The Orioles and the state of Maryland have approved a new lease agreement, as reported by multiple outlets and announced by the O’s. “The Baltimore Orioles have agreed to a partnership with the State of Maryland, Governor Wes Moore, and the Maryland Stadium Authority that will keep the Orioles at Camden Yards for thirty years,” the statement begins. It goes on to feature comments from John Angelos, chair and managing partner of the club, as well as Maryland Governor Wes Moore and others. Danielle Allentuck of the Baltimore Banner relayed the full press release for those interested.
Though the club announced they are staying at Camden for 30 years, they are currently only committed for 15, with Pamela Wood of the Baltimore Banner and Rich Dubroff of Baltimore Baseball relaying some of the details. If the club and the state can agree to a development plan for the surrounding area in the next four years, then the lease can be expanded from 15 to 30 years.
The new deal comes just in the nick of time, as the previous lease was set to expire at the end of the year. Back in February, the O’s had a chance to extend the lease for another five years but decided not to do so. The hope was that they could work out a longer deal that would allow them to take advantage of a new Maryland law and borrow $600MM for stadium upgrades. In August, it was reported that Angelos was trying to leverage the stadium negotiations into acquiring public land. He reportedly envisioned developing a mixed-use area with commercial and retail spaces, emulating to The Battery and Truist Park where the Braves play in Georgia.
In September, Angelos and Gov. Moore announced a new 30-year lease between the club and the state, though this was actually misleading. Reporting from the next day revealed that they had merely signed a memorandum of understanding, which was legally non-binding. The talks seemed to hit a speed bump when it was reported that private equity mogel David Rubenstein was in talks to acquire the club, causing State senator Bill Ferguson to express some concern with the agreement. This new deal will keep the club in Baltimore while kicking those development negotiations down the road for another four years. The new agreement was reported on Friday and approved today by the Maryland Stadium Authority and then by the Board of Public Works.
The Orioles have until December 31 of 2027 to win approval for a ground lease and development plan for an area that is believed to include the B&O Warehouse, the vacant Camden Station building and an adjacent parking area between the Warehouse and train tracks. If they don’t get those approved, they can continue with the 30-year agreement or switch to a 15-year pact. The 30-year pact also has four extensions of five years available, meaning the club could potentially stay for 50 years as part of this deal. If the ground lease and development plan are approved, it’s possible to change the terms of the 30-year agreement. The O’s and the stadium authority can now start accessing the $600MM in taxpayer-financed bonds that state lawmakers have authorized for major upgrades to the stadium.
Many details of the full agreement have not been publicly revealed and more will surely come out over time.
Great news! Camden is truly one of the most beautiful ballparks in our sport.
Too bad it’s in a dump like Baltimore.
There are some quite nice areas in Baltimore. But keep on spreading that silly narrative!
Bruh what’s with you guys who just dump on cities in the comments like this. Maybe turn off fox news, crawl out of your suburban basement bunker and get out in the world for a change.
Too bad we can’t dump dumb a$$ comments and users that make such comments as those that you make
Here’s to hoping this precedes a team sale
If there was ever a time to sell the Orioles, this is it. The team has been rebuilt and has a collection of cheap talent. They’re good. They have a new ballpark lease for thirty years.
That only happens once Peter passes. John won’t pay capital gains on the team.
I don’t think anyone, including Mrs Angelos, anticipated Mr. Angelos still being with us in 2023. Gut says team has been being prepped for sale since son John took over for dad Peter in late 2018.
It looks like to me, what’s happening on the business side of the Orioles mirrors what’s happening on the sporting side of the Orioles. John, representing Mom Angelos from day one, took the advice to stay out of the decision making part of business ownership and let professionals in their fields of expertise call the shots … with the goal being getting top dollar at settlement.
The Angelos family “hit a grand slam” with selection of sporting experts (Elias and crew) and, from the looks of it here recently, their business experts “have loaded the bases” in positioning family for getting top dollar at the closing table.
Oh Marvelous, now how about signing a top pitcher!!!
SMH
Name the top pitcher available you’d like them to sign.
Swing a trade with the Astros to acquire Framber Valdez
I don’t think Valdez is going anywhere. Cease though
Valdez isn’t going anywhere for less than a king’s ransom, and Cease just threw to a 4.58 ERA and 1.42WHIP this past season. The White Sox want a HAUL for a guy with one good season under his belt.
The Astros will only part with Valdez for another solid, more controllable pitcher coming back. Are you willing to part with Grayson Rodriguez for 2 years Framber Valdez?
As the one guy from Christmas Vacation said
Get me somebody, get me anybody and while I am waiting, get me somebody
We are going into next season with Means, Grayson and Bradish as 1,2,3. Another arm would be nice, but I don’t see anything out there that is worth the asking price. DL Hall could still be an impact starter if he gets his control under control, which he did a good job of last year. So unless we can get someone who isn’t showing steep signs of decline like Bieber and Burnes, isn’t perpetually hurt like Glasnow, someone with no track record of success like Cease, or isn’t going to cost an absolute fortune like Valdez or Montgomery, I don’t see the point of making the move. Montgomery is the only one I could argue for, and his asking price will probably $25m a year for 5-6 years, which will massively hamper the O’s. Show me a move that makes sense, I’m all for it, but there’s nothing out there right now that does.
I’d like them to sign Montgomery.
b&o,
Yamamoto is available.
Absolute fortune.
I was all for a Yamamoto signing when the price was said to be 200 million but apparently it’s approaching 300 now and the likelihood of the Orioles doing 200 was extremely slim, so we know 300 isn’t happening, nor would I blame them for bowing out at that range.
Snell. Montgomery. Yamamoto.
I can’t watch Snell pitch.
Snell walks more than 4 per 9 innings on his career and has 2 solid seasons in the past 8 years while having an ERA north of 4.00 four times. He’s a crapshoot. Yamamoto falls under the “cost an absolute fortune” category. He’s going to sign for $300m and he’s never thrown a pitch in the US. Yeah, smart move there. And I’ve already addressed Montgomery.
b&o, would you prefer they continue to be cheap? Signing Montgomery would not “massively hamper the O’s.” They have one of the lowest payrolls in baseball and have spent $100M more per season previously.
Did you not read my response where I state our rotation could have Means, Grayson, Bradish and Hall, which is a damn solid 1-4 if Hall continues his improvements he made last year? Why blow $25m a year tor 5-6 years when we’ve already got that 1-4 and just need a number 5 starter?
I read it. That’s a great young foundation. Who would you propose as that #5 starter? How about rotation depth in case someone gets hurt?
I can’t imagine anyone not named Angelos being happy with the team not pursuing improvements.
Because then Hall is a #5 and the rotation is even better.
Best pitcher in baseball last season. That is the kind of player most people want to watch.
Good for baseball!
Good for the Angelos family and their bank accounts – $600M worth of free stuff!
They literally have to use it on the state-owned stadium, so that flail of yours tripped on the way in the door.
Its a loan that can only be spent on stadium uogrades for a ballpark not owned by the Orioles but that has to be paid back by the Orioles.
There is no free stuff.
The same 600 the Ravens received for their stadium upgrades, yet I don’t see any hate or vitriol towards that team ownership.
Do the Orioles fans and the team a favor and sell the team, John.
We are in prime position for an extended run of success and having your slimeball hands in the pot will do way more harm than good.
Yawn… get a new line. It’s under him that this team has built itself up to contend in the long term. At this point, complaining about ownership is just tiresome whining.
It’s not a tiresome point, the comment has validity worth considering until the fans see substantial financial investments in free agency.
Until then, Angelos has only mixed the dough and has yet to put it in the oven.
Yeah, how dare he put together a winning club that’s set to be a winning club for years to come without spending big money.
101 wins = put in the oven and on the table.
John Angelos is a serial liar who views the Orioles organization (which isn’t even actually his) as his personal piggy bank.
The sooner the team is out of that wretched family’s hands, the better.
Gag me. Tired old spiel. They have put together a winning ball club. Who TF cares that they haven’t spent big money to do it. Hey, how did spending big money work for the Mets, Dodgers, Phillies and Astros this year? Oh, all had WORSE records than the Orioles. Have a seat until you find an argument that makes sense.
Whatever you say, John.
Why would that be a favor to fans? John brought in a GM and gave him the leeway to build the team the way he wanted and it paid off in 2023. Now he guaranteed the Orioles will be in Baltimore for at least 15 more years and will pay off a $600 million loan that can only be used to upgrade the stadium. I don’t see anything he has done wrong.
Now if you want to bltch at his father Peter you would have a right. Lots of years of losing with him running the show.
The talentless failure (John Angelos) has no source of income besides his daddy’s baseball team and has been running bottom 5 payrolls since he took over from his ailing father half a decade ago, and yet, despite Peter running a top 10 payroll as recently as 2017 or so without the team going bankrupt, Johnny Boy somehow still has the gall to claim that he would have to raise hot dog prices to increase payroll or extend our young stars.
No wonder he lied through his teeth about opening the organization’s books to the media when Dan Connolly asked him directly about the team’s shameful lack of investment in the major league payroll.
I’m glad some of you enjoy reading my Angelos bashing.
Elias has built this team up, not John. John holds the purse strings and his greed delayed the stadium lease and has also led to a minimized payroll and zero contract extensions after the Chris Davis disaster.
John had better give Elias a promotion and whatever salary he wants. If Elias jumps ship for whatever reason and John is still in control, that will not be good.
Some of you should pull the wool back from your eyes and look into John’s past and present business dealings. True, not all owners are exact shiny beacons of virtue, but John is notoriously awful.
So, until he sells the team, I’ll keep posting about it.
John Angelos hired Elias and had the good sense to allow him to do his job without interference. That is more than can be said for most owners. The results are clear and undeniable. 101 wins in 2023 and a team that has most of that core together for at least 3 more years.
If you were an Orioles fan you would be cheering. That leads me to believe you are not.
There was no greed involved in the negotiations, just getting the best deal for his team. Its a business, not a charity. The state also gets an incredible deal. They loan the Orioles $600 million and all of it is spent on upgrading the stadium the state owns and then the Orioles pay all the money back.
You don’t name any of his supposedly shady deals nor provide links, so I am going to assume you are full of it.
Keep on ranting about non-existent problems. You may be doing it for an entire generation.
@Pads
You said here and others often do too that Angelos lets Elias run things without interference. Thats a very presumptuous statement. Clearly Elias does not have Angelos blessing to sign free agents and or extend contracts to existing players. So, there has to be some meddling. It’s obvious and would be ignorant to think otherwise.
Look, Angelos is cheap. It’s well documented. This is part of the business deals I’m referring to. It’s not hard to google search them. For example, the MASN lawsuit, Angelos making cuts to staff in the warehouse as well as to Orioles television and radio production efforts. Not to mention his completely irresponsible and childish handling of the Kevin Brown situation.
Some people defend him habitually, and that’s, well, indefensible given his history.
I’m ecstatic about the success of the team in 22 and 23. Looking forward to seeing what we do in 24. But I’m giving all the credit to Elias, SigBot, etc and zero of it to Mr Napoleon complex himself, one John Angelos.
Not interfering, and Not dishing out wads of cash, are two very different things.
I direct you to the Mets and Padres. Your comments are so tiresome.
You do not know what you are talking about here, PadsFan. John is a serial liar who failed at everything in life prior to lucking into a gig where he can A) pretend to be a big shot despite having no actual accomplishments in life and B) pocket lots of cash he didn’t actually earn by refusing to increase payroll expenditures.
What did Pads Fans get wrong? Every point he made seemed to me to be true.
I can’t find a single thing that is true in your posts though. Just lots of ill- targeted hatred.
The team is winning and doing well by the fans by keeping the team in Baltimore long term while John is running the team.
Preach, brother.
The sooner the Angelos family sells, the better.
Love the four year window to the lease extension aka give me more handouts but no one wants to work billionaire clause
Great, now spend some money and field a real team! This ownership is a total, sustained embarrassment to our beloved sport. Sale the d*mn team!
101 wins in 2023 was not real?
Sale the team??
Lol
What part of the south you from?
South Bronx? South side of Chicago? South pole?
Dude they win the AL East this past season
No they didn’t. Elias was even better than we thought and got us into a position of sustainable competitiveness about a year earlier than anticipated. The O’s got exactly where they were built to get to in 2023 or 2024, a real juggernaut of a club that came a few arms short of truly contending into the post season. That core is strong and I believe Elias will get the job done.
Sorry, that reply was to the post below.
Yeah but keep it real. They way over achieved
@whiffa
Can you explain ‘over achieve” please?
I don’t understand the phrase, if a team wins that number of games, they achieve…they win that number of games
Be real, over-achievement is a term used by PECOTA enthusiasts that didn’t watch a single game. The O’s performed at essentially the same level they did post-ASB 2022.
@ubaldo
Yeah, I feel the same way. I live in London so I tend to watch the best games available rather than the A’s starting at 3am. So eastern games are easier.
I watched a fair few games last year and the Orioles are for real.
Dedication, watching from London. Good on you!
@skins
Yeah, I made this point about three months ago, only Angelos is holding the Orioles back now. Fellow poster “Samuel” described me unfavourably.
The Orioles have such a solid roster and real talent still to come through that all they need is at most a couple of complimentary pieces.
Montgomery? Plus a bullpen piece? They have such a chance for 5+ years…
Oh, “Samuel”… That’s a name I haven’t heard from in awhile, for good reason
@steinbrenner
I have to admit I was a bit “Billy Martin” at the time. But he went up the curtains and out the window.
AL East is going to be an intriguing battle this year. Are you guys going to invest all in on Yamamoto?
Liked “…up the curtains and out the window”
Most underrated stadium and organization in mlb.
This is great news. Phenomenal ballpark. Happy for O’s fans.
Weren’t the Angelos family looking to sell the team? This probably helps I would think.
His brother Louis claimed they were, but John has been adamant that they are not selling.
Louis is a piece of work.
I don’t care that the club announced they’re committed to 30 yrs, (despite the agreement being for 15). they also announced they had an agreement for 30 yrs on Clinchmas knowing full well that all they had was a non-binding memorandum.
Fool me once…
Thats not true actually. Its a 30 year lease . It does contain an opt out after 15 that they could choose to excercise if they fail to negotiate development and ground lese terms in the 4 year window.. But its a 30 year lease. You don’t see players saying ” Hey I signed a 7 year contract”, when its a 10 year deal with an opt out after 7.
It’s not just the Orioles saying it. wbaltv.com/article/baltimore-orioles-stadium-lease…
The state of Maryland has released this news as well.
“Clinchmas”. I see what you did there.
if the ownership is the same, you don’t think that they will take their option as leverage and try to negotiate what they want in the development rights plus more?
your assumption is that John Angrlos negotiates in good faith. I don’t assume that.
The development rights are simple. The Orioles want a 99 year lease on that piece of land. They get to develop hospitality and retail on the site and sublet it, pay a market rate lease rate, and the land always is owned by the state of Maryland.
The Orioles asked only for the right to lease an industrial plot of land that includes an empty building at the going rate for other plots in the area and then paying to develop it into restaurants and retail that will increase both the desirability of visiting the area and local tax revenue. All while the state continues to own the land.
Got to be pretty stupid to see any downside to that deal.
But then I have met Bill Ferguson and he resembles that description.
So the Orioles got the $600 million loan to upgrade Camden Yards and will be there for at least 15 years. That is a win/win.
If they can get the lease for the state owned land done, then the area will become more of a ballpark district and less of a industrial area. That will be good for fans and increase localized revenue. Since its a lease, not a gift of land, and the Orioles would be paying to develop the property into hospitality and retail that is good for the state as well.
It also will increase Orioles revenue so they will be able to spend more on players. Or pocket more profits.
If I was an Oriole fan I would be very happy with the way things are going.
Obviously, as an Os fan, I’m thrilled for the team and city. But I’m wondering if other teams and fans are worrying. 101 wins with no long term contracts and a profitable local broadcasting operation that also has the rights to the Nats. 4 of the top 8 pre arb bonus earners and 4 of the top 10 prospects (Holliday, Mayo, Basallo and Norby per Fangraphs). 3 picks in the Top 35 in the next draft. Means healthy. They are going to get A LOT BETTER.
$600M loan?? This is a $600M gift from politicians to a billionaire, similar to so many other stadium schemes that are welfare for the wealthy.
It’s a bond, that must be used on the stadium. The Angelos family does not own the stadium. If you’re going to complain, at least find a valid point to harp on.
Its a loan that can only be spent on the ballpark. The money is not even released to the team. Its given directly to the stadium authority and used on upgrading the ballpark. Not one penny goes to the Angelos family but they do have to pay it all back.
Your rant was amusing if completely off base.
It is a loan. The money will have to be paid back AND the proceeds of the loan can only be spent on the stadium itself. The state of Maryland owns the stadium, so the state gets $600 million in upgrades on their property for free and the Orioles pay them money to lease that property.
Terrible news for the New York Highlanders.
“The O’s and the stadium authority can now start accessing the $600MM in taxpayer-financed bonds that state lawmakers have authorized for major upgrades to the stadium.”
Glad to see the billionaires getting the help they need from the taxpayers! Thank goodness they don’t need to use any of their own money! I wouldn’t want them to be uncomfortable in any way!
What part of LOAN do you not understand?
The Angelos don’t own the ballpark and it’s 30 years old. It needs a lot of upgrades and deferred maintenance.
The Angelos will pay every cent of that $600 million because its a LOAN.
Amazing they got that done. I wonder how much Moore pocketed in the deal.
I bet nothing, because there is zero indication he’s corrupt.
lol are you serious? How about the ‘if you have good credit, you pay more for a loan’ bill he passed. I guess he did that all by himself..he’s on their payroll. Wake up dude.
I think Ubaldo is employed by either Wes or John and or is MLBTR poster “King Omar”, who I think may have blocked me. They sound like the same person.
No he is typical leftwing loony sheep. When he pays 50% tax to live in the slums, he’ll blame someone else…
Way to keep the neverending shakedown going, Angelos.
To be fair, the terms of this are far less team friendly than the iterations described previously.
agreed. it’s better than was previously verbally agreed to before the President of the MD Senate voiced his reservations. I wish that the development rights had totally been 86’d but I’ll take 15 yrs and another protracted negotiation. maybe by then, Peter’s wishes would have been followed and the new ownership would not make the redevelopment rights such a deal breaker. maybe they don’t even enact their opt out when (I hope) they don’t get their way in the next few years.
So 15 years is better than 30 years guaranteed? That is all that changed.
The development rights were always separate. They also called for the Orioles to lease the land at market rates for 99 years, pay all development costs, have the right to sublet, and the land still belonged to the state. The Orioles were in essence paying what anyone would pay to lease the land AND paying to improve the state of Maryland’s property.
But people are beotching? Are you serious?
Whew…
Man, just a little bit of that 600 mil in tax revenue, would go a long way, as far as providing more resources for the homeless, as well as providing substantial funding to the Baltimore PD. Lord knows, they could use the help.
Would it? The real issue is housing. $600MM for housing is nothing. Why are you complaining anyways? From VA = not your tax dollars.
My user name is FROMVA, genius, not currentlylivinginva. It is my tax dollars. DUH
Glad to hear that the Orioles will be staying in Baltimore.
Wes is Moore.