Birdland was in an anticipatory mood as the baseball winter meetings kicked off on Dec. 4 in San Diego, but by the end of the week fans in Baltimore acquired two important quotes that pertain to the future of the Orioles. Both can use a bit of unpacking.
The first and most important came from MLB commissioner Rob Manfred, who made it crystal clear that despite the Angelos family litigation, the club was staying in Baltimore.
“As long as I have a job, I think you can count on the fact the Orioles are going to be in Baltimore, No. 1,” Manfred said. “No. 2, I have talked to both John and Mrs. [Georgia] Angelos at length, in person about this topic. I’m comfortable with the positions that they’ve taken.”
I know when it comes to quotes from executives in any business, the public may have reason to be skeptical, but usually in those cases the executive or person of authority equivocates. Manfred in this portion of his answer was point-blank stating this as fact.
“It’s absolutely clear under baseball rules, John Angelos is the control person and he has the vote for the club,” Manfred continued. “So I’m sorry there is litigation involved. It attracts all kinds of negative attention to the game. Having said that, I’m really comfortable with the way the club is being run and our relationship with the club and Major League Baseball’s relationship with the club.”
Regardless of what may have happened between John and Louis Angelos that caused this litigation, Manfred is now on record as saying that John is recognized as the control person of the Orioles franchise.
The other quote came from Orioles GM Mike Elias, who attempted to verbally extricate himself from being taken so literally when he used the word “liftoff” after dealing Trey Mancini and Jorge López at the deadline. His exact words when he met with the media ahead of the Orioles’ Aug. 3 game against the Rangers in Arlington were, “I think it’s liftoff from here for this team.”
Orioles fans have taken that word “liftoff” quite literally to mean that the club would step up the payroll significantly because management believed it was the right time to do that. But as the winter meetings were ending and all that had been spent was $10 million on a one-year contract for Kyle Gibson, Elias felt it was time to redefine for Birdland what liftoff really meant to him.
“I rattled that word off in Texas,” Elias said. “I feel very organically that is what I meant. I mean I think this team is going to continue to get better from this point forward. We’re sitting here with this young nucleus that’s extremely talented that’s going to be here for a long while. We’re sitting on the No. 1 farm system.
“We have a roster and a payroll that we can custom build over the next few years because we don’t have any long-term contracts to build around and this is not a specific proclamation that we’re going to do it all at once in the winter meetings, but that the next several years of baseball in Baltimore is going to be excellent.”
The only part of that explanation that I’d take exception to is whether or not this club will be able to make long-term commitments to its best players when they are eligible for free agency. Failing that, I’d like a definition from Elias as to what constitutes a long while.
But I never took the word he used back in August to mean the payroll was going to “lift off” in a big way in 2023.
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This isn’t a quote. Rather, it’s a brief observation about Kevin Willard after wattching one of the Maryland men’s basketball program’s most significant wins since Gary Williams left in 2011. I am talking about Maryland’s breathtaking and hugely entertaining win against then-No. 16 Illinois on Friday, Dec. 2.
The university knew this was an early opportunity for Willard’s Terps to breathe some life back into Xfinity Center. Ticket prices were lowered to really get fans in the building and it worked. After the Terps’ nail-biting 71-66 win, everybody from the announcers to Illinois head coach Brad Underwood to Willard talked about how electric the building was on this night.
But the highlight of the evening for this observer came during the postgame pressers shown on the Big Ten Network.
About nine minutes into Willard’s session with reporters, the coach was in the middle of an answer when a reporter’s cell phone started to ring. Willard sternly took the reporter to task. “Can we turn the phones off?” There was a palpable pause, and then Willard stern face turned to a Cheshire Cat grin. “I’m just joking. Everybody took me serious.”
It was a small moment on a night when a win had Willard in a good mood, but I don’t recall hearing those laughs in a long, long time in College Park.
More importantly, the team Willard hastily put together this offseason put forth an effort I hadn’t seen in a long, long time in College Park.
Photo Credit: Courtesy of the Baltimore Orioles
Issue 278: December 2022 / January 2023
Originally published Dec. 21, 2022