The relationship between Peter Angelos, who died Saturday at the age of 94, and the press would sour as the team fell into a dysfunctional abyss for 14 straight losing seasons. But in those first years of ownership, Angelos loved bending the ears of the sportswriters who covered him and his team.
In 1994 — Peter Angelos’ first full season — the drama unfolded nearly every day in the Baltimore Orioles offices inside the B&O Warehouse.
I was in Angelos’ private box that night when Gomez blasted the game-winning home run. Angelos received hugs and high-fives all around. “I knew that playing Gomez was the right move,” he bellowed. This was typical for the theatrics that went on in the early days of Angelos’ ownership. I was the Orioles beat writer for the paper for three of those years and a columnist actively covering the team after that and had a front-row seat for much of it.
He would feed you the skinny — but sometimes he wanted something in return, like the time he asked me who should be their center fielder in 1995.But he wasn’t quite ready yet — turns out he would never be quite ready, batting .248 in five major league seasons with the Orioles, Reds, Rockies, Cubs and Blue Jays.
Then there was the time I got back from covering the July 11 Riddick Bowe-Andrew Golota heavyweight title fight in Madison Square Garden. This was the 22-minute riot at the Garden when Golota was disqualified for repeated low blows, but in the process had given Bowe a beating. I would have conversations with Angelos during the 1997 season, when Baltimore went wire-to-wire in first place in the American League East, and you would have thought that Johnson’s first name was a vulgar curse. He did not, contrary to popular opinion, fire Johnson.
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