Angelos Claims He's Not Selling

[drdelaware]

I didn't have a problem with much of what he said.  Not a fan of the Angelos family and not all the answers.  At least finally he gave an extended interview.

[Tony-OH]

6 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

He’s getting crushed for this on Twitter.

What a tone deaf comment.

Tone deaf is what you become when you grow up rich with no reason to work hard or a need to be good at anything. He just walks around acting like he's some crowned prince of the Orioles and Baltimore, hobnobbing with his political elites who were installed by the peasants who voted for them because they think they will be given a loaf of bread and a roof over their heads. 

It's easy to disgustingly bark at a peasant reporter who makes his living most likely paycheck to paycheck for not adhering to whatever charade the prince wanted to be applauded for, then it would be to address the very clear issues being brought up. How dare the peasant reporter speak to the prince in such a way. No, no, no, that's not how this works.

The prince will then turn to his recently hired propagandist to try and defend his words and actions which will allow certain peasants to be placated and thus, back to supporting their royalty.

John Angelos is not going to sell until the sale of the Orioles will make him, and him alone a very, very rich Nashville man.

 

 

[Frobby]

Let’s say the O’s win the WS in 2025.   Will people still be picking apart everything John Angelos says?   I’m not defending the man, or predicting a WS win.  Just wondering whether people would stop criticizing everything he says and instead see him as the guy who oversaw the building of a team that won the WS.   Or, would they say the O’s won despite him?

[Sports Guy]

17 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Let’s say the O’s win the WS in 2025.   Will people still be picking apart everything John Angelos says?   I’m not defending the man, or predicting a WS win.  Just wondering whether people would stop criticizing everything he says and instead see him as the guy who oversaw the building of a team that won the WS.   Or, would they say the O’s won despite him?

Do you credit PA for 2012-2016?

[Frobby]

31 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Do you credit PA for 2012-2016?

Not really.  I feel differently about the current rebuild than I did about the 2012-16 period though.   And I do think we heard a lot less sniping at PA when we were winning.  

[Hank Scorpio]

14 hours ago, Sports Guy said:

 

Pretty, pretty, pretttttttty good. 

I would note, however, that they’re in a different place regarding  team makeup, etc… once some of these guys blossom a bit is when the actual rubber will meet the road… and I fully expect at that point that Angelos will do Angelos things and bottle up.

I mean, he essentially said that they want to be like Tampa with a little higher payroll. The problem is, that’s not really a thing. If you are constantly pumping out high talent guys and being competitive, I guess you can get away with trading them away for 3-4 cheap young guys in arb year 2. 

What it boils down to for me is this:

Are we okay with the Orioles being competitive much more frequently without spending $200MM a year on payroll? Or are we only going to be happy if we’ve got 2-3 guys making $25-$30MM AAV? 

I personally legit don’t care how they become a big boy organization again, so long as we never have to endure 5-6 consecutive years of horror again. If they manage to win by out-scouting, analyzing, projecting everyone, fine. 

Look, this guy is kind of in a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation. I am sympathetic to that only because he is a different person than his old man. He has allowed Elias to do a lot of (in his mind) out of the box stuff. The last 5 years are DEFINITELY not something PGA would have overseen. 

I’m cautiously optimistic. Maybe I’m Charlie Brown and he’s Lucy and I’m about to soar through the air and land on my ass. But the last five years and tangible establishment and  improvement of processes has me optimistic.

There I said it.

 

 

[SemperFi]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

Let’s say the O’s win the WS in 2025.   Will people still be picking apart everything John Angelos says?   I’m not defending the man, or predicting a WS win.  Just wondering whether people would stop criticizing everything he says and instead see him as the guy who oversaw the building of a team that won the WS.   Or, would they say the O’s won despite him?

Attached is an article from Meoli which I think fairly challenges JA on a number of issues, embedded within is the whole press conference-if you have time it's worth watching as opposed to the parsed statements from it.  As much as I pillorized him as a condescending bully from the MLK event in this he comes across as bright, personable and likeable (IMO)-I also thought his answers about payroll were fair and hopefull as opposed to the parsed statements.  Media training works, it really does!!

 https://tinyurl.com/mrp9utjy

[Too Tall]

Here's where I am. In 1954 the Orioles were bad. They didn't start winning until 1960. There was a progression of improvement throughout the organization driven by some really good general managers. The team in 1960 had a mix of veterans and some real good youngsters - particularly in the infield. Their third base guy is a Hall of Famer! There was also the start of an influx of young pitching. I know times are different, but it does sound familiar. For the next two decades plus, the Orioles were relevant. A model if you would. 

I look at this team and dream that History Repeats Itself. I refuse to get all hot and bothered about ownership because I can't do anything about that except complain and that is like as we use to say in the duck blind, "pissing into the wind." 

My wish for many of you that weren't around during those years of relevance, is that History does repeat itself. That was a heck of an era. 

 

[Sports Guy]

1 hour ago, Hank Scorpio said:

Pretty, pretty, pretttttttty good. 

I would note, however, that they’re in a different place regarding  team makeup, etc… once some of these guys blossom a bit is when the actual rubber will meet the road… and I fully expect at that point that Angelos will do Angelos things and bottle up.

I mean, he essentially said that they want to be like Tampa with a little higher payroll. The problem is, that’s not really a thing. If you are constantly pumping out high talent guys and being competitive, I guess you can get away with trading them away for 3-4 cheap young guys in arb year 2. 

What it boils down to for me is this:

Are we okay with the Orioles being competitive much more frequently without spending $200MM a year on payroll? Or are we only going to be happy if we’ve got 2-3 guys making $25-$30MM AAV? 

I personally legit don’t care how they become a big boy organization again, so long as we never have to endure 5-6 consecutive years of horror again. If they manage to win by out-scouting, analyzing, projecting everyone, fine. 

Look, this guy is kind of in a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation. I am sympathetic to that only because he is a different person than his old man. He has allowed Elias to do a lot of (in his mind) out of the box stuff. The last 5 years are DEFINITELY not something PGA would have overseen. 

I’m cautiously optimistic. Maybe I’m Charlie Brown and he’s Lucy and I’m about to soar through the air and land on my ass. But the last five years and tangible establishment and  improvement of processes has me optimistic.

There I said it.

 

 

JA has done some good things. There is no doubt about that.

No one should be questioning him on many of the things that bothered us about the old man.

[HakunaSakata]

The only criticism I have of John Angelos as an owner relates to the team's payroll. Everything else is minutiae to me and I think much of the hate he gets on in this forum is consciously or subconsciously tied to his political leanings/affiliations. If he's willing to commit to extending the OPACY lease,  bump up the team's payroll over the next few seasons, and continue to invest in the future then he can publish a press release every week for all I care. 

[wildcard]

48 minutes ago, SemperFi said:

Attached is an article from Meoli which I think fairly challenges JA on a number of issues, embedded within is the whole press conference-if you have time it's worth watching as opposed to the parsed statements from it.  As much as I pillorized him as a condescending bully from the MLK event in this he comes across as bright, personable and likeable (IMO)-I also thought his answers about payroll were fair and hopefull as opposed to the parsed statements.  Media training works, it really does!!

 https://tinyurl.com/mrp9utjy

I think Meoli like many in the fan base connect payroll with winning.    The O's don't appear to do that.     Angelos/Elias equate having a system that generates high quality baseball players with winning.  And that generation comes from the investment in drafting, building as international system,  and developing players.   They  put their money there rather than in the FA market.  FAs are merely stop gaps  to be replaced by prospects. That is the Tampa model.  

Angelos appears be more interested in real estate development than the inter workings of building the baseball team.  He hired Elias and winning the World Series in Elias problem.  Thankfully,  Angelos appears to be hands off  the baseball interworking.   And Elias seems up to the task.

Edited February 20, 2023 by wildcard

[Frobby]

46 minutes ago, SemperFi said:

Attached is an article from Meoli which I think fairly challenges JA on a number of issues, embedded within is the whole press conference-if you have time it's worth watching as opposed to the parsed statements from it.  As much as I pillorized him as a condescending bully from the MLK event in this he comes across as bright, personable and likeable (IMO)-I also thought his answers about payroll were fair and hopefull as opposed to the parsed statements.  Media training works, it really does!!

 https://tinyurl.com/mrp9utjy

Just watched the whole thing.   Nothing he said offended or bothered me, but man is he circular-talking and long-winded.   

[Tony-OH]

2 hours ago, Frobby said:

Let’s say the O’s win the WS in 2025.   Will people still be picking apart everything John Angelos says?   I’m not defending the man, or predicting a WS win.  Just wondering whether people would stop criticizing everything he says and instead see him as the guy who oversaw the building of a team that won the WS.   Or, would they say the O’s won despite him?

If they win and we see that he's added payroll then he will get as much credit as any owner. At the end of the day, the best thing he's done is hire Elias and let him do what he needed to do until this year when I think he gave Elias  lower budget then he was expecting. Now that's my impression based off his "lift off" comment and then watching Elias have to walk back the comment.

Now, it might be on Elias that they didn't spend much and of course I was not particularly happy with how he used his additional expenses this season by signing an unneeded (in my opinion) Frazier. 

I agree with people that Angelos wants a legacy and right now his legacy, and that of his father, is of privilege and failure as owners. If the Orioles win a World Series though, he gets the ownership credit for hiring Elias and ultimately providing the funds to make it happen. I don't see anyone could not give him credit if they do win the Wolrd Series under his ownership.

[Tony-OH]

1 hour ago, Hank Scorpio said:

Look, this guy is kind of in a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation. I am sympathetic to that only because he is a different person than his old man. He has allowed Elias to do a lot of (in his mind) out of the box stuff. The last 5 years are DEFINITELY not something PGA would have overseen.

I agree he has done things different than his father. That is the one thing that can not be argued because of his hiring of Elias and allowing him to run things as he sees fit, or at least within budget. 

I don't like much about the guy, but I don't need to like the owner to be a fan of the team. At the end of the day, if he provides the funds so Elias can add/keep the necessary pieces then he's doing his job. Then it will be on Elias to build a true World Series contender and stop bringing in players that need comebacks to get them there.

[Tony-OH]

52 minutes ago, Too Tall said:

Here's where I am. In 1954 the Orioles were bad. They didn't start winning until 1960. There was a progression of improvement throughout the organization driven by some really good general managers. The team in 1960 had a mix of veterans and some real good youngsters - particularly in the infield. Their third base guy is a Hall of Famer! There was also the start of an influx of young pitching. I know times are different, but it does sound familiar. For the next two decades plus, the Orioles were relevant. A model if you would. 

I look at this team and dream that History Repeats Itself. I refuse to get all hot and bothered about ownership because I can't do anything about that except complain and that is like as we use to say in the duck blind, "pissing into the wind." 

My wish for many of you that weren't around during those years of relevance, is that History does repeat itself. That was a heck of an era. 

 

Unfortunately you are talking apples and oranges when it comes to building a team in the pre free agency era and now.