NEWS
By Childs Walker | April 7, 2009
Baltimore fans always show support for the Orioles on Opening Day. Then the optimism fades as the losses mount. But at Camden Yards stadium Monday, fans, players and team management said they had every reason to feel good about the direction of the Orioles - and not just because of a 10-5 victory over the New York Yankees, their biggest rival. In many respects, the Orioles' future appears brighter than it has in years. The club has signed its two best players, Nick Markakis and Brian Roberts, to long-term contracts.
SPORTS
By DAVID STEELE | February 16, 2009
Pitchers and catchers are reporting, which means it's time once again to ask how much longer fans plan to put up with what baseball is doing with performance-enhancing drugs. Maybe this is the year, and this is the moment, they stop, with Alex Rodriguez's failed drug test stinking up spring training. But if last year wasn't it - after the Mitchell Report, after the Roger Clemens circus, after Barry Bonds' numbers still taunted everybody even as he was being blackballed from the game - then it will never happen.
SPORTS
By RICK MAESE | January 28, 2009
TAMPA, Fla. - The Hit rendered us all motionless. At the point of contact, it was perhaps no different from the legalized brutality we will celebrate every weekend. One man hits another. Maybe he inflicts pain. Or maybe he simply jars the ball loose. At any rate, half the fans scream, half wince, and in short order they all get excited about the prospect of seeing an even bigger hit on the next play. But this time, Ravens running back Willis McGahee lay still on the field, and for a few brief minutes, we were all left motionless.
SPORTS
By PETER SCHMUCK | January 3, 2009
When this offseason began, just about everyone in Birdland was hoping and praying for the Orioles to get the big guy, which is why the signing this week of former NBA forward Mark Hendrickson has been viewed in certain quarters as some kind of cruel joke. The big guy, of course, was free-agent slugger Mark Teixeira, and big was a figurative term. He was the top position player in the free-agent market, and he's from Severna Park and he would have made a big difference in the way a generation of disengaged Orioles fans view the beleaguered O's franchise.
SPORTS
By Don Markus | December 10, 2007
There was a lot of talk over the past week about the cross-generational battle lines between Ravens fans and Colts fans, about how those old enough to remember the Mayflower moving vans should know better than to root for a team that used to play in Baltimore. But there's a segment of Colts fans who don't know any better - those born after 1984. They are no different from Brooklyn kids who rooted for Sandy Koufax and the Los Angeles Dodgers, not knowing the angst Walter O'Malley caused when he left for the West Coast.
ENTERTAINMENT
By Christina Lee | April 26, 2007
The NFL draft: an event that can induce anxiety, sweat and even a little bit of nail-biting. But it doesn't have to be. While in the company of your favorite team, the anticipation may be a bit easier to swallow. The Baltimore Ravens are offering this opportunity to more than 10,000 fans Saturday. At the 10th annual Spring Football Festival, players past and present will be at M&T Bank Stadium, as the first three rounds of the NFL draft air live on its big screens from New York's Radio City Music Hall.
NEWS
By Raymond Daniel Burke | December 17, 2007
The report on performance-enhancing drugs in Major League Baseball tempts me to cynically say that given the inclusion of 19 present or former Orioles among the 87 players named, you would think that we would have witnessed a better on-field performance than we have had to endure for the last 10 seasons. But the findings of former Sen. George J. Mitchell strike me in a way that leads my mind back to Game Four of the 1970 World Series, when the trees visible beyond Memorial Stadium's open end were full of glorious fall color.
SPORTS
By EDWARD LEE | October 8, 2007
San Francisco -- From one city by the bay to another, Steve O'Neil felt right at home. Despite being in a hostile environment in an opposing city, O'Neil, 28, was able to eat food, drink beverages, and whoop it up with other Ravens fans before yesterday's game between the Ravens and the San Francisco 49ers. "I've been blown away all weekend," said O'Neil, a 1997 graduate of Boys' Latin who lives in Washington. "We saw guys in bars and on the streets with Ravens jerseys and hats on. It's been building all weekend."
SPORTS
By Louis Spirito | August 5, 2007
The project began from basic curiosity. Being a professional cartographer and a baseball fan led to a fascination about foul balls - who hit them, how many were hit, where they all went. I started by creating a custom score sheet that allowed me to track several types of data. I then observed all 2,657 pitches in a nine-game Orioles homestand from the right-field club level, in Section 288. The result was a database that held the location of every foul ball hit plus other information, such as pitcher, batter, pitch type, pitch speed, inning, etc. For the graphic, I decided to keep the focus on balls that were hit into seats because this is where the game interacts with the fans on a unique level.
SPORTS
By Jeff Zrebiec | April 1, 2007
FORT LAUDERDALE, FLA. -- You know his swing, so short, sweet and powerful that it prompted one baseball lifer to say that Nick Markakis could become one of the Orioles' best hitters ever. But everything else about Markakis is hidden. He gives few clues to teammates, reporters and fans, who imagine the 23-year-old outfielder as the organization's cornerstone for the next decade. Out of uniform, he is almost always in sneakers, jeans and a T-shirt, most advertising baseball equipment companies.