Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Angelos folding his cards?

Anthony A. Williams, the mayor of Washington, D.C., told baseball last month that "the train is ready to leave the station," in regards to the national pastime returning to the nation's capital.

Along with Las Vegas and several other candidate cities, Washington is trying to woo the woebegone Montreal Expos in a Major League Baseball relocation effort that has dragged into its third season.

Baltimore Orioles owner Peter Angelos, a highly successful lawyer, might not offer his help in decorating the D.C. depot, but he seemed resigned, for the first time, to that possibility in an interview with the Associated Press.

Angelos has long expressed his dissatisfaction with another team infringing upon his territorial rights. His threat of legal action had been considered a negative in the potential move of the Expos to Washington or the Northern Virginia areas.

"Unfortunately, I have no choice," Angelos told the AP of the Expos, should they eventually be placed in Washington. "After all, Washington is also my capital."

Many sources and media outlets have considered Washington to be the front-runner for the Expos since the end of a quarterly owners meeting in New York last month in which relocation was discussed for 2 1/2 hours.

The existence of RFK Stadium as a temporary venue, until a permanent stadium is constructed, and a heavy commitment of public financing to build a new ballpark, for as much as $383 million, are several factors that are believed to favor Washington.

The Oregonian of Portland quoted MLB chief operating officer Bob DuPuy, one of the nine members of the relocation committee, as saying that that committee plans to make a recommendation to MLB commissioner Bud Selig by the end of this week.

Then Selig will run that recommendation by the MLB executive council, of which Angelos has been a member since January. Ultimately, baseball's 29 owners must approve of the moving of the Expos with a three-quarters majority vote.

The aforementioned Angelos comments appeared in a Saturday article in the Washington Times. However, a copy of the telephone interview Angelos conducted with the AP revealed that he wasn't so quick to anoint D.C. with a third try at baseball.

He would prefer the team land in Norfolks, Va., as opposed to what he views as his own backyard.

"(Norfolk is) 180 miles away from Baltimore," Angelos said. "We're 100 miles away from Philadelphia, and that works fine."

For the umpteenth time, he reiterated that another major league franchise in close proximity to the Orioles "would result in two mediocre franchises from a competitive standpoint."

Since his listed market territory is Baltimore city and county, and Anne Arundel, Hartford, Carroll and Howard counties, the legal options for Angelos might be limited.

Insiders believe Angelos, who did not return phone calls placed to his Baltimore office Monday, would only be able to make a credible legal challenge in his team's television and radio revenue, rights that extend into Virginia.

Sam Schroeder, an executive vice president and general manager of the network, Comcast SportsNet, that televises Baltimore games in the Mid-Atlantic region, told the Washington Post that he has not been a target of Orioles officials or Angelos.

"Not in the least," Schroeder said.

Nor does he believe the Orioles would be diminished, as a broadcast property, by another team in the area.

"I don't believe the Orioles would be hurt by the addition of a National League team in Washington or Northern Virginia," he said. "It's a fact -- as the professional teams we cover go, so goes Comcast SportsNet."

Another factor that could upend the Expos' proceedings is a lawsuit filed by 14 former minority owners of the Florida Marlins, against MLB, including Selig, and current Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria.

That group of Canadian businessmen once owned 76 percent of the Expos until Loria gained control of the club. In February 2002, Loria sold the Expos to baseball's 29 other owners and bought the Marlins from John Henry, whose group purchased the Boston Red Sox.

That minority group of former Expos owners now owns 6 percent of the Florida franchise.

In July 2002, they filed a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act lawsuit, a 46-page document, in U.S. District Court in Florida, then it was transferred to arbitration. DuPuy said those claims are "wholly without merit."

The suit seeks $100 million in punitive and at least $100 million in compensatory damages, which could be tripled. A ruling, to determine whether the former limited partners have a case with the RICO suit, is expected in August at the American Arbitration Association in New York.

Thirteen months ago, Judge Ursula Ungaro-Benages, of the U.S. District Court in Miami, ordered baseball to give her court 90 days' notice of any attempt to move or sell the Expos.

That could stall Selig's plan to announce a new home for the team for next season by the mid-July All Star break. Jeffrey Kessler, a lawyer representing the limited partners, has threatened to file an injunction against the Expos' relocation once that sale is announced.

Baseball economist and author Andrew Zimbalist said the entire relocation process is a mess.

"Here we are two years into trying to figure out what's going to happen to this franchise, and all we have are inchoate plans," he told The Oregonian. "I'm not sure the Expos are going to move. There's a significant chance -- something more than a 10-percent chance -- that they're not going to move the franchise at all.

"It's interesting because it's stalemated all the way around. It's not just the cities and MLB, but arbitration and RICO litigation also are stalemating the situation. There's nothing to move it forward other than a game of words."

So the train might not have enough power to leave the station.

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