Loverro takes one last shot at Angelos and Baltimore

[eddie83]

18 minutes ago, CallMeBrooksie said:

Lazy is really the only appropriate word to describe this article. @Tony-OH  has to keep it respectful with Laverro as a member of the media, but he essentially said as much without actually using the word. 

I mean, let's say the O's get sold today to the best baseball owner we could possibly hope for... does Laverro think that a competent owner would aim to make the team competitive by 2020? Surely that's not the case.

In a terrible article that part may be the worst. Things aren’t going to change overnight.  

[CallMeBrooksie]

My eyes about rolled completely out of my head at his line to the effect of 'down on their luck cities need a competitive team so that they can place their hopes and dreams on them and escape the reality of their poopy lives'. Condescending drivel. Garbage.

[Curse of the Bamdino]

“They’ve lost more than two million fans since their high of 3.7 million in 1997. Even when attendance picked back up, peaking at 2.4 million during the team’s five-year revival from 2012 to 2016, it was evident that many fans from the ’90s weren’t coming back.”

Interesting how the writer (in)conveniently omits the fact that another franchise moved into that team’s territory during that time frame, which took (guesstimating here) at least a third or so of its market.    

[Frobby]

3 minutes ago, Curse of the Bamdino said:

“They’ve lost more than two million fans since their high of 3.7 million in 1997. Even when attendance picked back up, peaking at 2.4 million during the team’s five-year revival from 2012 to 2016, it was evident that many fans from the ’90s weren’t coming back.”

Interesting how the writer (in)conveniently omits the fact that another franchise moved into that team’s territory during that time frame, which took (guesstimating here) at least a third or so of its market.    

He writes for a DC paper, so it’s not like he doesn’t know this.    I do think the O’s have permanently lost some fans that didn’t abandon them for the Nats.     It was pretty surprising to me that 2012-16 attendance never reached the 2005 mark of 2.62 mm, which was achieved despite the arrival of the Nats, who drew their franchise record of 2.73 mm that year.    

[waroriole]

I mean, it’s the Washington Times what do you expect?

 

Also, I’ve never heard of this guy

[Slappy]

11 minutes ago, Frobby said:

He writes for a DC paper, so it’s not like he doesn’t know this.    I do think the O’s have permanently lost some fans that didn’t abandon them for the Nats.     It was pretty surprising to me that 2012-16 attendance never reached the 2005 mark of 2.62 mm, which was achieved despite the arrival of the Nats, who drew their franchise record of 2.73 mm that year.    

I think we would need a World Series appearance to really gauge what the attendance potential of the franchise is. If that doesn't get a casual fan's attention, nothing will. I think it is probably about 2.8-3 million. Which is plenty to support a team.

[Todd-O]

I'm entirely sick and tired of the DC media's constant quest to skewer and crap on the Orioles.  If it's not Loverro, it's Boswell.  

Living in Montgomery County, I'm surround by prickly former O's fans that root for the Nats.  And they perpetually point to crap like Loverro's piece as reasoning for hating on the Orioles.  I'm constantly told the owner is evil, that he's destroyed baseball in Baltimore, that anyone going to an Orioles game is an idiot... that the Orioles legacy is tainted... and the future is insanely bleak.  Oh, and then they feed off the Nat's reporters' sunny propaganda-filled articles.  

 

I can't stand it. Just 20 years ago, the Washingon media loved the O's... now they're on a scorched-earth campaign to ruin the franchise's image.  Sucks 

[theocean]

35 minutes ago, Frobby said:

He writes for a DC paper, so it’s not like he doesn’t know this.    I do think the O’s have permanently lost some fans that didn’t abandon them for the Nats.     It was pretty surprising to me that 2012-16 attendance never reached the 2005 mark of 2.62 mm, which was achieved despite the arrival of the Nats, who drew their franchise record of 2.73 mm that year.    

I've posted this a lot - and I usually get someone who flippantly responds with a picture of a full Minute Maid Park during the playoffs. But, I'll do it again anyway:

I'm a millennial. Grew up during the fourteen losing seasons. I learned to read, graduated high school, learned to drive, moved out on my own, had a few jobs, graduated college all before the Orioles had a winning season. They were awful. But for some reason Jeff Conine and Luis Matos and Daniel Cabrera turned me into a diehard Orioles fan. I'll never forgive them for cursing this evil upon me.

I truly know like five dudes my age who actually know, understand, and follow Orioles baseball on a daily basis. That's it. Five dudes who are diehard baseball fans. Sure, I know a ton of people who "like" baseball - but they couldn't tell you the difference between a four seam and a two seam fastball. Couldn't name you another player on another team outside the obvious ones. They don't know basic rules. Believe me, I unfortunately know they don't because I've played on the same softball team with them.

A big reason is that everyone my age grew up when the Orioles played like absolutely butt every year and the Ravens had Ray Lewis, Ed Reed, and company bashing people's skulls in and winning the Super Bowl. 

Those same people who don't know basic baseball rules could tell you all about why the Ravens should attack the A-gap with their running game against a certain team. They grew up watching a lot of football and are lifelong, diehard football fans for life.

A lot of people my age all went to games a lot from 2012-2016 because the O's were good, Adam Jones was cool, and they wanted a place outside to drink. But, now? They don't care. It's just me and the five dudes I know who care about Hanser Alberto breaking up a perfect game. That's it.

My point is - when you tank or unintentionally tank for long period of time, you lose a generation of young fans. Yeah, winning brings in new fans - but having a butt product on the field kills that core foundation of fans that is needed to fill a stadium. 

Those same people who grew up during fourteen losing seasons are all having kids now. How are those kids ever going to care about baseball if their parents don't care and the Orioles of their youth are also butt.

We can try and explain low attendance as much as we want - but the O's have pretty much been butt for a long time. I really caution against scorched-earth, tanking rebuilds because they really do permanent damage to the health of the fanbase.

 

[LookinUp]

I've been listening to Loverro for years now. I alternate between loving and hating the guy. This I know: he takes a position and then drives it home to the extreme. When he's right, he's right. When he's not, he comes across as whiny and screechy. With that said, I think he broke news in this article when he said this:

Quote

 

But sources said that John Angelos has explored the possibility of perhaps entering into an arrangement like the one that former Baltimore Ravens owner Art Modell had with Steve Bisciotti.

 

So buried in his article about how the O's won't be good until they sell, he broke a story that he has sources that John Angelos is looking into a way to transfer ownership to the next group. 

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, theocean said:

We can try and explain low attendance as much as we want - but the O's have pretty much been butt for a long time. I really caution against scorched-earth, tanking rebuilds because they really do permanent damage to the health of the fanbase.

But I think the point of a “scorched earth” rebuild is to shorten the period in which the team will be bad.    Five years of sucking instead of 14, but with a much lower bottom.   And in theory, when the rebuild is done, the good seasons last a lot more than 5 years because you’ve built something more sustainable.    That’s the theory.     Now let’s see how that works for us.

[Chromehill]

1 hour ago, theocean said:

I've posted this a lot - and I usually get someone who flippantly responds with a picture of a full Minute Maid Park during the playoffs. But, I'll do it again anyway:

I'm a millennial. Grew up during the fourteen losing seasons. I learned to read, graduated high school, learned to drive, moved out on my own, had a few jobs, graduated college all before the Orioles had a winning season. They were awful. But for some reason Jeff Conine and Luis Matos and Daniel Cabrera turned me into a diehard Orioles fan. I'll never forgive them for cursing this evil upon me.

I truly know like five dudes my age who actually know, understand, and follow Orioles baseball on a daily basis. That's it. Five dudes who are diehard baseball fans. Sure, I know a ton of people who "like" baseball - but they couldn't tell you the difference between a four seam and a two seam fastball. Couldn't name you another player on another team outside the obvious ones. They don't know basic rules. Believe me, I unfortunately know they don't because I've played on the same softball team with them.

A big reason is that everyone my age grew up when the Orioles played like absolutely butt every year and the Ravens had Ray Lewis, Ed Reed, and company bashing people's skulls in and winning the Super Bowl. 

Those same people who don't know basic baseball rules could tell you all about why the Ravens should attack the A-gap with their running game against a certain team. They grew up watching a lot of football and are lifelong, diehard football fans for life.

A lot of people my age all went to games a lot from 2012-2016 because the O's were good, Adam Jones was cool, and they wanted a place outside to drink. But, now? They don't care. It's just me and the five dudes I know who care about Hanser Alberto breaking up a perfect game. That's it.

My point is - when you tank or unintentionally tank for long period of time, you lose a generation of young fans. Yeah, winning brings in new fans - but having a butt product on the field kills that core foundation of fans that is needed to fill a stadium. 

Those same people who grew up during fourteen losing seasons are all having kids now. How are those kids ever going to care about baseball if their parents don't care and the Orioles of their youth are also butt.

We can try and explain low attendance as much as we want - but the O's have pretty much been butt for a long time. I really caution against scorched-earth, tanking rebuilds because they really do permanent damage to the health of the fanbase.

 

I agree with you, problem is what is done is done.  The last half decade the team poured all their resources into the major league roster to hopefully win it all.  The result the major league team that collapsed in September 2017.  They doubled down for 2018 and now they have a lousy major league roster with a barren farm system. 

At this point the complete rebuild is the only logical approach.  Adding Jim Palmer and Cal Ripken in their primes would not make this team competitive (.500).  They need more quality players which is going to take years. 

[Tony-OH]

1 hour ago, LookinUp said:

I've been listening to Loverro for years now. I alternate between loving and hating the guy. This I know: he takes a position and then drives it home to the extreme. When he's right, he's right. When he's not, he comes across as whiny and screechy. With that said, I think he broke news in this article when he said this:

So buried in his article about how the O's won't be good until they sell, he broke a story that he has sources that John Angelos is looking into a way to transfer ownership to the next group. 

Nice catch on the selling issue. I caught that as well but didn't address it since I was defending the franchise a bit. It was an interesting comment thrown in there. The article would have been much better had it been more rounded and focused on this "breaking news". I have zero issues with Loverro and respect him as a journalist, but he and others like him really struggle with the new quick format articles they now have to write.

I wonder if his word count led him to end up writing a shell of an article when it could have had real impact. 

[LookinUp]

1 hour ago, theocean said:

My point is - when you tank or unintentionally tank for long period of time, you lose a generation of young fans. Yeah, winning brings in new fans - but having a butt product on the field kills that core foundation of fans that is needed to fill a stadium. 

I don't disagree with your post. You pretty artfully articulated how we got here, but you didn't address how to get out of it. If your answer is to spend more money in the short run in hopes of competing (e.g., the anti-tanking strategy), I'd like to know just how much you mean. In practice, the O's have done that in the past and failed to compete. That approach created the conditions for fans to leave.

Elias' plan is to create the conditions for sustained success. If he achieves that, he will bring back old fans and they will bring their kids, and their friends. If it's truly sustained, he will create the conditions for financial success and a new love affair between generations of fans and the O's. 

[LookinUp]

4 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Nice catch on the selling issue. I caught that as well but didn't address it since I was defending the franchise a bit. It was an interesting comment thrown in there. The article would have been much better had it been more rounded and focused on this "breaking news". I have zero issues with Loverro and respect him as a journalist, but he and others like him really struggle with the new quick format articles they now have to write.

I wonder if his word count led him to end up writing a shell of an article when it could have had real impact. 

Who knows? Like I said, sometimes I love the guy and sometimes I hate him. His opinions are so strong that they're often off-putting. He dismisses nuance. That gives him clarity, which is good, but not context.

[eddie83]

1 hour ago, theocean said:

I've posted this a lot - and I usually get someone who flippantly responds with a picture of a full Minute Maid Park during the playoffs. But, I'll do it again anyway:

I'm a millennial. Grew up during the fourteen losing seasons. I learned to read, graduated high school, learned to drive, moved out on my own, had a few jobs, graduated college all before the Orioles had a winning season. They were awful. But for some reason Jeff Conine and Luis Matos and Daniel Cabrera turned me into a diehard Orioles fan. I'll never forgive them for cursing this evil upon me.

I truly know like five dudes my age who actually know, understand, and follow Orioles baseball on a daily basis. That's it. Five dudes who are diehard baseball fans. Sure, I know a ton of people who "like" baseball - but they couldn't tell you the difference between a four seam and a two seam fastball. Couldn't name you another player on another team outside the obvious ones. They don't know basic rules. Believe me, I unfortunately know they don't because I've played on the same softball team with them.

A big reason is that everyone my age grew up when the Orioles played like absolutely butt every year and the Ravens had Ray Lewis, Ed Reed, and company bashing people's skulls in and winning the Super Bowl. 

Those same people who don't know basic baseball rules could tell you all about why the Ravens should attack the A-gap with their running game against a certain team. They grew up watching a lot of football and are lifelong, diehard football fans for life.

A lot of people my age all went to games a lot from 2012-2016 because the O's were good, Adam Jones was cool, and they wanted a place outside to drink. But, now? They don't care. It's just me and the five dudes I know who care about Hanser Alberto breaking up a perfect game. That's it.

My point is - when you tank or unintentionally tank for long period of time, you lose a generation of young fans. Yeah, winning brings in new fans - but having a butt product on the field kills that core foundation of fans that is needed to fill a stadium. 

Those same people who grew up during fourteen losing seasons are all having kids now. How are those kids ever going to care about baseball if their parents don't care and the Orioles of their youth are also butt.

We can try and explain low attendance as much as we want - but the O's have pretty much been butt for a long time. I really caution against scorched-earth, tanking rebuilds because they really do permanent damage to the health of the fanbase.

 

There is no doubt the 14 years of losing did major damage to the fan base. As you said, as you grew up  the team was awful. The Orioles unfortunately can’t undo that now. 

I think what they are doing right now is the best path to avoid going through that much losing again. Have to hope it works and a tradition of winning, which earlier generations saw repeats itself.