SARASOTA, Fla. — Long before David Rubenstein bought the Orioles, everything the club did under general manager and Executive Vice President Mike Elias and his team was done with the long-term health of the organization in mind.

Coming from the nadir they inherited in 2018, and given the particular short-sighted nature that brought that bottom upon the Orioles, that mindset made all the sense in the world — and has continued to be how the front office operates even as the team has turned into the perennial contender Elias envisioned.

Rubenstein, Michael Arougheti and their group no doubt appreciate the asset they purchased — the fruits of Elias’ promised elite talent pipeline and the scouting and player development apparatus that produced it — but will have seen this winter that long-term building doesn’t lend itself to the kinds of signings and trades that dominate the offseason.

Elias and his team have definitely been more aggressive in the year-plus since the Angelos family agreed to sell the team, from trading prospects to signing free agents, and the sum of their commitments to the present have the payroll increase as the largest percentage-wise in baseball this winter, with the projected $161 million payroll just shy of the club record.

It’s not so much that they’re tigers changing stripes as much as simply adapting to climate change. There’s another level to go to, one that might not be the best for the Orioles long term but would help in the present. The question this season will beg is, will the ownership group think the front office’s approach is enough to win? So far, it seems so.

“Baseball has shown over the years that generally spending now doesn’t necessarily produce a championship, so championships are won by team spirit, by having real good camaraderie and by having good players,” Rubenstein said. “So, it’s a combination of things. If spending more money was a guarantee of winning a World Series, then, you know, we’d be happy to spend more money, it’s no guarantee.

“You want to have a team that works together well and it’s a team not just for one year, but as a team that’s going to get along for quite some time. So, I don’t think we have a view that there’s any financial constraints that we’re operating under. We have fair amount of money and we’re in pretty good financial shape. We therefore spent money this offseason and we got some pretty good players, and we’re very happy with the team we already had, but we’ve added to it.”

That description of the Orioles’ winter is at once simple, honest and fair. Energizing the fan base might be Rubenstein’s self-appointed mission, but there’s no spectacle there. Not the kind there would have been if he and Arougheti got to stand beside Elias to introduce Blake Snell or Max Fried as their signature free agent signing this winter in Baltimore.

In reality, the Orioles spread a lot of money around with only one long-term commitment (outfielder Tyler O’Neill), and in place of top starter Corbin Burnes they added a pair of lower-cost veterans in Tomoyuki Sugano and Charlie Morton.

They committed $66 million to free agents this offseason, but also added several players last trade deadline who are among their highest-paid players this year. That list includes Zach Eflin ($18 million), Seranthony Domínguez ($8 million), Gregory Soto ($5.35 million), and Trevor Rogers ($2.6 million), all of whom are Orioles this year because the team parted with players who would have helped support that goal of long-term health. Same goes for the players who helped bring Burnes to Baltimore.

I don’t think the Orioles regret any of that, necessarily. I’ve heard the words “process oriented” too many times over the last seven years to think that just because the outcome didn’t go the front office’s way that they now think they made the wrong decisions.

I do, however, suspect they don’t want to make a habit of trading a dozen prospects a year to reinforce their roster. Money will do just fine for that, and keep the sustained health of the organization intact. Just days ago, Elias noted that’s still the goal: “to keep this organization strong, healthy, competitive, [with] playoff-caliber baseball.

“It’s been something that’s been hard to do for the Orioles, to have sustained, competitive success here year-after-year, other than a couple of windows, it’s really something you have to go back many decades to see,” Elias told reporters last week. “So, I think it’s a challenge but it’s really a goal, and I think our ownership group is going to be a big asset.”

I’ve spent the winter wondering just how much patience ownership was going to have, though. In October, Rubenstein told NPR that, given his age, he had to “speed up the effort to get a World Series a lot sooner than maybe some younger owners would.”

Making sure the pitching staff is as deep as possible and letting their core of homegrown offensive stars carry this team into and potentially through October still might be the best way the Orioles have multiple cracks at a championship with this group.

Extensions for the likes of Adley Rutschman or Gunnar Henderson would probably satisfy all parties. They’re the kind of splashy, narrative-driving deals that owners crave and have a below-market discount that is attractive to the team’s value-driven front office.

Or maybe this is going to be the perfect marriage of front office and ownership. After all, Rubenstein’s declarations of the team’s financial health and lack of debt mean something. Committing to paying a player or two $30 million a year apiece in 2030 wouldn’t change that, but they have a really good team without doing that, and that might be preferable.

The team can stay in “very good financial shape,” as Rubenstein described it, for a long time with Elias’ front office staying true to their methods. Or, the perceived quick fixes of giving top free agents long-term contracts or trading the farm to win now may grow more attractive with another disappointing October.

For now, we know where ownership stands. If that changes, I think we’ll know pretty quickly.