It's Not a Total Loss

After so many years of losing and what appears to be a complete failure of a rebuilding effort, a fellow Orioles fan recently posed the question, "What does this franchise do right?" Well, I'm here to tell you that it's not a total mess. I can think of two things right off the top of my head:

I like the mascot. The team is named the Orioles, and their mascot is appropriately an anthropomorphic Oriole Bird, rather than some imaginary creature, similar to the Phanatic, Downtown Yorkie, Mr. Met, or Wally the Green Monster. It would have been easy for them to design some orange furry monster "that mysteriously crawled out of the Bay and discovered a love for awful baseball".



(The Capitol City Goofball would perhaps not be inappropriate for this year's team. But let's stick with The Bird)

Secondly, free ice. I went to 7 games last year, but only one of them was on a really hot day -- a Sunday game at the end of April where temperatures got up into the 90s. The Orioles had big tubs of ice that fans could take ice from for free to keep themselves cool. I thought that was nice. I'd never seen this at any other stadium on hot days, and I'm sure the Yankees or Red Sox would have charged $5.00 or more for a cup. That's something you can build on.

So keep up the great work, Orioles!