Orioles ownership: Local roots are nice, deep pockets are better

It’s only natural that when it came time for the squabbling Angelos family to finally strike a deal to sell the Baltimore Orioles, the first question on the minds of fans would be whether the new owner would have Charm City roots or not.

The good news is that David Rubenstein, the private-equity billionaire who will have a controlling interest, is a Baltimore native and even a Baltimore City College man.

Word that Cal “Iron Man” Ripken Jr., easily the most Baltimore of any living Hall of Fame baseball player on the planet, is among the minority investors may prove even more reassuring — not just because Cal is Cal but because Rubenstein, who may live in Bethesda but is really a creature of the New York-Washington, D.C. power axis, thought it important to include him.

And while all that sentimentality is great, especially for those Nervous Nellies who still think the O’s will leave town at the drop of a hat, what the co-founder of the Carlyle Group brings to the table is a lot more than some childhood memories from Northwest Baltimore of the 1950s and early ’60s.

For those who don’t follow Major League Baseball closely, here’s a newsflash: Money talks.

Unlike the National Football League where revenue sharing and salary caps level the playing field, MLB is all about class warfare.

For a small market team like the Orioles to succeed, they need a wealthy owner willing to spend his dough to compete against the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox (and that’s just in their own American League East division).

Rubenstein is reported to have a net worth of $3.8 billion, which ranks him at No. 326 in the Forbes 400. But just as importantly, the 74-year-old is regarded as a really, really smart businessperson, a magna cum laude Duke University graduate, a gifted lawyer and a trusted government adviser. He has friends in high places and a strong interest in philanthropy (and more about that in a moment).

You want an owner who can figure out how to compete in a system that favors bigger markets, and you could scarcely do better. And he looks especially good now given the posturing and reversals of John Angelos in recent months.

The Orioles CEO and chair has publicly misrepresented his intentions over selling the team, over whether he and

Gov. Wes Moore had negotiated a lease and the employment status of a popular broadcaster on his payroll. And don’t get us started on his efforts to grab development rights to taxpayer-owned land.

Frankly, we have no idea what kind of owner Rubenstein will turn out to be. We had high hopes when local attorney Peter Angelos bought the team in 1993 but couldn’t foresee what the next generation might bring.

But if anyone has the tools to appreciate the economic-based challenges ahead, surely Rubenstein does. Frankly, he’d do well to follow the lead of O’s GM Mike Elias: Sign rising young stars to long-term contracts, trade those who become prohibitively costly to keep and don’t throw money at over-priced free agents on the decline. It won’t always be a roster of familiar names but it gives the Orioles the best chance of being contenders.

So if we could give a few tips to the new ownership group (and, hey, we do know something about new local ownership here at The Baltimore Sun), we would encourage the newcomers to be open, to be honest and to be consistent. Fans would appreciate getting a bit more respect from the O’s front office.

Meanwhile, resolve not to hustle state taxpayers for maximum advantage, resolve to support downtown redevelopment as a good neighbor, and try directing some of that philanthropy for which the new big boss is so famous (like restoring the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C.) to help Baltimore and its residents thrive.

Oh, and we’d like if you could make it back to the World Series, where the Orioles haven’t been since 1983. Pitchers and catchers report on Feb. 14, guys. Let’s play ball.