Can the Orioles win the World Series for the first time in 40 years? The 1983 team sure thinks so. – The Denver Post

There aren’t many similarities between the 1983 Orioles and the 2023 Orioles.

The old club was veteran-laden with a new manager, a few Hall of Famers and an established pedigree as one of the best teams in the major leagues for the previous two decades. The current team is youth-driven, catapulting itself out of a rebuild and into relevance.

But former center fielder Al Bumbry, one of the approximately 20 players from the 1983 team back in Baltimore this weekend to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the franchise’s last championship, said these Orioles have something those Orioles also had.

“I think the biggest thing that we all talk about is the camaraderie that the players had, the connections that the players had,” Bumbry said. “Everybody’s rooting for the other players, there’s not a whole lot of individual guys and it’s not displayed in the way they play. The best teacher or the best guide of success is winning, and they’ve started to win. They’ve gotten a taste of what winning feels like compared to three or four years ago. I think that’s a major, major factor that’s pushing them now.”

Bumbry and the rest of the members of the 1983 club reminisced about the good ol’ days, what made that team special and what it takes to win a World Series. They believe the current club, owners of the American League’s best record, has what it takes to reach baseball’s mountaintop.

“Heck yes,” former starting pitcher Mike Boddicker said when asked if the 2023 Orioles can win the World Series. “I look at these pitchers and stuff, and I’m going, ‘Yep, they’ve got enough.’”

“It appears the magic is back,” former pitcher Bill Swaggerty chimed in. “That’s what we thrived on — Orioles magic.”

After this year, former right fielder Ken Singleton doesn’t expect to be in the same position he and his former teammates will be Saturday when they’re commemorated before Baltimore’s game against the New York Mets.

“They’re young. Even if they don’t win this year, I have a feeling they won’t be bringing us back after so many years because we were the last team to win the World Series,” Singleton said. “I’ve got a feeling that this team’s going to get it done.”

Here’s what the rest of the 1983 team said about the 2023 Orioles:

Pitcher Jim Palmer: “I was here for almost 20 years. The farm system was kind of where they are now. We always had really good teams, but we also had really good organizations and farm systems.”

Left fielder Gary Roenicke: “I think this is fantastic for all of baseball. The Orioles can go from where they were to all of a sudden the team that they have now. Excitement is back, and the ballpark now is filled in. It’s what’s good about baseball.”

Pitcher Scott McGregor: “It’s hard to win. When you have that magic and that winning thing that the Orioles are finally getting together now, when I watch the games every night now, I don’t care what the score is, I think they’re going to win. That’s hard to find, that’s hard to get.”

Pitcher Tippy Martinez: “I think the guys, it’s so enjoyable to watch, especially the catching and the way [Adley Rutschman] handles the pitching staff. … It’s really enjoyable to see them, you can see the players are having fun. You can almost feel the air or see that our motto is, ‘Stay close, and something good will happen.’ I get that feeling right now with this team. They know they’re going to win. If not, they’re going to be awfully close, and they’re going to be tough to beat.”

Pitcher Storm Davis: “I think goals are something that teams or players set if you want to try to do it once. I think systems are put in place if you want to repeatedly do something. I think when we played I think we very rarely talked of goals. We talked of the Oriole Way. That meant something different to all of us. … I think what they’re doing now is, even though we’re long in the past, this system is now being put back in place. Well, how do you win big league games? Well, you pitch better than the other team, usually, you defend better than the other team, usually, and at some point, somebody’s going to have to get a big hit. That’s how you do it over and over, and if you look back at the end of the year after 162, you’re better than everyone else. You get in the playoffs, and then it’s a flip of the coin type of thing. So that’s kind of how we did it, and I’m sure that’s how they’re doing it now.”

Center fielder John Shelby: “I’ve kept up with ’em, even though I haven’t been an Oriole for years, but I’m an Oriole at heart. It is surprising to know that it’s been 40 years, but they have a good ball club right now. I think the organization, they have a really good minor league system, and I think this organization, this is just my opinion, the next couple years I think they’re probably in a situation where they could possibly win a World Series. I just see things that have transpired over the last couple of years, I saw things when I was coming up with the Orioles, how they had a good mix of players, they played together, and this team looks like they’re playing very well together. Over the last couple of years, things have turned around.”

Catcher John Stefero: “I think what I remember the most about the [1983] season is the team itself. The team was a very close-knit team, very similar to the team that’s out there now that’s winning and producing. Everybody was together. There was no three or four guys that sat together all the time, it was everybody with everybody. … We all believed and we all had the ability. This team out here, if you watch ’em, they believe.”

Third baseman Glenn Gulliver: “I was thinking we were here like 10 years ago, and there was nobody in the stands and it was sort of shocking. Because when we were here in ’82 and ’83, it was always crowded, it was a big baseball thing. Then we’re here 10 years ago … coming to the games for three days in a row, I’m like, ‘Wow, there’s nobody in the stands. This has gotten bad.’ And now, I’ve been watching them on TV last weekend, and the place is packed, and it looked cool again.”

Catcher Rick Dempsey: “Are they good enough? I think they are, and for one reason: I like what I see out of Adley Rutschman. He has an effect on the pitching staff that you don’t see anywhere else in baseball. He walks out to the mound when the guys come off the mound being successful, he reinforces that. He has a way of communicating with them, and I think all of the players, from what I hear, really like him. I think he has a huge effect on them. Not only is he a great switch-hitter, a lot like [Singleton], maybe not his power, but a good contact hitter. And his relationship with the pitching staff. It could happen. In the playoffs, if they get hot in the right spot and enough young guys that really play with confidence. That’s what I see. It’s not that everybody gets a hit exactly when they need it, but when they get going, they can put up some pretty good numbers.”

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