Last season, Cincinnati Reds owner Phil Castellini “taunted” Reds fans after an offseason that saw them turn a team that just missed the playoffs into a gutted, Oakland A’sesque big stinky loser that ticked off everybody who rooted for the team. His signature line, the one that will follow him to hell, was pretty straightforwardly evil:
“Well, where are you gonna go?” Castellini said. “Let’s start there. Sell the team to who? … What would you do with this team to have it be more profitable, make more money and compete more?”
It wasn’t any sort of “mask off” moment for turd owners like him and it’s only by the grace of his largesse (an estimated $400 million net worth on a team valued a little over a billion) that his brain didn’t have the capability to massage the impulse that shot through his amygdala which gave us a very clear target for who the enemy is.