Why does Angelos keep shunning his hometown?
An open letter to Orioles owner Peter Angelos:
I read your latest comments on the state of the Orioles in the Washington Post on June 23. As a longtime season-ticket holder, Baltimore native and Orioles fan for 46 years, I am wondering what motivates you to discuss the plight of the Orioles at the expense of your hometown newspaper, The Sun, and at a cost of alienating your largest fan base.
I am wondering what motivates you to publicly ponder and self-examine the team's future in a marketplace that represents, at best, one-third of your paying customers. ... I am wondering if it is the power of Washington that calls to you while your old friends and best allies still live the simple life in your native Highlandtown. Perhaps your rare public outcries are your way of hardening your foothold in the nation's capital in the face of a potential move by a certain National League club in Canada.
I am wondering where you and the Orioles will eventually stand in the ever-expanding Washington community when the Expos finally head south to D.C. I am wondering how your favorite newspaper and its many readers will feel about your old, slow and vastly overpaid players when the fresh, young, speedy former Expos step up to the plate in D.C.
Will you then be forced to return to your native Baltimore with hat in hand, begging for a fresh new start among your own kind? Will you ponder the future of your baseball team in your hometown newspaper, while speaking directly to your "real" fans on local TV and radio stations?
Who knows, maybe us old Baltimoreans will ... take you back and forgive you for ruining a once proud and classy franchise.
Leonard Arzt
Silver Spring
Woods' dominance intimidates competition
Taking nothing away from Tiger Woods' outstanding 12-under-par performance in the U.S. Open, what happened to all the other name golfers in that competition? For the best of [them] to achieve a score of 3-over par is as dismal a performance as can be imagined.
Woods' aura apparently has intimidated the entire group. Sad.
Howard K. Ottenstein
Baltimore
From Canada, thanks for embracing the CFL
I'd like to thank The Sun's Ken Rosenthal for his column of fond remembrance for the Baltimore Stallions and its players.
Many of us in Canada continue to have a special place in our heart for Baltimore. The manner in which you embraced football that surely must have appeared strange to those weaned on the NFL-style game impressed us.
What continues to keep the connection strong is the avid support of a core group of Stallions fans who honor the legacy of those all-too-short two years by continuing to follow the league and coming to Canada to cheer for this unique brand of football.
They are some of the unofficial ambassadors of your city and your country, and they represent themselves, Baltimoreans and Americans as no diplomat ever could.
Scott Oberg
Calgary, Alberta