first what the yankees do to sign players is perfectly fine within the scope of baseball. what the yanks ask for from ny to help build their stadium and whatever the city/state does to help is no concern of orioles fans unless they live in ny and their tax money is being used for the new yankee stadium. the yankess have alot of money and choose to use a lot of that money to put back into the team. i'm an orioes fan but what is wrong with what the yankees do. every fan of every team should want the owner of their team to put money into their team. stop complaining about the yankess. root against them yes. but they play within the rules so stop kvetching about them.

Steinbrenner and company are the curse of baseball. Greed incarnate.
The Stinkees are all that is wrong with baseball these days.

Tammany Hall and Boss Tweed "alive and well." Yanks get the gold mine and the tax payers get the shaft.

Pete, thanks for taking the time to respond to comments. I don't always agree with you, but I do enjoy and respect that. Now, you did respond to my last comment, but you didn't deal with the topic in it: how will we compete in 3.5 years?
I think you or Zrebiec ought to write up a State of the Orioles. In it you might consider the level of talent in the minors and on the parent club. Also, consider the talent on the big club and which ones will be part of the next contender. That would be interesting. Rather than telling fans to be blindly patient and happy with a guy who's doing little, and that we should be careful not to run him out of town, you could actually examine whether or not he's doing a good job. Even the casual fan has now enough information to assess an organization. This way, however, you could propose how it is that the slow footed one is going to actually get the O's there.
Yes, each team is given one 1st round pick under normal circumstances, but they aren't always normal. In what other ways is it possible for AM to acquire enough talent?
Maybe even consider signing players who won't help the team become a winner, but will cost money, which could otherswise be spent on worthwhile free agents. Looper, Redding - wastes of money.

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Pete's reply: I'm sure Jeff will write an analysis of the player development system and the overall organizational depth a little closer to spring training. Got to wait and see what they do over the next few weeks. The way you by-pass the draft to get young players is through international scouting (an area they are trying to improve) and out-smarting the other teams by identifying players they're willing to give up that you value higher than they do. I would think that's what happened with the Freel deal, and now we'll have to wait and see who's smarter.

It's teams like the Yankees and the Red Sox that are making it more neccesary for a salary cap to be put in place. The spending spree of the Yankees and the salary demands most notably of Scott Boros is the main reason why a salary cap needs to be put in place. I know the union will always oppose of this and the owners would love it. But with the way the economy is now something has to be done now. Big deal the Yankees will have a new ballpark. And how is it going to be paid for, the tax payers will pay for most if not all. There will be less tax payers now days with a failing economy. I know it's New York and there is a lot of money in the state but still they have to feel the pinch as much as the rest of the country. Milwaukee Brewers owner (can't remember his name) has stated that a salary cap is needed to stop this crazy spending spree. I got this from MLB.com I can't see as many fans going to games this year with the way the economy is. Of course this is just my opinion.

Pete - kinda off topic but you've shed a lot of light on the Orioles' measured approach to turning the team around. I agree with that approach but I don't understand why they were willing to let Daniel Cabrera go and were rumored to be willing to trade Garrett Olson when there's so little in the pipeline to eat up innings. Your thoughts?

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Pete's reply: I think they finally just got frustrated with Daniel. I'm a little surprised they didn't try to re-sign him for less than he might have gotten in arbitration. That's what the Nats did. With Garrett, I think he was a guy the Padres had an interest in and the O's felt they have other guys in the organization who are similar in talent and ability. They weren't going to throw him away, but they've always like Felix Pie, so they were willing to be part of that three-way Peavy deal that never happened.

Stop complaining. Its not the Yankees fault Peter Angelos is cheap and the Orioles have been a terrible team.

You're right, Peter - the modern professional sports eco model, especially as mastered and executed by MLB, is like a form of crime. Unethical, at the least.

This is why I cannot and will not support any MLB team/product at this point in my life. 'Corrupt' as a descriptor of MLB and its financial system doesn't even begin to get scratch the top layers of its reality.

Let's see if the same Liberal yuppies who want to annoint a clueless Caroline Kennedy, can get away with further pissing away their core taxpayer's money during a recession.

Pete , half of Baltimore doesn't care about baseball anymore anyway.

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Pete's reply: If the other half does, the Orioles are in better shape than I thought.

The hearings on the 15th should be pretty interesting although I think the Yanks will get the money in the end.

Pete, the more I think about it, the more it makes a lot of sense to trade Brian. He is the only major chip we have to trade and given that there are no leadoff hitters available this year coupled with Brian having another excellent season, I think the haul could be equal to or greater than that of the Bedard trade and perhaps we could get a SP to go along with some prospects. The only concern I have is do you think Freel or Miles (if they sign him) can play 2B for 162 games?

Pete, I completely agree with you that signing 2 or 3 guys to 3 yr. deals, is not going to get the desired results, but what about just one guy like Dunn, Burrell or Abreu? It appears that Luke would be better served as a full time DH, so Abreu or Burrell would be major upgrades in LF or if the O's feel Huff can't handle 1B full time than Dunn would be a great addition. I am not saying break the bank, but the O's should be able to get one of these guys for a fair deal. None of these guys are Marty Cordova or Jay Payton, so in my opinion, we would be adding power, filling needs and taking pressure off the young guys (Matt and Adam) to put up power #s in the lineup.

I wanted to add something on Chad Bradford. I wasn't happy that we traded him, but I still think Andy would make the deal again because Walker and Baez aren't desired by anyone, so the one guy who we could trade (save money as well) was Chad. The money from his salary this upcoming year should get us a 5th starter, plus the BP does have Ray and Baez coming back in 09.

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Pete's reply: They saved about $4 million by moving Bradford, which might get you a No. 5 guy, but I don't think it's a budget issue. The O's dealt Hernandez for Freel and realized almost enough savings to sign Izturis for two years. They can spend a few bucks to shore up the rotation without mortgaging the future.

Pete-Are you happy with Baseball current ecomonic system ? Or do you advocate a Cap as solution for Baseball?

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Pete's reply: I think it would be a better game if there was a payroll ceiling and floor, but I'm not advocating a cap because it'll just start another labor war. They need to continue to increase revenue-sharing and force the lesser teams that receive luxury tax money to spend it on players. Let's remember something else. The Yankees were way more dominant in the 1940s and 1950s than they are now, and there was no free agency. The Orioles' problems really aren't related the wealth of the Yankees. The O's let their organization go to seed over the past decade and it's going to take awhile to straighten things out.

Wouldn't it be great to see the NYC tell the Yankees to shove it? It would restore my confidence that the city and the team's fans aren't as dumb as we think they are.

Friends,

While I hate the evil empire and I'll be honest I envy the fact that their ownership is committed to win with his checkbook! I don't take it out personally on George or Hank! In fact I root for a football team not to far down the road that spends lots of money and never wins! I can share with you this, at least with the Redskins there is hope, there is the feeling the owner is trying to do right by the fans and spends MEGABUCKS to help them win. With the O's, well I feel like Peter the Scrooge is raping me! He has given me NO discernable reason to watch his team and it is his team. He can hide behind the name change on the front of the uniform and make some money from gulible fans buying the road jersey with B-more, but these too are pigs in the poke and smoke and mirrors move to note change when in fact none took place. 11 years ago the uniforms should have changed to Angelos' Losers!

Completely off topic Pete, sorry, but what do you think the chances are that Salazar could start the year at 1st. He had a pretty good year last year and if he builds on that, maybe we could trade him for some younger prospects around the All-Star break. Do you think this is a viable option, or do you think Huff will be at 1st and then we'll attempt to trade him?

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Pete's reply: I think Huff will be at first.

Baseball is finished without a salary cap.

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Pete's reply: Finished? What, do you think revenues will plummet to only $6 billion next year.

Peter - I don't get this. Maybe you can restore some sanity over the airwaves since OBVIOUSLY there's a lot of boneheadiness on the internet.

The more I read, the more I see that there was NO reason...NONE ZERO to spend $180MM on Texeira. I am certain, gosh I hope so anyway, there are better ways to spend that kind of cash.

If all you Tex fans were so smart - you might have a bit more in the can already - Markakis, Weiters and Roberts. Different kind of hitters/players but you NEED those to even have a prayer for 2010. Markie is just one bad slide away from the DL and more Yankeee lore.

Enough of this garbage, McPhail did right. Maybe SOME of your should head to Bowie or Norfolk for a couple of games this summer. You MIGHT just be enlightened. Somehow - I doubt it.

MR Ducks in Odenton, CM wangs? What you do not get my non-forward-thinking friend is that Roberts, Markakis and Wieters will not resign and stay with the team now that the O's are clearly going on the cheap with the rest of the roster. The Orioles are now at best the Marlins without the intermittent success. The Orioles are nothing better than a minor league team for the rest of the AL East to shop from. I'm sure our homegrown players will take discounts to sign long-term contracts, just with someone other than the Orioles.

What baseball needs is a fan's union. If the disgruntled fans in small markets were to boycott the products of baseball's major sponsors for a couple of months, the league would soon be considering the needed parity measures, such as a salary cap and a draft for international players.

Just a quick question Pete... It's been widely reported by you and others that the Oriole offered Teixeira 7 years/140 mil. Now the question.... why on Gods green earth would Teixeira even entertain that offer when he turned down 140 mil from Texas last year ?

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Pete's reply: Well, it's been reported as being somewhere between $140 million and $150 million. I think you start where you start. The problem was that it didn't go anywhere from there, which was largely because Tex didn't want it to. At least, that's what I've heard. If the guy wanted to play here, he could have publicly said so and put pressure on the O's to up their offer...and I'm almost certain they would have. I believe he just didn't want to wait on the rebuilding program.