Apparently They Play Baseball in Baltimore

So today I was perusing the news when I came across an interesting thing: Some baseball expansion team named the Baltimore Orioles have fired their manager.

Honestly, it seems kind of soon to can your manager when it’s your first year of existence. Surely he deserved some more time to grow with the club. Expansion drafts aren’t usually good builders of talent, you know?

Wait, what? The Orioles actually trace their roots back to the original Milwaukee Brewers, founded in 1894? Huh.

Seriously, that’s the state of baseball in Baltimore. The only time anybody talks about it is when the Yankees or Red Sox come to town. Even then, the Orioles are just a punch line.

The reality is that’s kind of sad.

This is a franchise that won four pennants and two World Series from 1966-71 and another World Series in 1983. Think of the great players that have donned the orange and black: Brooks Robinson, Cal Ripken Jr., Eddie Murray, Frank Robinson and Jim Palmer, among many others. That doesn’t even include legendary manager Earl Weaver.

This was once a proud franchise. Now it has the worst record in Major League Baseball and, frankly, hasn’t been worth a crap since before the turn of the century. Yep, this would be 13 straight losing seasons.

That’s not kinda bad. It’s pathetic.

The best part as a Cubs fan? Former Cubs head honcho Andy MacPhail has been trying to fix things.

You know it’s not going well when one-time can’t miss Cubs prospects like Corey Patterson and Lou Montanez dot the roster. And let’s not forget former Cubs reliever Will Ohman.

I mean, have you ever looked at the Orioles roster? There are like four players other teams would take: Adam Jones, Nick Markakis, Brian Matusz and Matt Wieters. Then it’s a bunch of players that were either never good or aren’t anymore (looking at you Miguel Tejada and Luke Scott). It’s never a good sign when Kevin Millwood is probably your top starter. Really.

So fire the manager, sure. That’ll shake things up and have the boys shooting right up the American League East ladder.

You’d be better of just blowing the whole thing up and petitioning to move into another division.