The cliché that "if you say something enough times, people think it's true" appears to be the driving force behind those opposed to baseball in Northern Virginia. Not content to simply assert that they'd like MLB closer to their own personal home or office [in most if not all cases closer to DC proper than Dulles], columnists and reporters at the Washington Post and Washington Times are actively and incessantly leveling attacks that are often fact-starved, misleading, and inaccurate on NOVA's MLB effort, especially following the monumental announcement of completed financing for a Dulles ballpark site. It's not enough to express a preference on their part for the ballpark to be located DC proper and build a case for it; rather, a workable site to be serviced by major roads and Metrorail access in a part of the market that is prosperous and reachable by fans not only in Northern Virginia but the District and its adjoining suburbs in Maryland has been incorrectly painted as a complete nonstarter, apparently to sour the local fanbase and MLB officials on it.

How have many of those columnists and reporters been describing the Dulles site and the area surrounding it? Mere suburbs at best and "Wal-Mart country" nowhere near civilization [AKA DC proper] at worst! One look at demographic and business numbers throughout the Dulles Corridor completely destroys charge, but as with many such campaigns, the object is to obscure the facts with inaccuracies, hyperbole and scare tactics, which have been especially strong and exaggerated. How about the drive to such a stadium? Histrionics reach a fever pitch when that comes up, as pieces in both newspapers have shrilly warned that trips the Dulles site could take everyone not within 5 miles of the site hours, and that a trip "out there" would be hardly different from driving to Camden Yards. Metro access? Some simply say there'll be no public transportation and move on with their assault; others slyly try to act like the Metrorail option could be decades away, despite the fact that an express shuttle bus service from Metrorail has been cited as an option and could run down the Dulles Toll Road from the West Falls Church stop from Day One as they now do for Wolf Trap concerts.

Mark Zuckerman's column in the Washington Times entitled "Rush to Judgment" is more of the same in virtually every way. Despite using elements that would frame the piece at first glance as an academic exercise that would "eschew political motivations," his agenda appears clear from the outset, describing Loudoun County as "more than 60 miles away from downtown Baltimore - not to mention anything remotely resembling civilization." Zuckerman asks on behalf of "Joe and Jane Six-Pack" where the best place to put a ballpark is from the average fan's perspective, and actually tries to say travel times from Bethesda, MD represent the answer to that! I mean, using the DC media accounts describing NOVA and the Dulles corridor as "Wal-Mart Country" et al, wouldn't Joe Six-Pack be more likely to hang his baseball cap "out there" instead of in Bethesda? More central to the issue is the likely location of the heart of the teams' fanbase, to which all signs point to Northern Virginia. Caps owners Ted Leonsis has said that 66% of his DC-based team's fanbase come from Northern Virginia, a telling indicator that clearly calls into question Zuckerman's description of Bethesda as "the true battleground of the D.C./Virginia/Baltimore baseball fight" and thus the justification for that point as his starting point for his trips. That combined with the growing preeminence of Northern Virginia in the region's demographic and economic makeup and the overriding factor of protecting the Orioles' fanbase greatly enhances NOVA's chances of being seen by MLB as the best place to put a ballpark.

The funny thing about the Zuckerman piece is that in many instances, it actually would bolster the case for putting the team in Dulles in the eyes of Major League Baseball! All he does by submitting a Camden Yards time from Bethesda that measures the uncannily speedy time of 53 minutes is show MLB that a Dulles team would not negatively impact fan support from DC's MD suburbs! And what a coincidence it was that not only was his record-breaking time to Camden Yards from Bethesda [on a non-ballgame night, which is supposed to make this believable] over a full hour less than on his previous OPCY trip [when a ballgame was actually being held], but was made in less time that from Bethesda to the Dulles site... Also, his account of the driving time to Dulles seems as inflated as Marc Fisher's reported 77 minute trip to Dulles from downtown Washington, especially as the traffic flow moving west across the American Legion Bridge is usually much smoother than moving eastward out of Virginia at that time.

To get technical on the specifics of the Dulles trip, the time from Wisconsin Avenue to the Toll Road seems excessive, especially the time to the Virginia border. When there's a will, there's a way, and Zuckerman's will to take the quickest route to the American Legion Bridge on the way to a site he loathes might have been lacking. To have that slow a trip getting across the bridge with the majority of traffic moving the other way is as unusual as zipping unimpeded to Camden Yards in 53 minutes, but let's put that aside. Even though Zuckerman alludes to an absence of reported congestion on the Outer Loop, the choice of getting on from Wisconsin Avenue if traffic is always as notoriously bad as in this example strikes one as odd were he really beating a path west to get to a ballgame [which he did up to OPCY, clocking 75 MPH]. If it's 5 p.m. in Bethesda and you're living or working between the I-270 spurs where the Beltway is narrowest and you're concerned about backups, you stay on the local roads for a mile or two to pick up the Beltway where it has the greater number of lanes, which should greatly reduce your travel time. Also, the trek Zuckerman takes to Dulles doubles the time on the Dulles Toll Road leg of the trip that should be needed, which he admits he could've improved upon with an E-Z Pass. He also adds 7 full minutes by exiting at the Route 28 exit and then taking a roundabout way to the existing quarry, ignoring the well-published reports that a special exit off of the Toll Road will be built and made operational for ballpark patrons. Therefore, what took 24 minutes in his case could've taken as little as 12 minutes [or less using the same lead foot heading that zoomed him to Camden Yards], slicing his still-more-than-questionable time down to 53 minutes.

Zuckerman's remarkable luck that he had on his trip to Camden Yards held on his Metro experience to a DC ballpark site as well. He happens to start right near a Metro station at 5 p.m., luckily having no cab, bus, parking, long walk or other factor hindering him from getting to the Metro station instantly, which unfortunately describes just a handful of those who'd be using the Bethesda Metro station at rush hour. Luckily for him, no lines at the Metro card machines or wait to get on hold him up. No, the only place he ever had to wait on his treks was at the toll booths on the way to Dulles, which he admits he could bypass forever if he bought one in advance! (But do the published travel times reflect any of that? Of course not!) His luck holds some more to an unusual degree as the truly time-consuming factor of waiting for a connecting train when transferring on the Metro - at the immensely crowded Metro Center of, all places - was not a factor, as a train instantly arrived the second Mr. Lucky scooted down to the Orange Line tracks in no time! His account of catching a "glimpse" of RFK Stadium cannily avoids factoring in the extra time of the half-mile or so walk to the stadium from the Metro stop [which would include a delay waiting for the police to manually stop the 22 nd Street NE traffic to allow fans to cross, to be even more precise in keeping up with the detailed account from Zuckerman of his journeys]. That makes for another unrealistically fast "best-case" time to go along with his insanely unrealistic and fast time to Camden Yards to contrast with his unrealistic and added-onto time to get to the Dulles site. Unbelievable --and I do mean "unbelievable"!

Zuckerman also fails to note that the West Falls Church Metro stop - from which he would have the same transfer point to the Orange Line as he did to RFK Stadium - is a mere two stops more coming from Bethesda than the stop to RFK, and that holds for everyone on the entire portion of the Red Line northwest of Metro Center! Please don't tell us that MLB is going to choose DC over Dulles because of a two-stop difference on the Metro unless you want us to have a really good laugh! The great thing about this is that no matter how DC-based writers twist and turn these times and distances, "it's a fruitless debate" as the author admits, since MLB would only have a problem with the Dulles site were it relying on DC's Mayor Williams with his public comment that the Dulles site is "40, 50 miles out" from Washington proper or on other dubious accounts of distances and times emanating from columnists in the Post and Times. As with Angelos' similarly fact-starved claims about this market, they make nice space filler for those with an agenda against baseball in Northern Virginia, but MLB's relocation process is designed to cut through such noise and agenda-driven nonsense to get to the facts, which speak for themselves when taken directly to MLB and will continue to be pointed out by more reliable sources than the aforementioned DC boosters.

One more point: On the way to Dulles, Zuckerman says he screamed: "Who are all these people, and where are they going?! There's nothing out here to go to!" Claiming ignorance on who "all these people" are while simultaneously claiming "there's nothing out here to go to", he crystallizes the perception problem from the area's DC-centered print media and their willful or blissful ignorance on this matter that has plagued and colored their coverage from the start. All those people were heading to where this market's population and workforce has been moving for decades, and MLB will not be encumbered by the media's provincial take on the Dulles site and the Northern Virginia effort when considering the best site to serve the present fanbase and future fanbase in this market.