sO many questions

wayward O went to Outers Bankses for vacations. there were many waves, grilled meats and pretty girls in bikinis. Os did not technically lose single game while wayward O took summer hiatus from grind of life! sure they losed silly 'suspended game' but loss counts for june 28. and they had decency to wait until wayward O was back in big apple to lose yesterday.

if you are Orioles fan and don't like to miss ballgames, and still wish to avoid family strife, outer banks is place for you. Outer Bankses has MASN baseball network on cable television! if there is day game you can say "my tummer hurts" and run back to beach house to sneak in innings while children frolic in surf. not that wayward O has childrens he knows of.

anyway, time on beach looking at stars and god's creations brings so many questions about Orioles to wayward O's mind, such as:

question One: what if entire yankee team were swapped for entire Orioles team?

this is a hypothetical question but friend of wayward O insisted wayward O give answer. wayward O would have slighly MORE TROUBLE rooting for damon, the traitor, clemens, etc. than he would rooting for current orioles squad wearing pinstripes. but wayward O could not stomach yelling "lets go yankees!" so if such an unlikely scenario came to pass wayward O would probably just root for NEW YORK METS. wayward O follows mets pretty close-like here in NYC and they have nice team with all prerequsites wayward O requires: good manager, good free agent signings and promising young players. simple, no?

question two: have orioles finally turned corner?

dare we hope that post all-star team is the team we can expect to see for next 18 months? they sure look like a good team. wayward O never found himself regretting john maine trade more than he did this past week, however. answer ... could be maybe. hopefully.

question three: could wayward O be any more tired of cal ripken hype?

nO.

question four: is trembley da man?

two weeks ago, wayward O gave qualified 'maybe' as answer; now it feels more like qualified 'yes.'

nevermind the answer, what's the questiOn?

riding high on monday ... shot down in may. that's life!

wayward O doesn't like losing to mariners anymore but big vacation is on way. blogging will be light.

sometimes after a few days away from workplace, wayward O has deep thoughts. for example:

What is meaning of life?

much like late douglas adams in his book 'hitchhiker's guide to galaxy,' orioles beer man has come up with likely answer:



that's right. six times seven is forty-two. forty-two is answer. now what is question?

while you are working on question, please take to heart another important beer man quote:

"Keep th' party goin, man"

it cOuld happen...

so thrilling that agent steinz first printed below entry complete with key illustrationz -- wayward O will guest bog for you any times!! entry re-printed below for sake of posterity but you should not read here. should read on steinz's blog ... SO MUCH BETTER THERE.

wayward O had epic, feature-length dream! -- set just weeks in future and ending in early october 2008 -- in which he was back living in DC.

wayward O was driving to camden for baseball game! honda was cruising north on bw parkway, a/c battling late july heat. orioles had just traded fireballer daniel cabrera to texas for mark texeira throwing in jay gibbons and $3 million to play string at first base for rangers.

buzz was loud in crabtown!

puffy clouds danced over dundalk!

my friend todd was sending absurd text messages about how great owner angelos now is!

not even peyton manning showing up at minicamp could bump baseball from radio!

then bulletin came over airwaves ... orioles had made yet another deal, this time with nationals: orioles were sending melvin mora and first-round draft pick matt wieters to nationals for ryan zimmerman. mora waived no-trade clause because of proximity of dc club to quintuplets and desire to play head-to-head against other venezuelan third baseman in NL East, miguel cabrera, in order to finally find out who's real hugo chavez of hot corner-istas.

with adam loewen coming back, the rent-a-pen finding its feet and with orioles lineup now including zimmerman and texeira, orioles were starting to hammer on all cylinders at end of 2007 and ... wow the future was bright for 2008.

even corey patterson was getting on base!!!!

like wayward O said, this was a dream...

wayward O's dream extended into off-season and more surprises were in store: washington nationals' newly healed first baseman nick johnson and 2007 comeback player of year dmitri young holed up in a super-intensive baseball & fitness camp and both came back ripped, taut and ready for 2008 DC campaign. also ross detweiler made huge strides in offseason, john
patterson spent winter in mothering hut and came back ready and chad cordero decided nationals' baseball was in his blood and decided to sign, flat brim and all, for another contract go around.

as wayward O snoozed away, and 2008 season started in his dreamz, things started to get interesting. orioles were hammering away at hideous, depleted yankee organization, hanging tough with boston and finally getting interleague wins.

even more of a dream-land surprise were nats, with melvin "something to prove again" mora playing hard, nick and dmitri hitting home runs and pitching staff locking down games, nats were out to a hot start vs. oldsters on mets and phillies and also holding own with rest of National League.

regular season interleague matchups between the two teams were getting lots of play in national media! FOX even took on on television! there was a BIG TO-DO over an alleged "hand gesture" mora may or may not have made at the fans way back in section 80 of camden after chants of "melmo" reached peak during rubber match.

by july 2008 it was really starting to get a bit crazy in the bw corridor. all-star game featured many orioles and nationals! brian roberts, young, texeira and patterson to name a few. Os were solidly ahead in AL East and looking to cruise into playoffs. and nats too were walking on air, well
ahead of weak NL East competitors and thinking about october. manny acta and dave trembley were pleasant surprises and cultivated aura of pride and winning.

spots yackers tony kornheiser, tom boswell and peter schmuck were all terrified to even mention the possibility .... of a fall classic featuring each heretofore lowly team.

only downside from Os perspective of sending wieters to nats was wieters was proving himself to be a natural. if ramon hernandez weren't having a big walk year, disappointment would be palpable in land of pleasant living. nevertheless there was lots of grumbling from Os curmudgeons on roch kubatko's blog!!

wayward O starts awake as horn honking rattles brooklyn street ... drinks blue gatorade and promptly falls back asleep a few weeks later on in dream...

dream picks up with Os having vanquished mariners in wild card, a la 1997, and having topped angels in epic ALCS that went six games and featured nick markakis in a night-time mission to have special tzadziki plate blessed by greek gods and feeding magic sauce to pitcher erik bedard, who K's sixteen angels in amazing game four in anaheim, putting Os up three games to one. but that's not all, mora and his amazing nationals dispose of milwaukee brewers in first round and then melvin bats .430 in NLCS vs. hated marlins with four home runs and 12 rbis to propel nats to sweep. and now, in dream of course, there is only one thing left to come....

BALTIMORES MEET WASHINGTONS IN WORLD SERIES.

fox sets up cameras. jeannie zelasko puts chopsticks in hair to affect
new-style look. kevin kennedy sets up shop at top of waterfront marriott
with case of bourbon and dominos hotline and amber theoharris' head
continues to grow physically larger with each passing moment as baseball
world turns laser focus on

HIGHLY IMPROBABLE FALL CLASSIC

john "kick 'em when they're down" kruk says world series is "illegitimate" and refuses to anchor baseball tonight desk until yankees and cardinals start winning again.

(nobody misses him)

angelos is finally seen in public for first time since 1998. he orders "SHOTS for everybody" at harborplace philipps crab restaurant but then refuses to pay bill, saying outburst did not amount to binding, legal contract.

sure enough ... on 4 october 2008, the first pitch in the Baltimore Orioles vs. Washington National World Series is thrown!

wayward O wakes as alarm clocks sounds ... and dream vanishes like a genie who's just been insulted by an upstart bottle-rubber. he rubs eyes, pours cup of coffee and wonders ....... WHO WOULD HAVE WON?

revisionist histOry

man. all-star break is longest three days ever isn't it? wayward O thought about posting a 'state of Os' report but so many others have done that! no need to repeat about how jay gibbons cannot hit baseball!

so instead wayward O has very special treat. please enjoy timely email interview with lifelong baseball fan who was "dere" when Dodgers left Brooklyn and who begs to differ with those currently floating revisionist idea that Robert Moses was actually greatest villain.

without further ado:

the wayward O: There is a lot of sportsyack in Big Apple this week about HBO show about Brooklyn Dodgers. From what I understand about show, Robert Moses is new goat and Walter O'Malley and former Mayor Wagner are being touted as victims of a planner with too much power who had a vision for baseball in Flushing, Queens. Wachoo say?

sponsort: The record is clear - as early as 1953 O'Malley was conspiring to move da Bums. He nearly had a deal with Minneapolis but reneged (which is why they later got the Senators). He bought the land for Dodger Stadium secretly. He is, indisputably, the villain of the story who broke the hearts of several generations. And you could look it up.

t.w.O.: So you're saying even as O'Malley pleaded with NYC for new stadium, he was laying groundwork to build own stadium in California, right? And it follows that he could easily have:

1) torn down Ebbetts
2) played for a year or two somewhere nearby while new stadium went up
3) moved back in to new park on old site

Since he had money to build in L.A.

sponsort: The record that has come out since the move shows clearly that O'Malley was stringing Brooklyn along for years. Oh sure - if NYC had come up with a mammoth sweetheart deal, he could have dumped the Chavez Ravine site in L.A. (just like he did the site in Minneapolis). Peter Goldenbock's book "Bums" documented all this more than a decade ago (along with the infamous agreement by L.A. officials to keep quiet about all of it so as not to rule up the fans in Brooklyn).

I think the height of O'Malley's perfidy was convincing the owner of the NY [Baseball] Giants (Horace Stoneham) to announce that he was moving the Giants to S.F. before the Dodgers announced and BEFORE STONEHAM EVEN KNEW WHERE THE GIANTS WOULD PLAY. Of course S.F. ended up with a terrible deal, and a lousy stadium (Candlestick) and has never won a WS. As far as logistics goes, O'Malley already had the Dodgers playing some regular season games in Jersey City as early as '55 or '56 (not sure of exact date).

And since the Dodgers were only drawing 20,000 or less at Ebbett's Field, he wasn't losing any money by doing so. I don't recall that tearing down the old park and re-building was ever a viable option. Ebbett's Field stood on a tiny space with no parking at all.

I believe that everyone agreed a new site was needed. As far as money goes, recall that O'Malley got an amazing deal in L.A. As I recall, he basically got the land for free and had to pay only for the stadium construction. And while we are on the O'Malley topic (in this Jackie Robinson anniversary year) remember that he is the man who traded Jackie to the Giants in '57. Luckily for all that is decent Jackie retired instead.

t.w.O.: So, how do you think Rob't Moses fits into puzzle? Was it a situation where each man used other man and each gave own version of events? Moses clearly did not want O'Malley to built new park at Flatbush & Atlantic ... others are still fighting over that site to this day.

sponsort: I do not know any details of the role of Moses. I know from my reading that he was in the mix, and that he was a supreme egoist. For that reason I suspect that he would have loved to keep one or both of the National League teams somewhere in NYC. What I really DO know is that O'Malley smelled $$ on the West Coast (the arrival of cross country flights in the late 1950s made travel feasible). He wanted to be the first, but in order to succeed he had to become a traitor to Brooklyn. And he was - with malice aforethought, and he took Willie Mays and the Gi'nts along for the ride.

t.w.O.: I think it may be a case where both men are villains. I tend to think Moses thought a new Dodger stadium in Brooklyn would compromise his vision for the huge complex in Flushing, Queens, which now includes Shea and the Tennis Center.

sponsort: Sorry, but I can not defend the idea that both were villains - Moses was trying to keep the Dodgers in NY. Instead of moving the Dodgers a few miles east O'Malley moved them 3,000 miles west .

What's wrong with this picture? I think I just figured out what's going on here. L.A. apologists have been lobbying to put O'Malley into the Hall of Fame (Executive Wing).

They believe that his "leadership" in bringing baseball to the West Coast makes him deserving (even though baseball on the West Coast was going to happen in any event). [It's] probably part of a campaign to rehabilitate O'Malley and get him elected to the H.o.F. Well it WON'T WORK and will be OVER OUR DEAD BODIES!

pay that man his mOney

let's talk about erik bedard.

wayward O didn't want to bring this up this year. he wanted to wait until next year when Orioles have good record. but with 15-K domination of rangers last night, eriK moves lifetime record to 34-33, all with orioles, who have been losing team over same span.

my friends, eriK isn't looking back ... win total will move way beyond where it currently stands.

wayward O has grown used to watching eriK pitch and desperately hopes Orioles are smart enough to keep him. despite taciturn demeanor, erik is a solid dude, very smart, and plays hard. is there storm inside mind of canadian pitcher? perhaps. perhaps not. the lengthy time off in 2005 because of injury still sticks in back of wayward O's mind as black spot on resume -- but that's the only one. and one must give him courtesy of understanding he's young and has plenty of room and leeway to mature.

so it's time for a 4-year, $60 million contract offer; lock him up through 2011 now. show him he's valued and he's not going to be traded and orioles are going to make a winner around him.

to naysayers on baltimore blogs, who suggest that bedard isn't a tough guy, wayward O simply says: you are bitter, absurd and probably drunk.

bedard is real deal.

turn up the radiO

so exciting to be on radio with michael popovec on AM 1570 in baltimore tonight!

wayward O enjoyed it immensely and will definitely be back!

will post audio recap here if it can be found.

edgar allen pOe

this poem's for the trait'ros moose
who left for yankees over pay
we love to see mussina lose
it should happen every day

he never really had ferocity
although he is a wily one
now he seems to lack velocity
his time in baseball's almost done

sunday it was jason kubel
his homer satisfying
mike can buy the kit 'n' kaboodle
but money will not buy a ring

take the mound and lose the game
and give the ball to mister torre
don't forget this sweet refrain
you belonged in balti-morey

O you belonged in balti-morey!

tell 'em wayward O sent ya

orioles are battling hard!

ump made a bad call sunday as mora snuck under tag versus angels. but jay payton was probably late to base on bunt single. so wayward O supposes calls cancel out. anyway it was just latest bad call that went against team and cost them a win.

sunday's game at camden was exciting, fun and well-paced. not to mention beautiful; golden sunlight and blue sky; puffy clouds dancing over the land of pleasant living. and word is organization has dialed back beer prices slightly. not so much for dippin dots; tasty but pricey!

AP photo shows determination on jay's face!

then last night bedard struggled and right after wayward O lost WHFS signal (all the way up in New Jersey, can you believe it?) Os fell behind chisox and wayward O wondered if all the bad calls were finally catching up with team again and demoralizing them.

it was not until a bit later when wayward brO sent text message that wayward O suspected something was up. and sure as you're hatched, Os finally finally made late-inning comeback and put one more nail in Ozzie's coffin on south side of chicago.

cOrey patterson has to be player of game last night. get on base and keep on running dood! wayward O just hopes somehow corey can pick up the pace enough to have Orioles keep him on team. he's really something in center field.

and the closer too ... capped off a great night monday night by bullpen. chris ray probably sat down, watched 'caddyshack', and found his eternal consciousness.

so he's got that going for him. which is nice.