Orioles Making a Constructive Effort

"This was better than I expected," Dave Trembley said of his Opening Day. (By Greg Fiume -- Getty Images)

For those, like me, who are peculiar enough to enjoy the idea of teams in both the National and American leagues within an easy drive, these are enjoyable times, not a chance to demand a loyalty oath. The Orioles are bad. But, finally, they are bad in the right way. Team president Andy MacPhail has taken over the reins with the understanding that he be allowed to treat the Orioles as a teardown, not an expensive remodel.

On that score, another key test was passed when Gibbons was released on Sunday. MacPhail called Angelos "looking for some advice." MacPhail laid out the situation. Angelos said, "You gotta do what you gotta do." Translation: Burn that $11.9 million contract in public.

If only other Orioles general managers had been given such authority. But MacPhail is in a different category. He's third-generation baseball aristocracy. MacPhail won two world titles in Minnesota, a small market few thought would ever win anything. His results with the Cubs were mixed. But if he resurrects a jewel franchise in Baltimore, he may be the front-runner to replace Commissioner Bud Selig someday.

Right now, he has a roster that's quickly being stripped down to scrap. Will it collapse under the guidance of a 20-year minor league manager or will it fight for its dignity, as Manny Acta's Nats did last year?

"I've had no problems since day one," Trembley said of his player's intensity.

"This was better than I expected," Trembley added of his first opener as a big league manager. "It was like Christmas morning to a lot of these young guys. Me, too." Then, looking at a crowded interview area, he quipped, "There are more darn people in this room than in some of the ballparks I've played in."

Some teams fight their underdog fate, resent it, think too highly of themselves to cope with being bad collectively. And they flounder. Other embrace it and sometimes keep their dignity. The booing of Huff for his gaffe on a shock-jock show was a team test. They passed. Huff admitted he'd been "stupid" and took his medicine, then volunteered, "With the bad [chilly, misty] weather, we still had a pretty good turnout today. This is a diehard baseball city."

Cleanup hitter Kevin Millar said: "Sometimes we're going to be behind the eight-ball this season and be undermanned. But you have to have a chip on your shoulder. I don't think anybody had the Rockies in the World Series last year. If two of your starting pitchers and two or three hitters have career years, it changes your whole season."

Some young Orioles will have a chance to show why big names were traded for them. Only by running the risk of being truly bad, by trading stars for prospects, by drafting high after awful seasons, can a downtrodden team in a mid-sized market crawl back toward the light.

"I just relish this opportunity," said center fielder Adam Jones, 22, the key man in the Bedard trade. "Millar keeps telling us there are seven billion people in the world and only 750 of us get the chance to be in the big league. So play like it."