From the good — like Angel Reese’s money moves — to the bad — like The Orioles’ disappointing season — here are our picks for the top sports moments in Baltimore.
Best “Pop out and show n****s”: Lamar Jackson being “quarterbacky”
After our previous “Best (and Worst) of Baltimore” issue, Fox Sports commentator Monse Bolaños gave an infamous statement about Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson. “Not ‘quarterbacky’ enough” quickly trended on X, due to the unfortunate dog-whistle that the quarterback position is a white man’s game, and that Lamar Jackson isn’t MVP material or deserving of the position. Racism in sports is a long-running issue, and hearing a blatant attempt at discrediting Jackson like that was a reminder of that. Yet Jackson and Ravens fans would get the last laugh.
As a 2019 MVP winner and 2016 Heisman Trophy recipient, Jackson would lead the Ravens to their first AFC Championship game since 2012, became the first quarterback with over 1,000 passing yards in multiple seasons, and is the only quarterback with four perfect passer-rated games. He won his second MVP win in 2023, and with another thousand-plus yard season in passing and second place in quarterback rating and touchdowns, Jackson is in the running for a back-to-back MVP rating. I guess this means he’s plenty “quarterbacky.”
Most Disappointing Season: The Baltimore Orioles
September 17, 2023, was a magical day in Baltimore. The Orioles clinched their first postseason spot since 2016 in an extra innings battle with the Tampa Bay Rays, their biggest foe that season. After going the entire season without being swept, it felt like the team could only go up from there.
Despite their losses to the Texas Rangers in the first round of the postseason, Orioles fans and players felt like the team was going to come back with a vengeance in 2024. And for a while, they did. The first few months of the 2024 season, the Orioles dominated the league.
Then the cracks started to show — pitching injuries started to pile up, the regular season sweepless streak was broken, and the offense just stopped clicking. The team limped its way into the postseason, but it was clear they had lost the momentum and cohesion that had brought them so much success in 2023.
And they just weren’t fun to watch anymore. You couldn’t count on the kind of late-innings comeback that they had mastered the year before, the one that made you believe in Orioles Magic.
The pieces that brought the Orioles success just a season ago are still here. We hope that Orioles management and ownership will make strong moves this offseason and that we’ll get to see some Orioles Magic again next summer.
Best Money Moves: Angel Reese
Angel Reese has been everywhere this year. At the Met Gala, on the cover of Vogue Magazine, and on stage with Megan Thee Stallion. And she’s been getting her coin along the way, with a multi-year brand partnership with Reebok and her own signature shoe on the way in 2026, a limited edition merch line with Reese’s (her fans call themselves Reese’s Pieces, making the team-up inevitable), and a podcast called “Unapologetically Angel,” which is the best way to describe her career so far. We’re proud of the Baltimore Barbie.
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