I’m Celebrating Twenty (Plus?) Years of Hanging Out!

[ChipTait]

You and Drungo are posters 1 & 1a for me.  I've been a dues-paying lurker for 19 years or so, and really look forward to the topics you start.  I don't post much due to the fact that I have no natural insight for player evaluation, but I sure do appreciate all the work that Tony and the gang put into keeping this place going.

Cheers!

 

 

[foxfield]

Congrats Frobby. And everyone else. Let’s toast to keeping it going for 20+ more years. And see if we can add a title to the collection in the next score. 
 

And of course thanks Tony!!

[Chaka Garcia]

I been lurker for the last 20 years and even done OH website updates during the early years. Plus game outings with the initial staff John-OH and Drungo. 

Edited December 11, 2023 by Chaka Garcia

[Jim'sKid26]

@Tony-OH when did the original board start? I think I remember reading it during the 1997 season but that could be a hallucination. I was a first year cardiology fellow at NNMC Bethesda then and didn't sleep much. I have distant memories of late nights spent in the hospital scanning the OH for Orioles info. I had a different screen name back then.

 

Oh, Happy anniversary, @Frobby

Edited December 11, 2023 by Jim'sKid26

[Tony-OH]

4 hours ago, Jim'sKid26 said:

@Tony-OH when did the original board start? I think I remember reading it during the 1997 season but that could be a hallucination. I was a first year cardiology fellow at NNMC Bethesda then and didn't sleep much. I have distant memories of late nights spent in the hospital scanning the OH for Orioles info. I had a different screen name back then.

 

Oh, Happy anniversary, @Frobby

There was a few different iterations of the board, but I do think I had the first one started up in 1997 or 1998. I know it was pretty popular by the time 2000 rolled around because that's when we went under the Rivals network.

[Sports Guy]

10 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

There was a few different iterations of the board, but I do think I had the first one started up in 1997 or 1998. I know it was pretty popular by the time 2000 rolled around because that's when we went under the Rivals network.

Yea I was aware of right around 2000/2001.

[Tony-OH]

On 12/10/2023 at 9:09 AM, Frobby said:

According to my poster profile, I joined the Hangout on December 10, 2003.  So that makes today my 20th anniversary as a Hangout member.  

Now, I actually don’t believe that’s quite right.   In my memory, I joined the Hangout in the last days of the 2003 season.  Then, when Tony created Plus memberships in December of that year, I signed up for that.  But whatever.  Officially, today is my 20th anniversary.

The Hangout has seen a ton of changes in those 20 years.   A few managing editors have come and gone (and I still miss weams terribly), site writers have come and gone, and some prolific posters have come and gone (and in SG’s case, have come back again).   The whole framework for discussion is different.   WAR existed in some dark corners of the internet but most people (me included) had never heard of it.  Moneyball  was published that year and its concepts like the importance of OBP and fielding-independent pitching metrics were just entering public consciousness.   BB-ref existed but was a little-used resource that not many people were aware of and didn’t have nearly the information and functionality it has today.  Fangraphs did not exist.   Nobody talked about spin rate, or launch angle, exit velocity or dozens of other metrics we talk about all the time.

But two things have remained constant throughout those 20 years:

1.  @Tony-OHhas seen to it that the site provides the most detailed and best-researched information on Orioles’ minor league prospects of any site on the internet.  In fact, that was what brought me to Orioles Hangout in the first place, a couple of years before I even realized there was a message board here.  I’d pop over a few times a year reading things like Tony’s comments on Erik Bedard when he was at Frederick, and the exploits of players like Tim Raines, Jr., Keith Reed and Eddie Rogers.  There was absolutely no better place to go for O’s minor league information then, and though there’s a lot more competition today, OH still reigns supreme.

2.  There’s no better place to discuss all facets of Orioles’ baseball with knowledgeable fans.  I know so much more than I used to about the intricacies of the game and the team thanks to the posters here.  And I can’t count the number of times that I had an opinion on some issue about the team and got talked out of it by good information provided by other posters.  

Anyway, it’s been a great 20 years for me and I hope I’m still on here arguing about the 2043 team 20 years from now!  Thanks to Tony and everyone else who makes this a great place to Hang Out!

 
 

Thanks Rick. 

You are such a huge part of our message board community then and now and I'm glad you've made this your online home! 

[NCRaven]

My internet home is an Onlyfans page.

[ChipTait]

On 12/11/2023 at 6:56 PM, Tony-OH said:

There was a few different iterations of the board, but I do think I had the first one started up in 1997 or 1998. I know it was pretty popular by the time 2000 rolled around because that's when we went under the Rivals network.

I found the OH in 1998.  That was when I first bought a computer to use in my home!  My neighborhood was a test market for this new thing called "broadband internet." so I thought, what the heck, let's give it a try.  

[Tony-OH]

5 hours ago, ChipTait said:

I found the OH in 1998.  That was when I first bought a computer to use in my home!  My neighborhood was a test market for this new thing called "broadband internet." so I thought, what the heck, let's give it a try.  

Awesome. Only two years after I started it so you count is one the OGs.

[Satyr3206]

I think it was 2005 when I started lurking. I think it was 2008 when I got a plus membership.

[nevadaO]

On 12/11/2023 at 6:56 PM, Tony-OH said:

There was a few different iterations of the board, but I do think I had the first one started up in 1997 or 1998. I know it was pretty popular by the time 2000 rolled around because that's when we went under the Rivals network.

I found you all in 1999 after moving to NC for college (and no longer able to get to watch any games). I was under a different username which I don't even remember what it was but the discussions back then between AmaralFan and the board and the strange opinions of JantheMan were always a good time