Team In Baltimore

Take a break on the CFLI was just wondering if the sportswriters at The Sun are on Jim Speros' payroll. Is there any one of you who doesn't care about the new CFL team in Baltimore? I haven't seen too many articles on football fans who could care less about this pseudo team. It may be a faster paced game, and it does fill a longtime football void in Baltimore, but it's not the NFL. And it never will be.Don't get me wrong, I think Baltimore got the shaft too when the expansion teams were awarded to two towns, one of which perhaps deserved it. I also think Mr. Tagliabue is conceited and makes decisions solely on ego, but it is the NFL. Kids don't come out of college football wanting to go to Saskatchewan.

Orioles owner Peter G. Angelos was in Los Angeles yesterday to meet with officials of the Los Angeles Rams, an NFL franchise he hopes to bring to Baltimore.Sources in Baltimore and Los Angeles said his meetings would include a get-acquainted session with team owner Georgia Frontiere."He expects to sit down and meet with her and be friendly," said one source yesterday. "He's committed to getting the team."Reached at a hotel in Los Angeles last night, Angelos said, "I can't say a word. No comment."

Prospective NFL investor and Orioles owner Peter G. Angelos said the truce signed between the governor and legislative leaders over the move of the Washington Redskins to Laurel should enhance his chances of getting a team in Baltimore."

Once again, legislators meet with Gov. William Donald Schaefer today to find a unified strategy for bringing football back to Baltimore while also assisting Jack Kent Cooke in building his Redskins stadium in Laurel. Key to making this happen: breathing space so that artificial legislative deadlines don't ruin chances for one or both stadiums.This is not the time for legislative malcontents to try to deauthorize a new stadium for Baltimore. It is inappropriate for the legislature to renege on its prior commitment to a $160 million stadium next to Oriole Park.

The Schaefer administration and General Assembly leaders will meet today with Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke to try to agree on a two-pronged approach to bringing professional football back to Maryland.Mr. Cooke will be looking for assurances from the governor and top lawmakers that the state will do nothing to block his plans to build a $160 million stadium for the Redskins in Laurel with his own money.In exchange, Gov. William Donald Schaefer will be looking for a commitment from the billionaire owner not to interfere with his continuing efforts to bring another National Football League franchise to Baltimore.

Representatives of the Washington Redskins will go to Annapolis today, the team's first official foray in its campaign to win Maryland legislators over to the idea of a Redskins stadium in Laurel.Team representatives have been visiting senators and delegates informally for weeks, and Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke has been making phone calls to a variety of lawmakers. But this afternoon, on just the second day of the 1994 legislative session, team officials will attend a joint session of the Senate committees on Budget and Taxation and Finance for what's billed as "an informational briefing" on Mr. Cooke's plan.

Gov. William Donald Schaefer said yesterday that Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke is simply wrong if he believes the Baltimore-Washington market can support only one National Football League team."

WASHINGTON -- Boomer Esiason was back in town yesterday and he had his hands full accommodating all those who wanted to wish the former University of Maryland standout well.But Esiason, the New York Jets quarterback, took time out to express his disappointment over the failure of Baltimore to get an NFL expansion franchise."I really feel badly for Baltimore and Boogie Weinglass," said Esiason. "I think Boogie would have been a great owner. I was lobbying all along for him."When it was mentioned that he and Weinglass would have made a great owner-quarterback team in Baltimore, the flamboyant Esiason, 32, smiled broadly and said: "I don't know if I would have wanted to be playing by the time an expansion team was put together [1995]

Commissioner Paul Tagliabue said yesterday that the Washington Redskins were not a significant factor in the NFL's decision to bypass Baltimore when it awarded expansion teams to Charlotte, N.C., and Jacksonville, Fla."Baltimore was not eliminated on geography grounds," Tagliabue said in a national conference call. "The committee we had was broadly representative of the whole country, and the consensus was on the Southeast as the focal point. I think that's what drove the committee's thinking.

No new team may be betterNFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue and the 28 owners might just be doing Baltimore a favor if they don't vote for an expansion team in Baltimore. If we were selected for an expansion team, no doubt we would get a lot of castoffs, and that would mean six to 10 years down the road before we would even become competitive in the NFL.If an established team were to move here, we should welcome it with open arms and perhaps take a shorter route to having a winning team a whole lot quicker.