It's rare enough to have a rooting interest in two baseball teams, as I do, especially when those two teams were matched in a memorable World Series in 1969. It's even rarer still that one man could have a major hand in changing the fortunes of both teams.
Then again, Frank Cashen was, especially in this day and age, a very rare kind of man. A Renaissance man in an age of specialists, a man who built success one brick at a time in an age of instant gratification, and a Baltimore boy who had the courage to face down the lions in New York and became king in the asphalt jungle of Big Apple baseball.
I started following the Orioles around 1964, at the age of 8, one year before Cashen became the team's executive vice president, and two years before they began a dominance of the major leagues that lasted well into the early 1970s. He engineered what was arguably the single most important trade in the team's history--getting Frank Robinson from the Cincinnati Reds--and hired Earl Weaver, who merely became one of the most successful managers in history. He drew on his experience in law, journalism and business and added to that a knowledge of baseball that proved to be crucial to the Orioles four pennants and two World Championships, and that ultimately earned him the reputation of being one of the last true general managers in baseball--one who knew enough about everything to be able to make the final decisions the right ones.
Later, after college, I started working at a civil-service job in New York City--in Queens, to be exact, seven short subway stops from Shea Stadium. Since my rooting interest in the Orioles precluded rooting for the Yankees, I adopted the Mets as "my" team for my new home town. And, not long after than, the Mets were sold for the first time in their history--and the new owners promptly hired Frank Cashen to resurrect the by-then less-than-miraculous Mets. In a way, it helped make me feel right at home, known that a fellow Baltimorean was trying to make it in the Big Apple.
And it helped that much more that, like me, Cashen wanted to succeed on his own terms, rather than being led by the short-term passions of the fans or the press. He had owners who were willing to spend big, even to the point of getting into a bidding war with the Yankees for Dave Winfield. But Cashen believed very strongly that winning teams were build from within, and not by participating in what he once referred to as an "auction of mediocrity." He knew that would take time, and he knew that it would not win him any short-term popularity contests. Despite that--and despite media coverage that was often vicious to the point of injustice--he never deviated from what he had learned through his experience in Baltimore.
I read all three major New York papers (as well as Newsday) every day, getting upset and angry each time I read the sniping comments about bow ties, crab cakes, and any other Baltimore references the so-called sophisticated Big Apple columnists could throw by way of insult at Cashen and his allegedly cautious, small-town approach. What did any of them know about running a team? Cashen, by contrast, had already accomplished everything they had accomplished during his days with the old Baltimore News-American--and presided over two World Championships with the Orioles, or twice as many as the Mets had won by that point. As a fellow native of Charm City, I felt bad for Cashen, but admired the fact that, publicly at least, he never let the insults bother him.
And, in the end, he didn't let them stop him from proving that his way was the way that worked, as anyone who watched the 1986 World Series knows.
Thanks, Frank, for showing that what works in Baltimore can work anywhere, even in the worlds' toughest market for sports (as well as everything else). I ultimately left civil service and the Big Apple to find success elsewhere, but I will never forget the lift you gave to my spirits, twice in my lifetime. As a Mets and Orioles fan, both of my rooting interests will always appreciate you more that I can ever say, here or elsewhere. I never met you, but perhaps we'll meet on the flip side.
In spring training, of course.
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