Beltway Series

Beltway Series

Baltimore Orioles Washington Nationals
First meeting	May 19, 2006 Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium, Washington, D.C.
Latest meeting	June 8, 2017 Nationals Park, Washington, D.C. Nationals 6, Orioles 1
Next meeting	2018
Statistics
Meetings total	63
Regular season series	Orioles, 38–26 (.594)
Largest victory	Nationals, 17–5 (May 20, 2011)
Longest win streak	Orioles: 6 (September 22, 2015-August 24, 2016) Nationals: 4 (May 20-June 14, 2007)
Current win streak	Nationals 2 (May 10-June 8, 2017)

The Beltway Series, promoted by the teams as "The Battle of the Beltways," is the Major League Baseball (MLB) interleague rivalry series played between the Baltimore Orioles and Washington Nationals. The Orioles are a member of the American League (AL) East division, and the Nationals are a member of the National League (NL) East division. The series name is taken from the beltway highways, the Baltimore Beltway (I-695) and the Capital Beltway (I-95/I-495), that serve Baltimore, Maryland, and Washington, D.C., respectively.

History of the series

When interleague play began in 1997, MLB identified the Philadelphia Phillies as Baltimore′s interleague "natural rival," and the Orioles began an annual interleague series against the Phillies that season. At the time, the franchise that would become the Washington Nationals played in Montreal as the Montreal Expos, and the Expos played the Toronto Blue Jays as their interleague "natural rival" each year from 1997 to 2004 in what became known as the All-Canadian Series. The Orioles and Expos met one another in routine interleague play – without any connotation of a "rivalry" or other special association between the teams – during the 1998, 1999, 2000, and 2001 seasons, and Montreal won seven of the 12 meetings, but the Orioles and Expos did not play one another again after the 2001 season.

The relocation of the Expos to Washington for the 2005 season marked the first time the Baltimore–Washington Metropolitan Area had two Major League Baseball franchises since the 1971 season, after which the second Washington Senators franchise had moved to Arlington, Texas, to become the Texas Rangers. MLB changed the Orioles′ "natural rival" to the Nationals, but the Expos move to Washington came after the 2005 schedule already had been set. Thus, Baltimore and Washington did not face one another at all in 2005; that season, the Orioles played the Phillies as their "natural rival" for the last time, while the Nationals played what would have been the Expos′ 2005 schedule, including six games against the Blue Jays – three of them at Toronto and three at Washington – that would have constituted the 2005 All-Canadian Series if the Expos had remained in Montreal. The 2006 schedule thus became the first one to include games between Baltimore and Washington as interleague "natural rivals," inaugurating the "Beltway Series."

Interleague play has ensured that the rivals have faced one another in each year since. From 2006 through 2012, the teams played each other six times a year, with one three-game series in each city and the two series taking place in May and June and separated by between three and six weeks. Since 2013, when a realignment took effect in Major League Baseball′s two leagues and their divisions, the schedule has varied according to whether the American League East and National League East are scheduled to play one another in interleague play, which occurs on a rotational basis once every three years. In seasons in which the two divisions do not meet, the Orioles and Nationals play four consecutive games, two in each city. Once every three years, in seasons in which the National League East and American League East face each other in interleague play (for example, in 2015), the Beltway Series consists of six games, with one three-game series played in each city, and the series can be widely separated; in 2015, the teams played in Baltimore in July but did not play in Washington until September.

Through 2017, the Orioles lead the Beltway Series in series wins, 7–1–4, as well as in games won, 38–26.

Controversy fueling the rivalry

History of play between the cities

Both cities have a long history of professional baseball, beginning with the 1871 Washington Olympics and the 1882 American Association Baltimore Orioles, followed by the 1886 Washington Nationals of the National League. At the formation of the American League in 1901, franchises were placed in both cities, with the original Washington Senators and an earlier Baltimore Orioles team among the eight charter members. The Senators and Orioles played 39 times in those first two seasons, with the Orioles winning 22.^[1] The original Orioles, however, moved to New York in 1903 and eventually became the New York Yankees.

Play between Baltimore and Washington resumed in 1954 when the St. Louis Browns relocated to Baltimore and became the current Orioles, once again giving both cities teams in the American League and regular meetings each season. This second period of play between Baltimore and Washington lasted through the 1971 season. The original Senators moved to Minnesota in 1961 and became the Minnesota Twins and were replaced by a second Senators franchise, which played from 1961 through the 1971 season. After the 1971 season, the second Senators franchise moved to Texas and became the Texas Rangers. Overall, the Orioles won the series with the Senators 224–126, which included an 89–65 mark against the original Senators and a 135–61 record against the second Senators franchise.^[2][3]

After the departure of the second Senators franchise, various efforts to return MLB to the Washington, D.C., area occurred, including a 1973 effort that almost relocated the San Diego Padres to Washington for the 1974 season, bids to purchase the Orioles in 1975 and the San Francisco Giants in 1976 and move them, a large "Baseball in Washington in ′87" promotion in 1987 advocating that a team to come to Washington, calls in 1991 and 1994 for MLB to place an expansion team in Washington, and efforts to buy the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1995 and the Houston Astros in 1996 for a move to Washington. None of these efforts bore fruit, and Washington, D.C., had no Major League Baseball team from 1972 through 2004.^[4][5][6][7] Play between Baltimore and Washington did not resume until the advent of the Beltway Series in 2006.

Opposition to relocation by the Orioles

In addition to the existing rivalry between the cities of Baltimore and Washington, the Nationals–Orioles rivalry is also influenced by circumstances surrounding the Nationals' founding. Peter Angelos, the owner of the Orioles, opposed the move of the Montreal Expos to Washington on the grounds that it would harm the Orioles financially, contending that the Orioles alone had a legal right to the Baltimore-Washington market. Ultimately, the owners of the other MLB teams approved the move to Washington in a 28–1 vote on December 3, 2004; Angelos cast the sole dissenting vote.

In the first four full seasons after baseball returned to Washington, the Nationals drew 9,127,252 fans to their games, compared to 8,892,951 fans attending Orioles games. The Nationals were a larger draw in 2005, while both teams were about the same in 2006 (the Orioles drew exactly 100 more fans that year), and in 2007 the Orioles were a larger draw by nearly 200,000 fans. In 2008 the momentum swung back the Nationals' way, with the Nationals outdrawing the Orioles by over 370,000 fans, due in part to the opening of Nationals Park.^[8]

Television rights

The dispute with Angelos over the move was resolved when the Orioles were granted the right to broadcast Nationals games on their new television network, the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network. However, the deal was struck only days before the beginning of the 2005 season and many D.C.-area fans did not receive the new network for some time and were unable to watch most games. Furthermore, it has been reported that Angelos and the Orioles hold majority ownership in the network, which has led some Nationals fans to contend that the channel exhibits a bias in covering the Orioles compared to the Nationals (such as displaying the scores of Beltway Series games as "Orioles vs. Washington" as opposed to "Orioles vs. Nationals"). Furthermore, the Orioles changed the name on their away jerseys from "Baltimore" to "Orioles" in 1972 after D.C. lost the last Senators team, in an attempt to convince D.C. fans to adapt them as their team. In 2009, the Orioles changed back to "Baltimore" on their away jerseys.

"O's!"

The tradition of yelling "O's!" during the line "Oh say does that Star Spangled Banner yet wave" in the "Star Spangled Banner" is a Baltimore Orioles tradition. Over the years it became a staple of Washington, D.C.-area sporting events. The chant has had controversy in the past, and the usage of the "O's!" chant at Nationals games, even when the Nationals were not hosting the Orioles, reignited such controversy.^[9][10]

2017 rainout

With Baltimore leading the series two games to one, the final game of the 2017 Beltway Series was scheduled for May 11 at Nationals Park, but it rained for much of the day and the Nationals postponed the game based on a prediction that rain would continue well into the evening. The game was rescheduled for June 8. In pregame comments to the media on June 8, Orioles manager Buck Showalter noted that the sun had been shining by the time the Orioles' team bus left Nationals Park on May 11 and that the game could have been played, adding that the Orioles would have played with a healthy lineup that evening that included center fielder Adam Jones and third baseman Manny Machado, and that Dylan Bundy, the Orioles′ best starter, would have been on the mound. In contrast, the Nationals had planned for A. J. Cole, who had had only mixed success at the major-league level over the preceding three years, to make a sport start on May 11. By June 8, Jones and Machado both were injured, Bundy was not the scheduled starter. Sports reporters took away a clear impression that the Orioles believed that the Nationals had unnecessarily cancelled the game so as to avoid an unfavorable pitching matchup and facing the Orioles′ best lineup. The Nationals won the June 8 game to clinch a 2-2 Beltway Series tie for the season.^[11]

Asked about the Orioles′ interpretation of the postponement, Nationals General Manager Mike Rizzo responded that the weather forecast for May 11 had called — incorrectly, as it turned out — for rain to persist well into the evening and that Showalter had been in full agreement on May 11 that the game should be postponed. Rizzo added that the Orioles had refused to play on the teams′ next mutual off date, May 15, necessitating that they play on June 8, and that the June 8 date actually was less favorable to the Nationals, who gave up an off-day after a 10-day, three-city trip to the United States West Coast, than to the Orioles, who were just completing a nine-game homestand. Given all of this, Rizzo said that the Orioles should "quit whining."^[11]

Questioning whether a rivalry exists

The idea that a rivalry exists between the Nationals and Orioles is itself controversial. Despite the marketing of the Beltway Series as a "Battle of the Beltways" and the animosity some Baltimore and Washington baseball fans feel toward one another′s teams and cities, some observers – both sports journalists and fans – question whether a Nationals-Orioles rivalry truly exists, arguing that it is a "manufactured" rivalry born of the media, marketing, interleague play, and coincidental geographical proximity rather than history or the significance of the games, and that the Beltway Series lacks the meaning of true rivalries found elsewhere in MLB.^{[12][13][14][15]}

Non-competitive history

Sports rivalries generally arise between teams that are familiar with one another, play one another frequently, and have a history of parity and of meeting one another in significant games,^[16] but this has rarely, if ever, occurred between Baltimore and Washington MLB teams. During the years from 1954 to 1971, when the Orioles played the original Senators and then the expansion Senators regularly in the American League, the Orioles enjoyed great success, while the two Senators teams between them managed only one winning season, in 1969. This unbalanced competition militated against any real rivalry springing up between the teams, as games between them tended to be insignificant and dominated by Baltimore.^[13] Moreover, memories of this era have faded with time as Baltimore- and Washington-area fans age and thanks to the transient nature of the Washington-area population, where the dominance of United States Government employment results in significant turnovers in population as people arrive to participate in government activities, then leave as political circumstances change.^[15]

During the early years of the Beltway Series from 2006 to 2011, neither the Nationals or the Orioles fielded competitive teams, and this meant that the editions of the Beltway Series during those seasons carried no real importance in terms of either team′s prospects for winning seasons. Since 2012, when both the Nationals and Orioles began to achieve real success, fan interest in both teams has increased and led to greater attendance, but no particularly significant game has arisen as part of the Beltway Series.^{[12][13][17][14]}

Two-team fans

The Baltimore and Washington sports markets also call into question the extent to which fans view a rivalry as existing. Although relatively few Baltimore-area baseball fans appear to support the Nationals, many Washington-area fans adopted the Orioles as their "home team" during the 33 seasons Washington had no MLB team, and this penetration of the Washington sports market by the Orioles has resulted in many Washington-area MLB fans continuing to root for the Orioles, either instead of or in addition to the Nationals. Supporting both teams is made easier by their membership in different leagues and the rarity of their meetings compared to the number of games they play against divisional and league rivals. For fans who support both teams, the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area constitutes a two-team market in which they root for one team in each league; to such fans, the Beltway Series is a matter of interest because it involves both of their "home" teams, rather than their home team playing against a disliked crosstown rival. The Beltway Series tends to draw well in both cities, but this does not necessarily indicate that fans are attending to watch a chapter in a true rivalry between teams with a history of meaningful competition or animosity; many appear to view the series merely as an annual opportunity for low-key, good-natured competition between the teams and their fans for "bragging rights" in the Baltimore-Washington region.^[18][13][17]

Players' attitudes

With the exception of a September 2015 game at Nationals Park in which Nationals pitcher Jonathan Papelbon hit Orioles infielder Manny Machado with a pitch, resulting in an exchange of words between Machado and Papelbon, both dugouts emptying, and Papelbon′s ejection from the game, no particular ill feeling has existed on the field between the teams. Players of both teams appear to view the teams in their own divisions – which they play 19 times each per season – as their rivals, and they attach no particular significance to the comparatively short annual Beltway Series against a team in a different league that they otherwise would not play unless they met in the World Series.^[18][14]

Club success

Summary of results

Through June 8, 2017.

Beltway Series results

Game log

See also

• Major League Baseball rivalries
• Bay Bridge Series, Oakland Athletics vs. San Francisco Giants
• Citrus Series Miami Marlins vs. Tampa Bay Rays
• Freeway Series, Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
• All-Canadian Series, Montreal Expos vs. Toronto Blue Jays
• Red Line Series Chicago Cubs vs. Chicago White Sox (Named for the Red-line "L" route)
• Subway Series, New York Yankees vs. New York Mets, etc.

References

External links

• Brewing a Rivalry Washington Post
• No Need to Read Between the Lines Washington Post
• Dawn of a New Rivalry Sports Illustrated
• The Next Great Baseball Rivalry Business Week
• Beltway Battle Has Become Crowd Pleaser Washington Post