A.J. Endres
In years past, walking down the hallways in late September/ early October, Hereford students created a sea of purple and black supporting our local professional football team. This year, however there is still hype from baseball,which started in late spring. This is quite rare because as most know, for the last 15 years, the Orioles have had losing seasons. Orioles magic had been completely diminished, but things have taking a turn for the best, and created a brouhaha throughout the school.
Sean Demchak (12) said, “This is O’mazing; this is why I love baseball.”
The flood of orange is most likely now because of the “World Series Wednesday,” where students are supposed to wear orange for the Orioles all the way up through the World Series. Also there has been a lot more talk about going to games this year than in the past because the Orioles are playoff contenders. They haven’t won more than 81 games since 1997.
“I’ve been an O’s fan for about 16 years, and this is the first winning season I can remember; its electrifying,” said Brooks Wilhelm (11), who was named after Brooks Robinson by his dad. The Orioles have already secured the winning season with 92 wins as of October 1st with four games left.
In school, Kids Helping Hopkins sold 100 tickets to an Orioles game for $15 each to raise money. The tickets sold out in a quick two days; some of the students had to be refunded because they ran out of tickets, but kept selling them.
In years past the Orioles have never had trouble scoring runs, but they have always lacked in their bullpen. There has been a big change this year in the pitching, bringing in Japanese pitcher Wei-Yin Chin, who has a sub-four earned run average (ERA) and has 12 wins. The Orioles also have been one of the most home run hitting teams. Both of these stats have helped the Orioles set a record of winning 16 straight extra inning game wins.
This is the first time the Orioles have made the playoffs since any students in the school can remember.
