Bird Tapes 2025: An interview with Fred Lynn

A nine-time All-Star, he battled the Earl Weaver-era Orioles for a decade before joining them with the idea of playing behind their stellar pitching. But his timing was unfortunate.

After competing against the Orioles for a decade, Fred Lynn signed with them when he became a free agent in 1985. He thought he’d enjoy playing behind the excellent Baltimore pitching he’d always admired.

It was a nice thought. But his timing was terrible. After more than two decades of winning, the Orioles were running out of magic pitching dust and about to experience a rapid decline.

Instead of playing on Oriole teams that resembled the formidable clubs he’d battled seemingly forever, Lynn became an eyewitness to the crumbling of a dynasty.

“I wish we could’ve done better,” Lynn, now 73, told me in a recent interview, which is available below to paid Bird Tapes subscribers.

I sought him out for an interview because I thought his perspective was missing from the Bird Tapes archive. An excellent player — he was a nine-time All-Star and four-time Gold Glove winner when he joined the Orioles at age 33 — he competed hard against some of Earl Weaver’s best clubs before coming to town and enduring an era many Baltimore fans would just as soon forget. What did he see from the other dugout? What happened to the Orioles during his time with them?

When he arrived, the Orioles were just one year removed from winning their third World Series title, culminating a run of eight postseason appearances over a 17-year span. Their 83-win total in Lynn’s first season (1985) didn’t satisfy anyone.

“When I came in, the expectation was to do well. The Orioles didn’t field .500 teams,” he said.

But by the time he left in a trade near the end of the 1988 season, the Orioles were the worst team the American League. Period. There was no debating it after they opened that season with 21 straight defeats.

“Itrritating as hell. Frustrating. Demoralizing. Embarrassing. All of the above,” Lynn said about that infamous season.

Lynn’s performance wasn’t a key aspect of the collapse. Batting behind Eddie Murray in the lineup, he hit .265, drove in 232 runs and scored 212 in 434 games with the Orioles over three-plus seasons. He hit 23 home runs in each of his three full seasons and played solid defense in center field, as he had throughout his career.

But he was in mid-thirties, and after a run of injuries, no longer an All-Star. The fact that the Orioles signed him at all was evidence of their mounting problems. For two decades, they’d counted on their farm system to replace aging stars, but there wasn’t a suitable in-house candidate to replace Al Bumbry as the everyday center fielder.

In fact, with owner Edward Bennett Williams encouraging GM Hank Peters to go that route, the club also signed outfielder Lee Lacy, closer Don Aase and second baseman Alan Wiggins in free agency in 1985. The influx of veterans from outside the organization undermined Baltimore’s tight team chemistry and ended the familiar pattern of young Orioles from the farm system replacing veteran starters.

“The vibe was different,” Lynn said.

Facing the Orioles had been a major challenge when he played for the Boston Red Sox and California Angels in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, Lynn said.

“It was hard to score against them,” he said. “Their pitchers all had great control. They were masters. Everything was down in the zone and they knew how to make you hit the ball to the fat part of the ballpark.

“Their defense was great, too. When I first broke in, they had Brooks (Robinson) at third, (Mark) Belanger at short and (Bobby) Grich at second. Good luck.”

They also had Weaver pulling strings and baiting umpires, a sideshow Lynn thoroughly enjoyed from the opposite dugout.

“When you saw (cigarette) smoke coming out of their dugout, you knew Earl was fired up,” Lynn said, laughing.

But the quality pitching and stout defense had vanished by the time he arrived. Suddenly, a whole new set of characteristics defined the Orioles.

“The outfield was in flux the whole time I was there. I was set in center but they were always shuffling guys in left and right,” Lynn said. “None of the pitchers threw hard, and they all had (command) issues at the same time. We couldn’t get off the field defensively. We could catch the ball but we didn’t have any team speed. We ran the bases station to station. Put all these things together and it was, like, ‘Whoa, things are getting a little dicey here.’”

It didn’t help that he played for four managers in three-plus seasons as the organization kept trying — and failing — to recreate what had worked for so long. It took the 0-21 start in 1988 to make clear the need for major changes.

But despite what happened on the field, Lynn has positive memories of his Baltimore years.

“I hit a home run in the bottom of the ninth in three consecutive games in 1985. I’d never done that before,” he said. “And the fans were fantastic. They stuck with the team through thick and thin. My wife went to every game. We lived in Lutherville. Flanagan was near me. Cal was near me. We’d carpool to the games. There was a real family environment. (Playing there) was so much fun.”