100 Words or Less About … The Off-Season

A concise summary of O’s events

By Matthew Taylor

We debut our "100 Words or Less" theme - which we'll use regularly during 2007 - with a tongue-in-cheek review of the Birds' off-season maneuvering.

The goal of this particular posting is to use 100 words or less of corporate speak to dissect the hometown Hot Stove action. How many of these buzz words have you heard in your office?

100 Words or less starts ... now:

"A download of the off-season: The 30,000-foot view suggests there won’t be a hostile takeover of our Northern baseball neighbors. It’s fair to question the synergy between the front office and ownership. The O’s reached out to free agents like Soriano and Lee, but our disconnect with top players continues. The GMs did think outside the box and loop back in to the market to sign 10 free agents. The deliverables included Huff, Payton, and a revamped bullpen. To your point, re: losing, the 2007 team could leverage a .500 record as a metric to incent disillusioned fans."

Final Count: 98 words. Mission Accomplished, with room to spare.

See you next time on "100 Words or Less."