill Cole 18:37
only other caveat I could put on it, or maybe it’s not a cat, it’s more of a secondary pathway is, you know, somebody also has to save baseball, right? Like baseball as a baseball as a product has problems. So maybe, you know, he it also scratches an itch for him around the idea of, you know, how do we integrate more technology? What do we make, you know, what is you know, and I don’t know if he’s gambling
Nestor J. Aparicio 19:06
is gambling is where is where the sport is, when they get together. It’s gambling, it’s streaming. It’s getting the game in real time and being able to bet on it from here, literally, that that that’s their scam. I mean, that’s their money, right? Like, and $15 beers and party packages. And I would think before this is all over with Bill. And this really speaks to the inclusive or exclusive part of it, where they say to you, you’re going to give us as a team $500 a year, and the $500 is going to get you the games. And you’re going to get the four pack family pack and the Adam Jones jersey and the bumper sticker. You know, you’re going to be a member of the club. And yeah, they’ve done this with the orange car because they have so much space in the stadiums. Come down anytime you want wander the upper deck if you’re a member of the $1,200 club. Yeah, you know what I mean? Or whatever. For that’s going to be because they want you to buy beer and popcorn. Like it’s like a movie theater at that point. And the merchandising part of it out merch, like rock bands. I mean, they’re figuring their business out, but their business is no longer we’re going to be siphoning $40 from the cold family off their cable bill and the daughters aren’t even gonna know what baseball is. Because this mass and things gonna be on a tear. We’re we’re just going to siphoned cable money because that’s their business. They’ve been scamming them for 30 years, ESPN, all of that. But now that cables done and the regional sports networks done, to your point, they have a business problem, they really do. And they’re not popular. They’re not as popular as they think they are. And their arrogance, specifically in this market, as we’ve seen is legendary. They’re legendarily arrogant as people like I can tell you that from my lifetime of work with them. There’s always a rope. There’s always a pay for play. There’s always a your stand over there. And we stand over here that he’s I mean, come on. We used to we used the word big leading you big league me big. I mean, that means you’re a dick. And quite frankly, you know, I, one thing about me being thrown out the last 18 years, and I had beautiful people that I met in baseball, you know, people that are still with me the rest of my life, but I was there for all the steroid stuff all the finger pointing all the Peter Angelos stuff, all the diving on their desk to keep the owner happy. And like, Dude, I saw it all the last 18 years, I’ve been better off not being around baseball people, like you know what I mean? Like to some degree. Now I want to get back in. And I’m thinking, it even looks at me that day, How often will you go down there to get your pass? And I’m like, I don’t I said, it depends on how I’m treated. Same things you same thing is everybody. It depends how often when you go to the games, depends how much money I spend and how much fun I have, right? Like literally, my daughter’s like it. Maybe I go back, you know, but they need to make it. So people look, the nerves that go down there that had been there for 120 losses me talking to nerds for 30 years when they had no chance to win. Like, that’s cool. And if you’re in the sabermetrics, and you’re that person and those poor folks, I saw keeping score in the outfield last year, who clearly it’s a lifestyle for them. But to your point, they’ve got a ways to go to win people. And all of this is in a bag because it has, as Deepak Chopra would say I’ll go deep on you go real deep. It has pure potentiality.
Bill Cole 22:30
I think I like overheard a conversation where I think I think I might have watched it or something. I don’t know. But it was the conversation was all about. Like, America is a country have like car loving people. But f1 was only famous outside of America. Netflix drops a series about it. 7 million people watch it. And now all of a sudden there’s all these American f1 fans. And it’s like, they did that with golf. They did it with tennis. You know? Like, there is something to the idea that if you introduced baseball as a sport to America today, I’m not sure it takes hold. Oh
Nestor J. Aparicio 23:19
two my wife and I were out the other night. Like literally it this was we went out Tuesday night we went to yoga and Planet Fitness shout out. And we we we went past three places in the Towson area where we turned the corner at eight o’clock at night. Kids fields lights, lacrosse, everywhere. Lacrosse lacrosse everywhere. So what I’m saying to you is that is that is the deal, right? I mean, especially in Baltimore, where they have a bigger problem with lacrosse here, man lacrosse Hall of Fame. Hopkins the cradle all of that stuff, right? The baseball thing here and Brooks Robinson is two generations removed. Now my last name is Aparicio it didn’t mean anything to these creeps that own the team the last 30 years didn’t mean anything you know and it means a lot to me I mean it it’s why did free the birds like I’m not some like I wrote a book I’m releasing it this month about my father and me and loving baseball and believing and all that bourgeois you know all that community and all that but it built Camden Yards and then I saw with my own eyes what he could do. I think it’d be seen it with football here how it can bring people together. It is it can be a magic elixir but to your point why can’t the Orioles be to Baltimore with the Cardinals are to St. Louis, what community and to Major League Baseball like the Colorado Rockies don’t mean anything in Colorado. The Arizona Diamondbacks don’t mean they’ve been trying to keep that team down in Tampa and Miami
Bill Cole 24:59
right Tampa. Raise me when and they can’t even Miami’s won
Nestor J. Aparicio 25:03
two World Series and they can like, like, for me, I don’t know what it is, but this community has the ability to do that. But it better involve African Americans too, in a way that it never has for here and like, and that’s something that anybody should be able to say out loud. Just go down there. Look around.
Bill Cole 25:21
So there is I think the missing piece for baseball honestly, is the connection to the players. Like like the reason f1 gets all the drive to survive thing is because it’s like behind the scenes, it’s like a, you know, it’s like one of them. Housewives celebrity train wreck shows, right? Like, like people. It’s the new form of soap opera. Right? And it’s wrapped around this sport. And then there’s these up. So fundamentally, I have this the human struggle, right and the charisma of the people and I like that guy. Oh, I hate that guy. And did it you know, you get that then. Okay. Is it the car thing? Is it the speed thing? Is it the technology thing? Is it the big business thing? Like then you get these other little ticklers that reinforce the interest, but the interest stems from? I need Joe Flacco. I need Lamar, I need Ray, I need Ed Reed. These are people that for whatever way they do it, you are able to create a connection. Right? It isn’t I mean, it isn’t because I think the ravens are out in the community more than the Orioles. But But I still don’t think that’s the thing because maybe football just has that. They have the the exclusivity of there’s only
Nestor J. Aparicio 26:45
a tribal thing to the ball is tribal. That’s what they tapped into. We have all
Bill Cole 26:52
week to talk about what happened last Sunday before we get another taste of the drug. Right. It’s
Nestor J. Aparicio 26:58
the true train wreck effect. Yes, yes. Yes. So that’s
Bill Cole 27:01
good for football. Baseball is like one day and then we’re back at it. Sometimes we play to another day and data. And I don’t know and maybe other people don’t have this problem because they stayed connected and they know who the players are. And
Nestor J. Aparicio 27:17
you know more hours and nights a lot of your time to care about. So Billy, some billionaire kid from Alabama can hit a baseball right? Like my kids playing soccer. My kids playing lacrosse. I got a movie to see Bryan Adams is in town and like, we’ve I always had those distractions. But my last name was Aparicio. And I was born into a family where my father loved the Orioles. And it was a it was a heartbeat of my family. It was a heartbeat of what I did. It’s why I built this place. And 35 years later now, I sit here and try and I do question the value of all of it. I questioned especially after getting thrown out for 18 years like, what did I miss out on? Not much in there? What am I going to miss out on if I’m not there on the ground floor of this? I don’t know. I am in the ground floor of this because I’ve had the whole history wrote the Peter principles. And I’m the one guy that can stand up and say, unlike any of the rest of them, I never took their money and kiss their ass never never. Like I never they didn’t pay the bill. I tried to kiss their ass and they didn’t pay the bill. So I would say like, from a being bought in. I’m bought in I’m on the ground floor. And I’m on the ground floor as a reporter saying what are you offering? What are you doing? I have nothing but questions. I don’t know that I’m gonna get any answers in the modern era. But I think they’re what they’re doing publicly and whatever. They orchestrate because he’s rich enough. He’s going to orchestrate can have his own version of Jack’s deal. And Greg bait or whatever, whether that’s a better person than Chad steel, or Greg Bader. I hope so. Because I’ve met those guys. But I would say from a public persona, from when this thing pops, and they have a press conference, whether they let me in out who’s asking the questions, whatever the answers they give, and the front they put and the advertising they do, and the people they hire, and how they treat me and you and everybody else is gonna make all the difference in the world. And Rubenstein knows that he’s a really smart guy. But the play here, to me still isn’t about selling tickets and baseball games. It’s much bigger play for him, bringing Bloomberg and these other folks in to say, well, how are we going to use this $600 million? How are we going to get people back? Like all of these really big questions that the nerds just want to know are you going to sign God or enter? Like when I do to talk about baseball people spend money to it’ll show us just show the investment. Okay, they’re gonna win great, and then they’re gonna lose, and the Yankees are gonna have more money. And so you know, and I know all of that because I’m 55 years old, and I’ve done this professionally for 30 years. So what’s the real story here? I hope they win a couple of World Series and that’s important and all that, but what they do to fumigate. deodorize and get me to for Get all the awfulness that was the awfulness, and go back and pay current prices with my wife pull our credit card out and literally fork over whatever the number is to be in the family in the community, for Dad, the games on television, whatever that is, right now it’s 1500 bucks a year because my wife gets cable. You know what I mean? So it’s sort of baked in one baked into that Comcast. But I got Verizon, right. So like, you’re only doing half the games? Who’s your cable provider? You have the
Bill Cole 30:31
games in your house? Yeah, Comcast. So,
Nestor J. Aparicio 30:34
I mean, right off the bat, you’re never gonna have the games in your house. So you don’t even have a connection to it. They make you pay a couple bucks a month to do that. They can’t get you to do that. You’re, you’re off the reservation. Literally.
Bill Cole 30:45
Like what else in your life is something you said a little bit ago about? Your love comes from? You know, your history with the game. Like what else in our lives? Did our parents generation love that hasn’t changed, that we are willing to spend two grand 10 grand whatever you end up spending
Nestor J. Aparicio 31:16
at the cost of Michigan on an airplane to go to Chicago to see him play Wrigley Field or you know, whatever. The playoff tickets are gonna be even if you don’t invest, you want to go to the playoff game or whatever. Like I love the Orioles. I’ve always loved the Orioles but like these last 25 years, man, like, I’m 55 Like there’s been a lot of things that I fell off the bandwagon with like the NBA. I don’t know. I just don’t watch the NHL, the creep that own the team that lied to me for years and years and years. I’m just done. I’m done. I’m done. Yeah, road trips down there. Rambis trips, kissing their ass. They want to move the team to Virginia. They’re not the owners of a liar. Like so. I just, I don’t like people that lie to me, Bill. I’ve known you 30 years. You don’t lie to me. I don’t lie to you. It’s part of the fundamental part of our relationship. It’s why we love each other. And you know, it’s hard to love people that have lied to you or mistreated you. I’m just saying what the baseball thing. I’m here hanging on and I want to go back what difference to make if I go back if nobody else goes back? What are they going to do to get you back? And I’ll tell you the first thing that’s different is that the game is not even on your your kitchen. Dude, the game’s not even on your living room right now. So the game’s not coming to you and the way that f1 doesn’t come to me. But you’re in a car family. Your family loves cars. So maybe they didn’t love it from the beginning. f1 But once they got it, they’re like, Oh, I get it. If you’re a family that loves sports, and you love Baltimore, and your whole family’s got a lacrosse stick and didn’t play the game. Like girls played lacrosse boys playing lacrosse girls in play softball boys and play baseball. barely know the rules. Going down to a ballpark and worshiping Gunnar Henderson. You know, I don’t know. I don’t know. They better figure this
Bill Cole 32:56
out. Who do you know how you are? This would be my pitch for Rubenstein. Like, do you need to run as many games through that stadium as you can? Like, I need the UMBC baseball team to play game there. I need the Maryland team to play a game there. I need local high schools to play games there. I need local youth leagues to get to come down and play games on that field. Like why else would people go there? Like they don’t go there’s nothing there. There’s nothing to do. It’s not it’s not the only the core group or people that love the game. Because the game hasn’t changed. So the history your connection point is the game. So all the parents who are taking their kids to the batting cage three times a week throughout the whole winter and are just doing the baseball thing. Like you have to build connection points. Bring the college team in bringing the high school teams in let them play games on that diamond. Get people into that stadium. Like look go to the the indoor soccer model right where Okay, listen guys, if all your mom and dads buy tickets to the game, you get to come in and you get to play a three inning game before the Orioles start they go to that model get the community back in the stadium
Nestor J. Aparicio 34:22
they’re not gonna let anybody run on that field but I I let you dream Bill Cole was here he is coal roofing is Gordon and energy he does good things in the community as well. The Inspire were of all things Baltimore positive going by the way next Wednesday, the 28th My wife’s 10 year anniversary of her prognosis diagnosis awful stuff happened March 20. So appreciate you sticking with us 10 years. They said it would never last a bill but 25 years of wn St. And there’s a cool little documentary put together with Blue Rock productions. My pal Greg Landry came to me and so I’m appreciative I appreciate you participating as well. Hey when we get together again we’ll talk some football right because it means you know I know you had something to say about Patrick when going to Pittsburgh and and King Henry come here right
Bill Cole 35:10
just makes me throw up in my mouth every time a guy takes takes the purple off and puts the black and gold on but it’s fine. doesn’t happen often. It’s the world. Yeah, I think next time or very soon, like where you need some sunshine and we’re going to be outside and things are going to be you know, looking up. Sarasota
Nestor J. Aparicio 35:27Bekins for me and Lucas Jones. We’re going to be going down to Sarasota. Watch some Orioles baseball next week. I’m looking forward to that as well. I’ve never seen the stadium and Fort Myers the Red Sox will see that so they’re not going to put the games on massive damage. I’ll go watch the games myself. Falling in love all over again. With baseball. I am Nestor. We are wn st am 1570, Towson Baltimore. And we never stop talking Baltimore positive
