A smart trade for the Orioles: Lease now, land deal later | STAFF COMMENTARY

The number three is essential in baseball. You get three strikes and you’re out, and you get three outs each inning. So it’s entirely fitting that the new lease for Oriole Park at Camden Yards required three announced decisions. The first came in September and flashed on the O’s scoreboard, but it turned out to be woefully premature. The second leaked Friday, Dec. 8, only to be nixed by Senate President Bill Ferguson. And the third was presented on Monday, seemingly tied up with a holiday bow: Quick, unanimous approvals came for the deal by the Maryland Stadium Authority’s board in the morning and the Board of Public Works in the afternoon — after requisite speechmaking. Even ardent sports fans can be forgiven if they found the complex agreement very confusing but this is what happens when a particular game (call it Lease Extension Hide and Seek) is played mostly behind closed doors. It’s hard to know for whom to cheer. Was that a guarantee that a beloved Major League Baseball franchise will stay in Baltimore or will the complicated deal prove costly down the road?

The good news, of course, is that the Birds are committing to at least 15 more years at their current nest, and perhaps up to 30 years or even more. And the matter that was most in dispute — how to potentially develop land adjacent to Camden Yards into a year-round tourist attraction with bars, restaurants, entertainment venues and whatnot — is essentially put on hold. The Orioles and John Angelos, the team’s CEO and chair, are welcome to propose some kind of massive development at the site within the next four years and then the MSA and BPW can decide whether to approve it. If they do so, the lease gets extended. If not, well, it’s back to the drawing board. That’s not unreasonable. If there’s a worthy, workable plan to upgrade downtown Baltimore, we’re all for it. But we’re skeptical, so it’s good to know that the O’s aren’t entitled to this state-owned land, they’re just welcome to give a pitch as to why they deserve to have control over it at some future date. No harm, no foul.

We suspect the effort may have cost Gov. Wes Moore some political capital, however. It’s not helpful to be seen as kowtowing to a wealthy team owner, especially when your state is facing massive budget deficits. The recent shutdown of the light rail — a system that was installed, in part, to serve the stadium complex — over maintenance issues raises an obvious question: Is the state shortchanging the Average Joes in order to enrich the Rich Johns? Each new budget projection with the distinct possibility of cutting education, health, public safety or other essential services (D.C. area transit is struggling, too), while facilitating an entertainment district modeled after Atlanta’s “The Battery” drove that message home. Had Governor Moore pursued this any further, he might have driven his credibility to a point of no return.

Maybe the Senate President deserves an “S” for a save of the Moore administration, or maybe the governor does for ultimately showing restraint. In either case, the possibility of a stadium district is now exactly where it should be — ready to rise or fall on its own merits and not as a bargaining chip to keep the Orioles in Camden Yards. It isn’t as if the Angelos family lost anything. They’re still getting hundreds of millions of dollars in ballpark improvements under the deal. The owner of the Baltimore Ravens is doing pretty well in that regard, too. But now, perhaps the matter is settled enough for the Angelos family to deal with estate issues, tidying up their financial loose ends as they prepare the inevitable passing of 94-year-old patriarch Peter Angelos.

Should the O’s continue their winning ways on the field, we suspect fans will forgive this flirtation with a taxpayer-funded giveaway. And voters surely won’t begrudge the governor his on-again, off-again deal-making when he presumably runs for reelection in 2026. But in our “fantasy” league, both sports teams are big-time promoters of downtown Baltimore and are actively looking for ways to make this a better city to work, live and play, not just enrich themselves. Those to whom much is given, much will be required. That’s from an entirely different rule book than MLB’s, but we’d like to think it still applies.

Baltimore Sun editorial writers offer opinions and analysis on news and issues relevant to readers. They operate separately from the newsroom.