Luke Jones and Nestor discuss the baseball disaster of 2025 Baltimore Orioles and what comes next

Luke Jones and Nestor discuss the baseball disaster of 2025 Baltimore Orioles and what comes next

Welcome home. We are WNST AM1570 of Baltimore. We are Baltimore positive. I promise we will get to the exclusive on all things NFL scheduling and the uh Buffalo Bills on the kickoff. We’re going to talk a little baseball here. Why? I don’t know. Because I send Luke down to the ballpark and they let him in. They don’t let me in. Maybe it’s a good idea they don’t let me in. I know you’re down there witnessing what is I I I don’t even know what to call this implosion, but you said last week you’ve never heard the fans angrier, the second game of the double header on Wednesday. I’m sitting here with my cat watching it, getting gussied up for Pat Benitar because I have to look good when I see her. Uh I I don’t even know what to say. There’s nobody at the ballpark. They played the games at odd times, so there’s nobody at the ballpark to try to get the game in with the rain. They played two games. They lost them both. I’m not sure who was watching at home, who’s listening at home. There weren’t many people there. You’re being compensated to be there. You and the ushers, I guess. Um, I don’t know what to make of this, man. I mean, it’s May. It’s pnness week. Uh, I’ve I’ve done a lot of pness this week. There’s a big golf tournament this weekend. There’s all I’ll be out in Vegas. The city’s about to go to sleep on this baseball team if they’re not already. Luke, yeah, you’re going to get no argument from me. I mean, you’re 15 and 26 a quarter of the way through the season. You’re on pace to lose a 100 games. There’s very, very little evidence of life other than a couple players here and there. Um, you know, they still have guys on the injured list. I mean, Jordan Westber had a setback and doesn’t sound like he’s particularly close to being back with the hamstring. Uh, they did get Ramon Reas back. Colton Cowser’s starting to do some baseball activity, but his return isn’t imminent. They stink. I And you know me, man. I I’m not one to to to to try to get a reaction out of anyone. This baseball team stinks. And we’re a quarter of the way through. We’re less than two weeks from Memorial Day at this point where that’s traditionally the the checkpoint to to start saying it’s not early anymore and you need to start either evaluating or re-evaluating what you think about any given club, good, bad, or indifferent. Uh but you just said it, this team has dug itself such a hole on the heels of an underwhelming off season. And and let’s let’s stop calling it an underwhelming offseason. It was a horrible off season. Michael has spent $72.5 million for what has been replacement level production from Tyler O’Neal, Charlie Morton, Gary Sanchez, Raone Lauraniano, Kyle Gibson. Sagano has been the bright spot of course, but he doesn’t make up for everything else that’s gone wrong in that group. Well, you spend that much money, something has to go right, I would think, right? I mean, you’re talking about one out of four, right? Kind of. Sort of, right? I just named seven guys. It’s been one out of seven. I mean, but but big money. But but decisions, if you’re talking about Colom and there’s been plenty of decisions in the war. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we’ve seen Danny Koul continue to throw scoreless make scoreless appearances against the Orioles, you know, Danny Koul uh you know, he he chose CNL Perez. Well, he saved $2.5 million, I think it was. And CNL Perez is the guy that probably should go next as it pertains to their bullpen even before Charlie Morton at at this point. But I mean, this is just bad. It’s really bad. And at some point in time, and we’ve talked about this, we’ve talked about Brandon Hyde, we’ve talked about the hitting coaches, you can’t continue to be this poor and not make changes. And I’m not necessarily even just talking about Brandon Hyde specifically, just in in a general sense. Well, Money Banks isn’t sitting behind home plate now. He likes being the owner when there’s a bobblehead and he gets to hang out with Cal Ripken and be the billionaire. But then when decisions are time to be made, I can’t find the Whistler. I can’t find Mark Fine. I can’t find Katie Griggs. They they stand hide up in front of it, which is what the textbook tells them to do. One voice. One voice. One voice. It’s the manager. One voice. That’s sports. That’s That’s what Chad Steel would tell you, so it must be true. Um, one voice. Well, he’s the voice right now, and it’s not a very strong one. It really isn’t right now out in front of this. Yeah. Well, and I mean, I’m sure we’re going to hear from Michaelas here again at some point, but I I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s this weekend. uh what’s he going to say uh at this point? But actions speak louder than words. And they can keep telling you that, you know, things haven’t gone to plan and they’ve got injuries. And look, plenty of that’s true, but this is this is a disaster of a season. I mean, this is this is heading towards, to your point, not just an an not just anger from the fans, complete indifference. And yeah, I mean, obviously the double header almost. Yeah. The opposite of love’s not hate. It’s indifference. Yeah. And obviously with the weather being what it is this week, I mean it was a strange scenario as far as having to play a double header. They, you know, the the rain whether it it came to fruition or not Wednesday evening had been in the forecast. So they were very much in a position where they wanted to try to get both games in and that probably wasn’t going to happen at least in their minds or that was in danger of not happening without moving it up. As a result, you had a series that didn’t have a whole lot of juice anyway from a fan interest standpoint, you know, when you’re talking about the Minnesota Twins who, you know, have kind of done what the Orioles need to do at this point. I mean, they got off to a bad start and they they’ve reeled off this long winning streak and uh they’re right back in the thick of it in the AL Central. But I thought worse for the the the poor girl that had to sing the national anthem at 5 after 12 and there were about 300 people there, right? like you look forward to the you know like you get the gig, you get the assignment, they move the game, you take off from work or whatever she had to do and she’s there and she’s singing a national anthem for like a soundcheck because there was like no one at the ballpark most of the day and I’m watching it and I’m thinking this is just sad. I’ve watched empty ballparks for years during co I saw Angelos play a game down there where tanks were circling the building. I’ve seen but this is like supposed to be a season of promise, you know. I It’s pnness week. It’s springtime. I mean, people now are pissed that they’ve given them money. You know, on on my list, I’m getting that. I put $1,000 on my Birdland thing. I’ve used $200 of it on opening day and I don’t want to go back down there. Like, I’m seeing that. And like Katie Griggs isn’t answering to me. Mark Fine, none of these people. They’re They might as well be Angelos. This is terrible. This is awful. And I do not want to bismerch these new people. I tried to welcome them with open arms. And so I don’t even know like where to even go as a fan, as a media member, as a what are you doing? Where’s the ownership? Where’s the leadership? I don’t know these people. These people don’t care to know most of anybody really. And now they’re hiding. And there’s 1,400 people in the stadium. And they’re going to play again this afternoon. And it’s gonna be better, I guess, because they sold some tickets, but like the season is like over and it’s May and nobody’s done it. To your point, there’s been no action. There’s been no leadership. Leadership is what I’m talking about here. Where’s Cal? People are asking that now. Cal don’t want to s Nobody wants to be associated with 12 games under 500 in May. Sure. Sure. Um, I mean, I don’t know what anyone wants to hear from David Rubenstein at this point. I mean, unless you’re so convinced that they need to fire Mike Elias and Brandon Hyde yesterday, you know, Michaelas is going to be the face person for this right now. Right now in in miday, not saying come the second half, not certainly not saying after the season all of that. So, I hear exactly what you’re saying, but at the same time, there’s also the here and the now. And if you just continue to not make any changes, this tells me that, you know, you think everything’s fine and you’re just not getting the right results. You’re you’re just unlucky. You know, you’re just I I don’t know, man. I I mean, it’s even the most pessimistic about their off season, no one saw this coming. Not this. I mean, unless you actually just thought all these young players just weren’t any good and that this whole thing was a, you know, that 2023 was a complete fluke and the first half of last year was a fluke. No one saw it being this bad. But that said, here we are. And, you know, for for me, the question isn’t so much, you know, who needs to go. I’m I’m trying to identify what actually needs to stay in place at this point in time. Uh, I mean, go down the list of just their young core right now. Gunnar Henderson’s looking like Gunnar Henderson again. He’s been fantastic over the last week to 10 days. Looks like himself again. The numbers are looking much more Gunner-like. Is he at the level he was first half of last year necessarily? No. But he’s putting up excellent numbers. So, we’ve seen that. Jackson Holiday, while he’s not a superstar or an all-star just yet, I at least feel like he’s on track. He’s trending up as the kids like to call it these. Oh, he’s healthy. He’s hitting the ball. He’s running the bases. He’s fielding his position. He’s 22 2 one 21 21. Right. Okay. But Jordan Westber and Colton Cowser are hurt. H Kerstad’s gotten plenty of time to play. H Kerstad’s 26 years old. H Kerstad at this point in time. I’m not ready to give up on him. Let me be clear about that cuz who the heck’s going to play as an alternative anyway? But he’s got a 626 OPS going into the finale of this series. I mean, that’s that’s not a anything close to resembling a starting Major League Baseball player. Uh I mean, Adley Rutman, my goodness, he went from being better than Matt Weeders ever was to being worse than Matt Weeders ever was in about a year’s time. And believe me, I’ve looked at the peripheral stats just like everyone else. The underlying stats suggest he should be doing better. The underlying stats do suggest that he’s been better in terms of drawing walks and things of that nature. Much better than he was in the second half of last year. So, I don’t think it’s necessarily just a a straight plain basic continuation of what happened last year. But, he’s still not producing. He’s still producing at a level where he’s closer to replacement level than an all-star, let alone the MVP candidate that people thought he was going to be and had looked like he was going to be his first couple years. And I hate to put it on one player, and it’s not just on Adley Rutman, let me be clear. But at the same time, we were all very eager to talk about how his arrival coincided with the turnaround. Well, his absolute collapse being a productive player has also coincided with them completely falling apart since late June of last season. So, what is going on with him? I I mean, I I I said this less than a week ago, I think it was. I mean, all of our conversations at this point run together because we’re talking about the same things over and over and over. No, some days it’s the pitching and some days it’s the hitting, and some days it’s just bad baseball in general. Some days it’s the base running. Yeah. But I said I if if I were Mike Elias right now, my question, my main objective would not be how am I salvaging the 2025 season cuz that’s already circling the drain to a a massive degree at this point in time and it’s getting worse. That’s not my objective. My objective is what the heck do I need to do? What the heck does the organization need to do to get this talented young core back on track? And if that means a new manager, so be it. If that means new hitting coaches, so be it. If that means So you’re saying, hold on. Rutman’s more talented as a player than Hyde is as a manager. We need to get more out of the play, thousand%. I mean, I I would and I would say that I would always say that, Nester. I mean, look, I’m not saying this is all Brandon Hyde’s fault by any means. We’ve all established this off season was what it was, a disaster. But that said, do I think Brandon Hyde is Earl Weaver or Casey Stangle or Bobby Cox or name your Hall of Fame manager that you want to throw out there? No. And I’d say that about most managers. At the same time, doesn’t mean I’m saying it’s negligence or that Brandon Hyde suddenly became an idiot. Uh, you know, after previously managing this club to successful seasons the last couple years. at the same time, what what exactly are is he and the other coaches doing that’s getting through like what what are the success stories on this team at this point in time? Again, a few players here and there, but it’s just bad. Everything they do is bad. Their hitting has been wildly disappointing. Their rotation stinks other than the guys at the top, you know, with Efflin and Sagano and Elyn’s been hurt most of the year. Their bullpen, which was solid over the first three weeks of the season, has been utterly terrible since then. I mean, who do you trust in the bullpen right now? Felix Batista, Brian Baker. And Batista, of course, has some limitations right now as far as when you can throw him. Brian Baker. I I mean, I I I saw a few people complain about Keegan Aken being in the game late in game one and saying, “Why why didn’t you have a better reliever in there?” Keegan Aken’s been one of their best relievers and and and that’s part of the problem. Not not a knock on Keegan Aken, but if you’re talking about him as one of your three best relievers, that that speaks to the state of your bullpen. I mean, Canó’s been bad. Sir Anthony Dominguez has been bad. Gregory Sodto has been bad. I’ve already mentioned CNL Perez, you wonder how much longer he’s going to be on the roster. He’s been so bad. you know, they they even on on Wednesday, they actually got a a quality outing from Charlie Morton. You know, solo homer aside, he he pitched pretty well over three innings and and gave them a chance and bridged the gap to the late innings and the bullpen still couldn’t hold it. So, I mean, I just you go down the list of the charge on Elias would be there’s no pitching and there’s no pitching coming and there was no pitching drafted. That really is if David Rubenstein understood anything about baseball and he doesn’t and this is going to be his decision. I keep going back to this. We’re back to Peter again. We’re back to a guy who’s a billionaire running around running his ego. Doesn’t know much about baseball, but likes to hang out and rub elbows with famous people and have a bobblehead. This is going to be the guy making the decision on baseball because at some point if you don’t like Mike Elias and you’re upset about him, they’re going to have to hire in that position. Yeah. And they’re going to have to hire everything down again in that position if you don’t like the way this is going. He just hired Katie Griggs. He’s decided to keep Craig Bader running around running the television network. I I I I all of it is so odious at this point and shocking to me because I thought if nothing else, this new breath of ownership and these new people and this new money and the smart baseball guy and this young rebuild that they put together, which is really a tank. I mean, we could call it whatever we want. when you’re trying to lose every year for five years and you know you’re going to lose and your promises you’re going to lose and your deliverable is going to be Tolton Cowser Adley Rutman Hston Kurs that Henderson was even one of the guys he wasn’t one of the guys they got because they stunk they could have gotten him at any point they could they could have finished 10th best in the league and drafted him. Um but that what they used with that collateral all of that losing was about five or six players. Mhm. the rest of them. If I take you in the second round, I didn’t lose a year to get you. If I take you in a with a sandwich pick, I didn’t lose for I lost for a year to get Adley Rutman or Bobby Wit or Ben McDonald or BJ. Go through the list of one ones, whoever they are. Pick them all. And that’s what the losing was about. If the promise is about anything more than that, it’s [ __ ] It just is. You you you become that bad. Ask the NBA. Ask the NHL. Ask the NFL. You You become that bad to get the best player that you possibly can get. Not the 19th best player, the 23rd best, the best player. That’s the only pro. That’s the only thing you get for 162 games of trash. And that has to work. That that dog has to hunt. That plane has to fly. And right now it’s Adley Rutman and it’s not. Yeah. And and let’s be let’s clarify and let’s be fair. They did not tank for Adley Rutman. 2018 was not a tank. That was That’s right. They tried. They got Ad was the previous regime. So, but so even if you know, even if we are splitting hairs and its semantics as far as the tank and all that, they got to the point where the organization had burned itself to the ground deliberately or not. I mean, it’s where it was in 2018. But certainly, Michaelas continued on that same course then over the next few years. We know all that. But that’s why I I I’ve continued to say for the rest of this year from this point forward, how do you get those young guys back on track? Because if if this truly if if all you do net is Gunner Henderson and Jackson Holiday, and obviously I’m being not ready to give up on any of those other guys. Let’s be very clear. I’m not ready to give up on the Orioles in the sense of getting back on track for 2026 and beyond. Well, by the way, when Moneybags looks down at at the ledger sheet for next year and beyond, they haven’t spent a lot of money. They still, you know what I mean? They haven’t committed big money. Committed long-term money. Sure. Sure. I mean, that’s one thing that they have on the business side that Rubenstein would look at and say, “Well, if I blow the whole thing up and we bring in new leadership, I don’t have Chris Davis money on a ledger or Bobby Benia money.” about all you’re going to have is Tyler O’Neal who’s at this point, unless he has an unbelievable final four months, he’s not going to opt out. I mean, he’s just not. So, but even that, you’re talking about a threeyear $49.5 million deal. That’s not in baseball terms as far as I mean, that that’s a a fraction of even the Chris Davis deal, which is now approaching 10 years. But if you’re giving a guy $20 million and your payroll is going to be 160, you’ve given him an eighth of your payroll and he’s a crappy I I’m I’m foul today. I I want to work blue today. I’m warming up for Mickey. His performance has been awful. I I mean, we don’t have to be personal, but we could call a spade a spade. I mean, he’s batting 197 now. He he played with a bad neck for two weeks, so I’m hoping there’s going to be better, but it hasn’t looked great since he’s returned, albeit in just a handful of games. But I mean, that’s what I said. I mean, Michaelas spent 72.5 million, you know, I think it was 72.25 maybe it was, uh, on those free agents that I rattled off. And Sagano is the only one that you give a definitive two thumbs up to. Lauraniano’s had his a couple moments here and there, but you know, it’s not been very good. And and they also Lauriano got $4 million. I mean, that wasn’t a massive investment anyway, but you look down the averages of of runners in scoring position, how they’ve hit because that’s really the story. I mean, the story is they’re all being paid to produce runs. O’Neal, whatever. O’Neal can go one for five every night. If he drives in two runs with the one hit, it’s a win, right? Like Yeah. Uh, I mean there’s situational hitting really situational hitting is really where they specifically and specifically with him against left-handed pitching. I mean in his career he’s feasted on left-handed pitching. Now he hasn’t, in fairness, we’re not dealing with a a massively big sample size this year for him specifically against left-handed pitching, but it’s it’s awful. Um, I mean, this is why I’ve I’m saying first of all, I’m dumbfounded by it being this bad, right? If you had told me they were 500, if you had told me through 40 or 41 games, like if they were 20 and 21 right now, not that that would be anything to be to celebrate or anyone would be happy about that, but given the state of even, you know, the division, let alone the entire American League, you would still say, you know, the there’s still a lot a pathway here to getting back into this thing and being a wildcard team. Maybe you’re not going to catch the Yankees, but you would view it through that lens. But it’s not just being 15 and 286. It’s not just being 11 games under 500. It’s not just being uh having a woeful run differential like the Orioles do, which run differentials typically predictive uh in terms of, you know, a team’s true talent level and how they’re going to continue to perform. I mean, they’re minus 70. You know, for some perspective, the White Socks, who are the worst team in the American League record-wise, they have a minus 29 run differential. So, the Orioles run differential is marketkedly worse than the White Socks. There there’s only one team in baseball that is definitively overwhelmingly worse than the Orioles right now. It’s the Colorado Rockies who are just historically poor. I mean, 7 and 36. I mean, they’re they’re the 88 Orioles. They’re the 2018 Orioles. Bad’s bad, though. And I think we went through that question like over the last 35 years, if I was sitting with Katie Griggs, I’d say there’s shades of bad. And then there’s this is a different level of promise, disappointment, anger, the new owner, just all of it. All all of it coming back for all of us that have suffered through all of the awfulness, you know, just in a general sense. Mike Flanigan’s names come up three times this week in my presence with people. So like I just the awful awful awful things happen and for me it’s PTSD of watching a baseball game with 1100 people there and thinking about COVID but more than that the tanks and just how bad they were. How many times you went out there in August and nobody was there because they were 41 and 83. You know like and that’s gone on for almost three generations of people here. We’re going back 40 years. I I recently looked at it. So, in the 42 seasons that the Orioles have played since they won the World Series in 1983, and I you know, this is obviously not an overly scientific uh you know, look at this, but of the 42 seasons, there were 27 that I said that were flatout bad, just plain bad, five that I would say were fine. And that’s like graving on grading on a curve in terms of like relative to expectations. Uh and 10 seasons that I would say were good. Now, when I say good, that doesn’t mean playing in the ALCS, of course, because they’ve been to the ALCS three times in the last four decades plus. But 10 seasons where I would say, hey, like 1989, good season. Did they make it to the playoffs? No. But that was a good season, especially relative to what they were in 1988. But when you think about that, I mean, 42 seasons and 27 you would just say were flatout bad or disappointing, five were fine, and then 10 seasons out of 42 you would say are good. Those 27 seasons though, let me let me talk about this for a minute because I’ve been on the air for 35 years, okay? So, I know a little bit about this. those 27 seasons. The problem isn’t it just saying it’s 27 which is just freaking horrible. It’s disgraceful. It really is. It’s in this stadium with what this community’s been through. Disgraceful. Disgraceful. Cal Ripken, Brooks Robinson, Jim Palmer. Disgraceful. What Peter Angelos did to this franchise. what he did to this city that I have to drive by his freaking name on my university when I I last night I was at the Lyric. So, I would just say this, but of those 27 years where they were awful, 26 of them you knew they were going to be awful. Only 1998 was like a year 989 where there smelled like a little bit of promise on the back end of what was really promise and then you realized this guy doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing when you’re seeing Albert Bell out in right field and he’s trying to sue Albert Bell out of a contract like a and we had all smelled what it was by then. And from that moment forward, from 98 forward, I mean, I’ll give you I’ll give you the Buck era for five minutes and the last year and a half of whatever, you know, really the last two seasons, but those 27 years, it’s not 27 years. Do do the math on this, Luke. 27 times 365. Add the leap days in. They didn’t have a prayer in 26 of those years. 26 of those years I had to sit here from the minute the season ended to the minute the season began and say they have no prayer next year and then they begin they get a beatd down on opening day and they’re three and eight and 12 and 19 and just down the line and then the draft happens and the pakness happens and other things happen and they’re not even an entity in the town and that’s why when there’s a rain out on Tuesday night and they play a game on Wednesday early that the businessman special. Everybody doesn’t run to the ballpark because people are out of practice going to the ballpark and all they have left are the people like you and me who’ve suffered through it all and are willing to suffer and watch it again today. There aren’t that many people left. People got [ __ ] to do. They don’t need to do that. They don’t need to sit here and watch this and be tethered to this soap opera that has squeezed very very little juice and and really no pulp, no no nothing to grab on to, especially with except a bobblehead. I mean, it’s it’s it’s outside the bounds of what I signed up for to sit here and talk about this after 30 years of Angelos’s shenanigans and his lies. And now these people are cowards. I’ve called that from jump. They are c they’re going to hide because that’s what they know. They’re all getting paid. They’re all making a lot of money. They’re just going to hide. Brandon Hyde is the only one that can’t hide. He’s got to come out and do a pregame today and a postgame today. All the Gunnar Henderson can hide in a shower. Adley, they can all hide. Mark Fine will help them hide. So will whatever her name is. Jennifer, whatever her name is. Like I I’m It’s It’s beyond the pale for me. Like I’m wondering, we do this professionally and you’re going to go down there every morning. We’re going to talk about Charlie Morton and whatever they’re going to do, but like I don’t know that people are going to listen to it and I don’t know that people are going to buy into it and I think would think by this time next month they’re just going to have other things that they’re doing every day. um other than the really hardcores that have suffered through 27 years where from opening day forward they knew they they knew the team was going to stink and and that that’s really that that’s where this really cuts at the heart of a 56-year-old apparicio is that this was a year where this it wasn’t supposed to be one of those 27 and now it’s 28. Yeah. I mean you’re not going to get any argument from me there. I mean, at this point in time, what are fans looking forward to? It the next bobblehead. No, I mean, it’s not that. It’s at this point in time, and I I may I alluded to this after the last road trip. I mean, at this point, it kind of just feels like everyone’s waiting for something to happen, you know, whether it’s Brandon Hyde, whether it’s the hitting coaches, whether it’s a couple players being designated for assignment. I mean, something along those lines. And that’s nice. A pound of flesh is great, but that’s not going to fix it. That’s not the solution. Well, that’s well that’s why but that’s why I said but hey, at the same time, I’m not I can’t sit here and say just because of that that means Brandon High just keeps his job. That the hidden coaches just keep their jobs that you don’t make any changes to your front office, right? Uh I mean because you need to view it through the lens of even if 2025 is shot and it’s close to being shot at this point in time when you look at the pace they’d have to play just to win 85 games which may or may not give you a a you know decent outside chance at the third wild card. say you need to be thinking in terms of 20 26 and you need to be thinking in terms of how the heck are you getting Ali Rutman back on track? How are you getting some of these other young guys back on track? How are you getting guys healthy? I mean, for as much as we talked about the Ravens and Steve Saunders and and everything that they did to revamp their strength and conditioning and and parting ways with him finally and all the injuries. I mean, why does Jordan Westber have a hamstring injury that, you know, first of all, he’s young enough where you’d like to not have soft tissue injuries like that? I I get it. Pitching injuries are everywhere. But what are you doing about it? Are are you just throwing up your hands and just saying, “Well, that’s that’s just how it is.” Or are you working behind the scenes to try to be more cutting edge, to try to figure this out, to see if you need to hire different people, to see if you just need to add new people? Sometimes it’s not always about subtracting. Sometimes it’s just about adding. And that’s why I’ve said, you know, even if even if you don’t want to make someone the scapegoat, that’s not to say you couldn’t bring in another hitting coach. Like, you know, and again, I the joke is they have three hitting coaches. I’m using that as just a simple example here. But why is your team so injured when you’re talking about largely largely younger guys, right? And I’m not even just talking about the pitchers. I mean, okay, Colton Cowser sliding into first base and and breaking his thumb, you know, there’s there’s no injury prevention there other than don’t slide into first base in that scenario, especially the fourth game of the season. Uh, but in the case of Westber, you know, Aras had a hamstring as well. I mean, why are you having hamstrings and things like that, you know, or are you smarter people than me, the Will Carols of the world who look into sports injuries and sports science, things like that, they would tell you that a lot of these soft tissue injuries are preventable. And that’s not to say they never happen, but if you’re having those happen frequently, I saw a player Tory Smith or somebody tweeted preventable injury. Cadre is smile. Kadri is I’m sorry. it was a lot to do with wide receiver and training. Uh, you know, I I asked the Ravens strength coach just a few weeks back, you know, about the fact that they had such a healthy season and now that this rings a little more hollow on the on the heels of Ardarius Washington having an Achilles injury. You’re you’re never, and let me be clear, you’re never going to eliminate injuries, right? These are human beings. They’re not machines. Machines break down. So, of course, human the human body is going to break down. Uh so but you know I I I asked him about you know what do you think the the biggest advancement has been in terms of injury prevention and you know is that’s kind of the next great the next great frontier for uh these teams is is in the in the area of injury prevention and trying to prevent uh preserve your investments and protect your investments. But so much of it has to do with personalized plans. uh training the body in a different way. Uh a lot of the movements being different and again some of this Kadre Miles talked about in terms of you know more specific specifically for football training but some of the same principles apply. Um and and let me be clear this isn’t me suggesting that the Orioles have been completely negligent in that area. Maybe they just have had very bad luck. But you better be really critical looking at it is that’s my point at this point in time. Even if you si even if you decide no, we’re not just making a change and firing someone just to to make the fans happy because to your point, it’s not going to make them happy because okay, they’ll fire Brandon Hyde and then what’s going to be next? When are you firing Mike Elias? You know, when’s you know, and look, that’s not to say that ultimately any of these guys are going to survive. I mean, if this young core doesn’t pan out to the degree that we thought it was going to a year ago or two years ago or three years ago, no one’s surviving this general manager on down. I mean, you’ll have a reset whether it’s this offseason, next offseason, or the one after that. I mean, no one will survive. Well, faster than you think under new ownership, you would think it could be. Sure. It could be. Sure. No question. And and look, as bad as things are right now, my honest opinion, Nester, I would not fire Michaelas after this season. I’d probably give him one more off season, but boy, there needs to be a lot of coming to reality that what you’re doing is not working and what you’re doing needs to be tweaked and changed and altered. By the way, if I’m a billionaire and I just went two billion deep in on this and I’m running around with my girlfriend and making bobbleheads of myself and throwing out hats and telling everybody how much I love the team and how exciting it is and all that and the place is empty and the new the guy I inherited just spent 72 million of my dollars and has got nothing for it basically, right? I mean, I’m and a guy and a guy who knows nothing about baseball, David Rubenstein. You wouldn’t you’d start to question how much that I would start to think that like an anti-billionaire would be privately pissed about $72 million. Steve spent 20 million on Bilick and was pissed at himself. So pissed that he fired him. I I mean, and it might come to that point at some point in time. I was just giving you kind of my personal like if Luke Jones were the owner. I would not be firing Michael. David Rubenstein doesn’t know anything. He knows but I don’t know nearly as much as Michaelas but with with how this has played out and even going back to I mean you know this I haven’t I haven’t been hiding from this. I didn’t love their 2023 deadline. I haven’t really loved their off seasonason the last couple years. I’ve talked about this. Uh, you know, there’s nuance here. There there’s a lot of space between Mike Elias is an excellent scouting director and we’re not sure what kind of general manager he is, right? I’m really starting that’s it, right? For for me, it was he did an excellent job, albeit through tanking and multi-year rebuild and not trying to win and all those different whatever semantics you want to use. I mean, that’s what it was. Uh but they they did make major strides in many ways to rebuild the organization to the point where they won 101 games two years ago. From from that point where the rebuild was clearly over, I’ve been extremely unimpressed with what Mike Elias has done. They won 101 games with no money and with lousy dying ownership. Like literally like I mean the cake was baking. There’s no question about that. Hey, you know that with with Kyle Gibson as being your big offseason acquisition at that point in time and and and look that was that’s not an opportunity. They were a year ahead of time. Let’s be honest that supposed to happen. Well, and that’s and that’s where you kind of look at this thing and say, “Okay, would you judge it a little bit differently had they won 88 games two years ago and been the third wild?” Yeah. And I can’t remember. Dude, I would think you would have judged it differently if they just would have gotten a couple of hits in Texas and won a game or two and maybe won a series. won a game or two or a series, fans here would at least say, “Yeah, we were in the ALCS two years ago where they they’d have what the Padres’s have, whatever that is.” I don’t know. But I I mean, it’s all of it. It’s all of it adding up to man such a colossal level of frustration or in some cases so people are so angry or so frustrated that they’ve completely tuned it out already and it’s like, “Oh, well, you know, American Idol’s on and there’s things happening. There’s other things.” You know, this is where this is where it’s interesting and I I can’t remember someone was talking about this recently. I you know, I I dabble in listening to some sports enterprise things of that nature. And obviously, we’re in this world now where more and more streaming, more direct to consumer options. Uh I mean, this is going to be the reality for it’s already becoming the reality for baseball. Uh it the the other non NFL sports, same thing. Well, you have to be very intentional about whatever it is that you watch. You think it’s through, you buy it and then you have to go get it and it has to come to you. It has to be on your app and it has otherwise you forget the caps are playing tonight literally. Well, but the difference is see that existed in the old world of cable and satellite and the traditional system of what it was for years that has hemorrhaged money and is going away. It’s not gone yet, but it’s absolutely going away. Going away rapidly. follow the numbers and see see how many subscribers the Direct TVs of the world are losing every year at this point in time. Uh but you you look at it and in the past even if people weren’t watching you were still getting your $2.50 or or whatever the number was from everyone who subscribed to that specific cable company or that sub specific satellite provider. That’s gone away. You’re now in a position where you can subscribe to Massen for $19.99 a month and not have anything else. Or if you do, you have Netflix or a couple other streaming services, you know, or even if you have a live TV service, it it goes by month. I’m getting ready to change my live TV provider. I’m not I’m not making this a commercial for anyone, so I’ll try to absolve from using too many names, but I am now going to be on since I got rid of satellite television at the end of January, I am about to be changing my live TV provider, I think for the fourth time, you can go month by month. So, the danger for a team like the Orioles at this point, no one, right? You just rolled out your direct to consumer option, which hey, I applaud them for finally doing it. I mean, they were way late in doing it, but I’ve been calling for that for for years now. So, I was glad to see it. But when you have this kind of a year, unless people signed up for the whole season, you know, the 89.99, man, you you start to wonder just how many people are are going to be continuing to stay with you, or are they just going to say, “Nah, you know what? Maybe maybe come August, you know, I may maybe because, you know, I’m interested in some some of the teams are going to play or What are what’s the team going to do? Call you a bad fan for pulling the plug and going away? Like literally you’re not loyal enough. You’re not a real loyal fan. You know, like that that was the old way of doing this. The new way of doing this is give me back my wallet. Give me back credit card. It’s a restaurant. I It’s a It’s a business. And if you don’t like what you’re getting from that business, whether the prices are too high or the product’s poor or the food isn’t very good or whatever, you don’t go anymore. It It’s nothing personal. you just don’t go anymore. I got other things to do at 6:35 tonight. Right. So, I mean, so that’s where this new ownership group and talking about the Katie Griggs and and all of the everyone that’s on the business side, so to speak, who came into this thing thinking that the the baseball ops at the very least was a Ferrari and thinking, “Okay, we’ve got to build this up. We got to do the ballpark renovations. We got to uh unveil the DT, you know, the direct to consumer streaming option. We’ve got to figure out our corporate sponsorships, all of those different things which were always going to be a major undertaking given moving on from the Angelos’s family to a new era. Uh, and understanding where sports media, where sports consumption is in 2025, those were always going to be challenges. But now when you have those challenges with a a bad baseball team, I mean, like I said, this couldn’t be a more disastrous season for them right now. I mean, I suppose if if Gunner Henderson was abducted by aliens, you know, that would be the the the only thing that could make this Well, Rushman was abducted by aliens last summer, so you know. I mean, but it I mean, this is this is really bad on that front because that $20 a month that you were hoping to get, not from every single person living in the city or the greater footprint of Baltimore, but if you’re in the playoff race and you’re in the race to win the division and you’re where the Orioles were the last couple years, there were certainly more interest. I I f I I I talked to to you a lot the last couple years about my text thread with so many of my friends from high school, guys that I played football with. only a couple guys in that group who have any interest in baseball. And I mentioned to you how much they would bring up the Orioles. Guess how many texts there have been about the Orioles the last six weeks in that group? None. Guess how many of them are given the credit card to buy June and July and August for their math. So this is I I mean these are things this isn’t about oh fire Brandon Hyde or oh fire Michaelas. This is about just a complete loss of interest and a loss maybe more worse than interest, a complete loss of hope in the future of the organization. That again, I’m not sitting here throwing dirt on it that I think it’s completely, you know, screwed long term, but I lost faith in these clowns when I talked to the Whistler last year and I realized that this is and now we’re a year into this. It’s been a year to today. It was a year ago today. It was on the Thursday before PNIS that the Whistler called me and told me I need to apologize to the organization that has all all of these stats that you have. I need to apologize to the Orioles organization to get a press pass back. I haven’t spoken to him in a year. Every I reach for my phone every day and I think what what should I say to you as a citizen, as a business owner, as a stakeholder, as an apparicio? My last name’s in their Hall of Fame and the real Hall of Fame and I’m a baseball guy sitting here doing this and you’re allowed in and I’m not and they’re trying to justify it by calling me a bad guy. That’s who they are. So that’s where I am about giving them 20 bucks a month and that’s how I’ve been treated. I’m thinking what what ability do these people have to fix this? What expertise do they have? None. Peter didn’t have any expertise and he efeded up at every turn. The only thing that fixed Peter was a couple years of Buck show Walter and and Adam Jones and a couple of deals that that were made by McFale that sort of seated Duket and and things. Yeah, Duket did some good things, too. I agree. I I’m just saying like I hear like in all of the years of Angelos’s decisions, all of it. All the money, all the Sid Thrift, all the Albert Bell, all the awfulness, Mike Flanigan suicide, just all of it. I can in 30 years I had one or two things where they did the right thing. Rubenstein and the Whistler who’s his puppet master are charged with now deciding sis they’re billionaires. This Aragetti guy is one of the I shook hands with him. I I mean these are the billionaires who are going to make these decisions that you and I are talking about about paper clips, about widgets, about Katie Griggs, about marketing, about you getting the press pass and me not getting it. Like, who asked the questions? Who’s allowed to ask the questions? Who are we going to be friends with? Who do we trust? Because Luke, I’m telling you from the billionaire part of this, this is my wisdom of 40 years of doing this. This guy at some point’s going to trust somebody baseball oriented because he doesn’t know anything about baseball. He’s probably going to be Cal Ripken. I guess Cal wants to be that guy. Cal’s never been great at any of that. Cal was great at baseball. You know what I mean? I don’t know that Cal like is going to show up and do 80 hours a week or has real opinions about what makes a great baseball guy or who’s the next that he should be the one interviewing the next Mike Elias or the next Joe Espada or I I I don’t know. Yeah. But like I know what happened before. The old man came in and listened to everybody and nobody. And the people he really trusted, Flanigan, Dempsey, those were the guys he went. Brady because his kids trusted him at that point. Sid Thrift had his ear early on where there was real trust. Real trust. Ruben says you have to trust somebody to be a baseball guy. And I don’t know who that’s going to be or how it’s going to happen, but I’m telling you, I know how this works with these billionaires who don’t know their ass from their elbow and mistreat people like me who are trying to help them because I saw it last year. I don’t want to help them now. I I want to witness it and memorialize it and analyze it. And that’s what I’m doing right now. And this is trash. And if I run into David Rubenstein or the Whistler, I could send Mark Fine a text. any of the people that are over there. Katie Griggs, heal yourselves. It’s May. Your team stinks and your attitude’s worse. Running from it, being cowardly, the stadium’s empty. I mean, no one But until they Until they fix the baseball, they can be as nice as Get out in front of it. Get out in front of it. Get out. Until they fix the baseball, none of that other stuff is going. Get out in front of it. Don’t Don’t run from it. Don’t run from the empty stadium today. Luke will be at the ballpark at lunchtime. Uh the the Ravens have a schedule. We’re going to get to that in a minute once we get done pitching about the Orioles. I’m Nester. He’s Loop. We got plenty more. We’re Baltimore positive.

Luke Jones and Nestor discuss the baseball disaster of 2025 Baltimore Orioles and what comes next