Why (and When) did You Become an Oriole Fan ???

[OFFNY]

10 hours ago, big_sparxx said:

 

I had no connection ........ and still really don't have any connection with Baltimore. I was a kid living in Canada, and went to my first game at Tiger Stadium. It was in 1976 and we beat Fidrych. He was awesome.... but we won.... I can't even remember the score. Tiger Stadium was this monolithic place, and Detroit seemed so ........ big. Fidrych was a God to the Tiger fans ....... I'll never forget it. 

 

I've been an O ever since.

 

o

 

Your life-long Oriole fandom (and the reasons why you became an Oriole fan) is similar to mine.

As I've said before, you sign an emotional contract with a team when you are a little kid, for whatever reason. That emotional contract is life-long, and it is non-negotiable.

 

o

[Yossarian]

I was born in 1971 and lived my formative years in rural south-central Utah.  I had very limited exposure to organized baseball beyond high school or "town team" baseball (a lot of the towns in the area would have adult teams that would compete on Saturday nights).  I had to go to Salt Lake City on rare occasions to see a low level minor league game.  I would catch an occasional nationally broadcast "game of the week" on Saturday afternoons (following Mel Allen's "this week in baseball").  I remember watching Eddie Murray play several times and I began switch-hitting in youth leagues.  I loved watching Eddie play - I would mimic him in backyard whiffle ball games.  When Ripken was called up, my Oriole fandom grew.  Then 1983 happened and that put me over the top.  I was all in at that point.  Ripken, Murray, Dempsey, Singleton, Lowenstein, Bumbry, DeCinces, Tippy, Denny, Flanagan, .... on and on.

In the late junior high years, we got this thing called cable TV.  This came with ESPN and more baseball.  I watched countless hours of WTBS (Atlanta Braves baseball) and WGN (Chicago Cubs baseball), but stuck with Baltimore.  Dale Murphy married a girl from my home town, but I stuck with Baltimore (but followed Dale religiously - met him several times even).  I would grab the Salt Lake Tribune every morning and flip to the box scores looking for a paragraph write-up of the Baltimore games and browse to see how the Orioles players did individually.  I would watch the local news for a glimpse of an occasional highlight from an Orioles game.  On weekends, USA today would publish the batting and pitching stats in big tables for the entire league.  I would go through those tables and highlight Orioles players to track their progress week by week.  I would look for their names in the leaderboards to flaunt in my brothers' faces.

I now live in California (in the coverage area of the Giants and A's), but the love for the Orioles has not wavered.  I play hookie from work when the Orioles are in town.

[Moose Milligan]

I wish when growing up I wasn't such a sucker for picking the hometown teams.  Being an Orioles and Redskins fan (used to root for the Wizards, not so much into the NBA anymore) has sucked.

It'd be cool to have been like "Yeah, I saw the Yankees on TV one day and I liked their pinstripes and Don Mattingly's mustache so that's who I started rooting for.  What do you want from me?  I was 6."

Nope, had to root for the dumbass local teams.  

[MongoBoy]

22 hours ago, WillyM said:

I grew up in upstate New York, in the Albany area.  A lot of people were Yankees fans, but there were Red Sox fans, Giants fans, and Dodgers fans (this was the mid-1950's).  So there wasn't any one team that everybody rooted for.

 

You still live there?

[MongoBoy]

On 10/2/2018 at 5:00 PM, OFFNY said:

o

 

if the Orioles went 2-160 in a single season, I would never regret becoming a fan of their as I did in October of 1971.

 

o

To this day, whenever there is an 11-3 score in any game, I think back to Game 2 of the '71 series.  Talk about bats going cold after a run outburst.  

But nothing will be worse than the '79 series with the Pirate wives with their whistles.  

[Tx Oriole]

5 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

I wish when growing up I wasn't such a sucker for picking the hometown teams.  Being an Orioles and Redskins fan (used to root for the Wizards, not so much into the NBA anymore) has sucked.

It'd be cool to have been like "Yeah, I saw the Yankees on TV one day and I liked their pinstripes and Don Mattingly's mustache so that's who I started rooting for.  What do you want from me?  I was 6."

Nope, had to root for the dumbass local teams.  

1959 was when I became a fan. Big Colt fan and thought I'd cheer for the Orioles too. 

[WillyM]

8 hours ago, MongoBoy said:

You still live there?

No, I don't.  I moved to the Philadelphia area in the 1970's and to York County, PA in 1995.  I still live in York County.

But when I arrived in York County and discovered that I had access to Orioles telecasts on MASN's forerunner, Home Team Sports, I thought I'd arrived in heaven.

[OFFNY]

1 hour ago, WillyM said:

 

No, I don't. I moved to the Philadelphia area in the 1970's and to York County, PA in 1995. I still live in York County.

But when I arrived in York County and discovered that I had access to Orioles telecasts on MASN's forerunner, Home Team Sports, I thought I'd arrived in heaven.

 

o

 

This is similar to my experience from the summer of 1976. That summer, my brother Mark and myself found out that after 7 PM (when all of the local and smaller radio stations went off the air), we could get Oriole games on WBAL ........ all the way up here, in New York State !!!

 

o

[shoriole]

My first game was in 1979 with my uncle versus the Milwaukee Brewers. Mike Flanagan started and Eddie Murray ended it.  It was my first taste of Ed-die Ed-die Ed-die.  O’s won 3-2.

[Legend_Of_Joey]

It happened almost by accident.

The first game I went to and remember was against the Texas Rangers with Nolan Ryan pitching. I became a huge Rangers fan and gave the Orioles second thoughts, especially since I mainly went to Frederick Keys games.

But a few years ago, I started going to a lot more games during unfortunate times for me and, since it is easier to go see the Orioles (and affiliates) than it is for me to go see the Texas Rangers...

[24fps]

 

[Il BuonO]

14 minutes ago, 24fps said:

 

Is there another thread with a similar topic? I know I’ve told my Orioles story before, but it’s not in that thread.

[carolinaoriole]

1966 the team was winning games like crazy Frank Robinson was the player that was leading the team to new heights.   They creamed the Dodgers to win the World Series.   Although I am not from Maryland my family lived there off and on when I was a boy  I have been a fan as far back as I can remember.  I live In South Carolina now and the Orioles are my team still.

[24fps]

49 minutes ago, Il BuonO said:

Is there another thread with a similar topic? I know I’ve told my Orioles story before, but it’s not in that thread.

I remember a bunch of them. They seem to pop up during the off-season usually.  OFFNY’s is the one I remember the most. 

[Yachtsman]

Moved back to the USA from UK in the early 70’s, went  to an Orioles game with my Dad when we came home, and never stopped going after that. I had never seen baseball in my life, and I was hooked through the good and bad of the Orioles.

Edited August 22, 2019 by Yachtsman