I’m going to choose to not overreact to what Orioles pitchers were able to do against the White Sox this past weekend. I fully recognize that it could have been worse! I’m just going to wait to see how Orioles pitchers perform when they’re not facing (checks notes) the worst offense in the American League.
But yeah, there have been worse weekends to watch baseball in Baltimore this season. All of them, really.
It’s a strange feeling watching the Orioles. I went to the late afternoon game on Friday. It’s not deep enough in the season to write them off completely, but there’s absolutely no reasonable thought that they shouldn’t be written off completely. And then there are all of the peripheral issues. Who’s going to be the manager? Is Mike Elias definitely still going to be the general manager? Who will be dealt at the deadline? Are they willing to take on contracts for players with control past this season to try to speed up the process of getting back to contention?
There are so many baseball games still to be played, but the macro is far more significant than the micro.
Two listeners sat in the row in front of me at the game on Friday. During the seventh-inning stretch, one asked me, “How does David Rubenstein feel about all of this? What is he going to do?” I started with my typical response when I get a question like this. “David Rubenstein isn’t quite like other owners. They’re all super wealthy, but he’s the one that’s traveling to Davos and trying to answer the world’s biggest financial questions and …” then I cut myself off.
“Yeah, he should probably be answering your question.”
There was a lot of frustration about how long it took for Elias to speak to reporters after Brandon Hyde was fired as manager. I think that criticism was fair. And I think it’s fair to criticize the owner of the team for not making himself available after a managerial change.
That’s not to say that this is Rubenstein’s fault, per se. Like I said about Hyde, when things go this poorly, everyone shares in the blame. It’s hard to say how large Rubenstein’s slice of the blame pie should be. As he has explained, he was inclined to defer to his front office about baseball decisions because of their success. That’s reasonable! But that also hasn’t worked.
He should answer for that, with “should” being the operative word. Oftentimes we say things like “_ owes it to the media” or “owes it to the fans” to answer questions. We say they “need” to hold a news conference. I understand the sentiment, but it’s incorrect. Politicians owe it to their constituents to answer questions. Congresspeople need to hold town halls. We want answers from the owner of a baseball team when things go wrong.
And he should want to provide them. That should be part of the understanding when someone purchases a baseball team. Owners ask for civic investment, so they should want to provide as much transparency as possible in exchange for that investment. Rubenstein knew the trauma the fan base had experienced due to the relationship it shared with previous ownership. Combating that appeared to be a priority early in his tenure, as he did lots of interviews and had a serious presence around the organization.
Rubenstein himself knew that the honeymoon period of his ownership could end. “People aren’t cheering and wanting the autographs of people who are in last place, right?” he said in our preseason interview. I think he should want to make that presence felt as the fan base struggles with what’s gone wrong.
The reality is that he probably doesn’t have the answers to the questions that would be asked. When he is asked about Elias’ future, the answer might really be “we haven’t decided yet.” And he might not want to say that because as Elias recently pointed out when called out about his previous defenses of Hyde, you never want to appear anything but fully supportive of the people who are in their current roles. But that shouldn’t mean Rubenstein should want to avoid the questions altogether.
Fans want to hear that the owner understands their frustration. They want to hear the owner intends to do everything necessary in order to fix this and return to contention as soon as possible. Rubenstein should be able to convey that even if he doesn’t have exact answers to every question that would be asked.
If things were going well, this wouldn’t be as pressing. But the Orioles are, in the words of longtime national MLB writer Jayson Stark (currently of The Athletic), “the most disappointing team I can think of in the last 30 years.” Any owner should want to get out in front of that. There need not be blood. But fan bases deserve to hear from them in these moments.
I hope Rubenstein chooses to try to reassure Orioles fans, even if he doesn’t know the entirety of the path forward himself.
Photo Credit: Kenya Allen/PressBox