Baltimore Orioles and Ravens: Weary of the Off-field Crap!

Oct 14, 2014; Kansas City, MO, USA; Baltimore Orioles manager Buck Showalter is interviewed before game three of the 2014 ALCS playoff baseball game against the Kansas City Royals at Kauffman Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Peter G. Aiken-USA TODAY Sports

Enough! Maybe some of you find all of the “drama” that unfolds in off-field situations to be interesting and riveting, but I for one am totally weary of it and completely sick of this endless crap. The drama has afflicted both the Baltimore Orioles and the Baltimore Ravens in the past 12 months.

These are stories with legs, as they say in the media and marketing businesses. They keep going and going. And of course, the sports story that is pushing Super Bowl anticipation and REAL sports writing and analysis off the pages these days is DeflateGate. Now there is a word that I never imagined in my entire life that I would type.

The NFL and controversy just can’t seem to keep off the sports pages, the front pages, and even the political shows on cable TV. The National Football League and controversies go together like peas and carrots, to quote Forrest Gump. I’d rather be quoting Justin Forsett and his reflections on 2014 and anticipation for 2015.

The Baltimore Ravens were headliners in the past 12 months in the controversy category. Of course the story with “legs” was the one seeing Ray Rice dragging the limp legs of Janay out of an elevator. And being a sports site that covers the Ravens, here at The Baltimore Wire we had to write a few pieces about it, even as we held it to a bare minimum.

The other half or our professional coverage involves the Baltimore Orioles. Whereas there have been a couple of developments in recent to write about that actually involve the sport of baseball, the bulk of interest in this current portion of the offseason revolves around what is happening with the Toronto Blue Jays attempting to extricate Dan Duquette from the O’s.

Sometimes in the offseason of a sport, while needing to write daily about a given team, it is difficult to come up with a topic of current newsworthy interest. I think some of my fellow Orioles writers are actually thankful for the Peyton Place drama that has been unfolding between divisional rivals, as it gives them some material. I don’t see it that way. I’d rather talk x’s and o’s and balls and strikes.

And if it isn’t Rice or Duquette, there are suspensions on both the Ravens and Orioles for the ridiculous crime of using Adderall. And, somebody in every offseason finds a way to get a DUI or get into a barroom brawl and make headlines.

I understand that off-field crap affects on-field realities. When Rice was in the midst of his drama, it raised the very practical question about what the Ravens would do for their running game. When Duquette is threatening to leave, it raises the question of the effectiveness of offseason roster construction. When Chris Davis or Haloti Ngata get suspended, it raises the issue as to who will fill the holes until the end of the season.