What's your favorite interaction ever with an Orioles player, coach, or manager?

[Greg Pappas]

Retired, current, former... doesn't matter. 

With the unfortunate situation ongoing with the Coronavirus, I'm looking for cool or interesting stories to take our minds elsewhere, if only for a bit.

Please, share? Thank you.

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

Ok I have one. I used to go to Orioles games in the 90’s and Dick Hall would be at the game sometimes. Really nice guy and liked to talk about how the O’s were doing. I think worked as a CPA after his baseball career. 
 

[Tony-OH]

I've met a lot of Orioles and and ex-Orioles but the nicest one I ever met was of course, Brooks Robinson. Thanks to Roy, I was invited to meet Brooks and Jim Palmer one afternoon after their lunch in Little Italy.

Brooks was the kindest man you will ever meet, and besides my late Grandfather, it's hard to think of a more genuinely nice man who actually acts like he's interested in you when all you want is to know more about him

 

[Greg Pappas]

12 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

I've met a lot of Orioles and and ex-Orioles but the nicest one I ever met was of course, Brooks Robinson. Thanks to Roy, I was invited to meet Brooks and Jim Palmer one afternoon after their lunch in Little Italy.

Brooks was the kindest man you will ever meet, and besides my late Grandfather, it's hard to think of a more genuinely nice man who actually acts like he's interested in you when all you want is to know more about him

 

My favorite Oriole ever... and it's stories like these that just affirm his greatness as a human being.

[Legend_Of_Joey]

29 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

I've met a lot of Orioles and and ex-Orioles but the nicest one I ever met was of course, Brooks Robinson. Thanks to Roy, I was invited to meet Brooks and Jim Palmer one afternoon after their lunch in Little Italy.

Brooks was the kindest man you will ever meet, and besides my late Grandfather, it's hard to think of a more genuinely nice man who actually acts like he's interested in you when all you want is to know more about him

 

Do you know what a “Brooks Robinson Collectors Item” is?

Its something that was placed in front of Brooks that was never signed.

[luismatos4prez]

I played high school baseball in Baltimore County and my coach volunteered us to go to an event where some Little League kids would do some drills with current and former Orioles. I was a grumpy 17 year old about the whole thing, but Rick Krivda and I were assigned to run the outfield drills for the kids.

Rick was really nice to me. He'd retired by this point, but he ran the drill with a great energy and he talked baseball with me and asked about our season and seemed genuinely interested in what I thought about drills and hitting and the high school baseball scene. It impressed me a lot at the time, his energy snapped me out of that "This is lame" mindset, at least for that day.

I also played catch with Jake Arrieta for a minute after the event. He was a minor league nobody at the time, not much older than I was. 

[Orange]

I interviewed Mike Mussina one time… In actuality I was an intern at WBAL and I put a microphone in his face in the locker room.  It was after a one-hitter though which is pretty cool.  It’s funny what stands out… I remember Gregg Zaun’s wannabe hipster outfit  in his locker with like a silk vest.  That, and Cal being there was pretty epic. 

[ThomasTomasz]

I remember going to Bowie for a game when I was in elementary school, and the Orioles played their minor league prospects in an exhibition game before the season.  Cal signed so many autographs that day.  He was out there for at least four innings.  I ended up on the front of a postcard that year from the team trying to get one.  He signed the sweet spot and that ball is a primary focus of my memorabilia collection.  

Also at Bowie, Josh Towers would always come over and talk to the young kids who were trying to get autographs.  One time he signed the bullpen gate and his signature was there for the entire season.  

One of last year's bullpen catchers, Joel Polanco, whom some of us affectionately called Yogi, would always take time to acknowledge me and chat for a bit.  Always got a baseball thrown up to give to someone.  I saw him on the road a couple times and we talked about what to do in the town.  

My dad did a Brooks Robinson autograph signing at Bowie and once he started talking to Brooks about moments in his career, he told the team attendant that he didn't care about the item limit and signed everything my dad had there.  My stepmom grew up in the same area of California as Rick Dempsey and she mentioned it to him when he was walking through the stadium and he stopped for 10 minutes to talk to her about it.  

[Woody Held]

 This isn’t my story but a friend of mine,  he was in St.Louis for business during the World Series.  He over slept, packed hurriedly and getting off the elevator when his bag sprung open and all his stuff fell out.  As he scrambled to pick he stuff up someone bend over to give him a hand.  That person was Jim Palmer who was there to do the color commentary on the the broadcast.  

[scOtt]

I got Brooks' autograph once at a donkey basketball game at our high school when I was 13-ish? He is the nicest human being I have ever met. Got Elrod's too, remember noticing his HUGE barrel-chest. Mountain of a man!

Always nice to catch Boog around the BBQ Pit too.

[scOtt]

I wasn't there but after the wildcard game in Texas 2012...

 

[scOtt]

This is the video I wanted!

 

[scOtt]

Players all look astonished at the reaction. Изумленный!

 

Wanted to say Ohuet! but can't figure out how to spell it in cyrillic.

[mdbdotcom]

31 minutes ago, scOtt said:

This is the video I wanted!

 

This is a great tonic for tough times. Thanks for posting.

[scOtt]

Hijack/tangent. The cyrillic/Russian alphabet is much simpler than English. It's very phonetic. No wasted letters in the cyrillic alphabet.

Taxi is taksi - такси  No hard and soft "C". C is s and K is the hard c. always. No I before E except after C bull.