Editorial

Batter Up: Baseball Returns to D.C.

We’ve heard the teeth-gnashing from Marylanders about Washington, D.C., getting back Major League Baseball.

We hear how Orioles fans will flock to RFK stadium instead of Camden Yards. How Baltimore will henceforth field a lousy team because of lost revenues.

How Baltimore Mayor Martin O’Malley and Maryland politicians didn’t step up to the plate to protect the Orioles interest.

To all this we slap the leather of our baseball mits and yell “Yippee!”

Yep, we’re baseball fans here at Bay Weekly, and Orioles fans to boot.

Baseball, like other sports, is an outlet for tenacious beliefs. One of ours has to do with billionaire owners in the habit of squeezing every nickel out of fans.

Plus, it’s been so long since the Orioles were any good that our hair has turned gray and our dogs have died. We’ve grown plumb tired of that perennial crew of wind-strikers and never-sweats in Baltimore who play the patsies to the Yankees and Red Sox.

We hear complaining from Baltimore interests like WBAL radio, about broadcasting revenues headed down I-295.

Guess what: We have no concern about a bunch of whining radio executives. (For all we care, they can just broadcast their boy, Rush Limbaugh, for another three hours a day.)

Our interest here are twofold: the pleasures of fans and the game of baseball itself.

For many Bayside fans in the Annapolis region, RFK on Washington’s east side, where the as-yet unnamed team will play for now, will be as easy or easier than hiking up to Camden Yards. And it looks like the new park will be built in another accessible spot just off Suitland Parkway.

Henceforth, we’ll be able to leap into the action of the National League, too, with its brand of intrigue and stars.

Meanwhile, those Orioles might feel the pinch sufficiently to send out a team that, come October, is playing in the playoffs rather than just watching.

Come cherry blossom time, for us there’ll be a whole new ballgame, as they say. For fans in Chesapeake Country, that’s not just a good thing. It’s a great thing.