In Baltimore, the home opener just means Mo

BALTIMORE -- Carter Lawhorn, a 9-year-old diehard Orioles fan, couldn’t believe the news.

First, there was an unplanned run-in with the club’s new majority owner, David Rubenstein, in the team store at Camden Yards a few weeks earlier. Now, there was this.

Carter was informed he had been named the 2024 Mo Gaba Fan of the Year.

“I fainted,” Carter jokingly said of his reaction.

The Mo Gaba Fan of the Year recognition is an honor that allows one fan to serve as the “10th man” for the Orioles at the home opener each year. The recipient gets to run down the ceremonial orange carpet -- after each player on Baltimore’s roster has done so -- and line up next to manager Brandon Hyde on the infield dirt for the national anthem, which Carter will do prior to Thursday’s Opening Day matchup vs. the Angels.

The distinction was renamed prior to the 2021 season in remembrance of Gaba, an Orioles Hall of Famer and superfan who died in July 2020 after five battles with cancer at the age of 14.

For Carter, the story of how he received this prestigious honor began March 4. That was the day Rubenstein -- whose purchase of the control stake of the Orioles became official on Wednesday -- visited and toured Camden Yards for the first time after agreeing to buy the majority share of the team from the Angelos family on Jan. 31.

Rubenstein’s tour took him to the team store inside the warehouse, where Carter and his mom, Laurie, were shopping with the intent of buying Carter a new jersey of his favorite player, center fielder Cedric Mullins. He came away with another piece of merchandise, too.

When Rubenstein found out the Lawhorns knew who he was, he decided to make their day. He pulled out his wallet, bought Carter a new Orioles City Connect hat -- “I’ve been wanting it for so long,” Carter said -- and then signed it for him. Rubenstein then joined them for a picture, which was later shared on social media:

“We were both on cloud nine,” Laurie said.

March became an even better month for the Lawhorn family when the Orioles reached out with the news that Carter -- a third-grade student at Timonium Elementary School who plays travel baseball for the Carroll Manor Cardinals -- would be this season’s Mo Gaba Fan of the Year.

“I’ve never seen his face more like, ‘Is this actually happening?’” Laurie said.

Since 1996, the Orioles have rolled out their 280-foot orange carpet that stretches from the center-field warning track to second base for their first home game of each season. It’s special to the players, and even more so to the fans serving as the “10th man.”

Mo Gaba Fan of the Year Recipients
2021: The entire fan base
2022: Jeffrey Austin
2023: Merrill Heim
2024: Carter Lawhorn

“It was freaking amazing, dude. It was absolutely amazing,” said Heim, the 2023 recipient. “It was one of the best experiences that I’ve had being an Oriole fan. For them to give me the love and the appreciation back for just me being a diehard fan, and for them to ask me to do that, it was just such an honor.”

Many know Heim as “Fired Up Guy.” The superfan from Abingdon, Md., can often be heard during games at Camden Yards yelling his signature phrase: “I’m fired up! You fired up?”

When Heim ran down the orange carpet last year, he caught Hyde by surprise.

“I had no idea that the ‘Fired Up Guy’ was going to be next to me for the national anthem,” Hyde said after the ‘23 home opener. “That fired me up.”

This year, that spot next to the skipper will belong to Carter, a young fan whose baseball fandom “came through his blood,” per his mother. Laurie is a longtime O’s supporter, a passion she once shared with her late brother, who died from brain cancer.

Carter is more than ready to have the attention of what will surely be a sellout crowd packed into Camden Yards, ready to ring in a new season for the defending American League East champion Orioles.

“I’m going to be a celebrity,” Carter said. “But please, no autographs.”