People always forget they had a lot of luck on their side. They were fukking up and talking on cell phones early on before Marlo was under Prop Joe's tutelage. The cops could've busted them easy in their infancy, but the CID was dysfunctional at the time and wouldn't get an investigation going. They had that idiot Maramo or whoever in charge refusing to do wiretaps.
Avon's crew was weak because Avon and a lot of them were locked up or had been killed and Stringer wasn't interested in going to war over corners.
Avon's team would've eventually crushed him once they tooled up and got more soldiers on their payroll. Remember Slim Charles and them had the drop Marlo, Chris, and Snoop outside the rim shop but the cops busted Avon's spot before he could give the okay. That would've been it for them.
They were ruthless and organized, but they had a lot of circumstances go right for them.
"A little slow, a little late"
I love how quotes and these little things like this in The Wire having bigger meanings later on.
Chris is more closer to Stringer than he is to Wee-bay because Chris was second in command. There's many times Marlo asked Chris advice for things or said he wanted to do something one way and Chris told him to do it another way and he listened.
This is true, I think people often act like Chris was just muscle. Snoop was just muscle. Chris was Marlo's right hand, and Marlo respected his input.
Marlo was talking about killing Omar after the Poker game and Chris talked about how many people got shot when the Barksdales were after Omar, and said it was better to frame Omar for murder, and Marlo listened.
Marlo told Chris that Michael should take out Bodie, and Chris said Michael knew Bodie and Mike's first hit should be someone he didn't know, so O'Dog killed Bodie and Michael killed that other guy.
When they are discussing what to do about Lex, you can see that Marlo makes his decision largely on Chris.
