Old Friends, Back in the Game

"Baseball's truly in his DNA," Kasten said. "He's not just a lifer. His family are lifers -- baseball lifers."

The main reason MacPhail's new desk sits at Camden Yards -- after 12 years as president and chief executive of the Cubs, nine years before that as the Twins' GM, where he won two World Series (including 1991, over Kasten's Braves) -- is because of that DNA. A MacPhail, out of baseball?

"I knew I'd come back," MacPhail said. "But I wanted to take the full year." He notes the irony in the timing of the announcement of his hiring -- last June 20, the first day of summer. "I've never been to Martha's Vineyard or Nantucket or anyplace like that," MacPhail said. Summers in baseball mean summers without vacations. "I was going to do that stuff."

The Orioles' job, though, was enough to change the plan. For a downtrodden franchise, the backdrop seemed perfect to MacPhail. His father, Lee (who later became president of the American League), ran the club as its general manager from 1958 to '65. Andy still has old pictures of himself, as a kid, hanging out with the Orioles of those days. "It's a labor of love," he said.

When Kasten joined the ownership group of the Lerner family in a bid to buy the Nationals, he had to learn the way his new bosses worked, a process that is still ongoing. Conversely, MacPhail knew Orioles owner Peter Angelos through two negotiating sessions for a collective bargaining agreement. In 2002, they were the only club representatives involved. After morning sessions, when the staffs of MLB and the players' association would retire to back rooms to work on details, MacPhail and Angelos were often left alone -- to kill time.

"What I came to appreciate about Peter was: Look, if Peter tells you 'X', just bank on it," MacPhail said. "He's going to do what he says he's going to do."

Thus, when Angelos flew to Chicago to talk to MacPhail about the Orioles job, MacPhail said he outlined the parameters under which he would be comfortable working for Angelos. "He said, 'Okay,' " MacPhail said. To outsiders, MacPhail's faith might seem naive, because Angelos's reputation was, at best, as a hands-on owner, at worst a full-on meddler. But because MacPhail had, as he said, "grown to know the human being," the trust was there.

Midway through last October, when he felt he had learned enough about the Orioles as an organization, MacPhail made a presentation to the franchise's top officials, Angelos included. The message, MacPhail said: "This is where you are. These are the commitments that you've made. This is the performance you're getting."

Ten straight losing seasons must have hung in the air. MacPhail made no recommendations at the time. He waited for it to sink in. Only later did MacPhail lay out his plan: strip it down, and build it back up.

"There was no, 'We could go 'A' or we could go 'B,' " he said.

Thus, the Orioles made 2-for-10 offseason trades that sent star left-hander Erik Bedard and shortstop Miguel Tejada elsewhere, but brought a core of players that might provide a foundation. Their payroll is $26 million less than a year ago, yet they enter this series near the top of the American League East standings.

"They're doing it a tough way," Selig said. "It's a painful way, but it's the right way. It was the right way in Branch Rickey's day, and it's the right way now."