NBA Kings owner negotiating to purchase local MiLB team (and stadium) for $90m - record price

[LadyStanley]

Kings Owner in Talks to Buy MiLB Team for Record Price

A consortium led by Sacramento Kings owner Vivek Ranadive is reportedly close to securing a deal to buy the city’s minor league baseball team.

frontofficesports.com

Local owner

Click to read more...

 

[HisIceness]

That's, an insane amount of money for a MiLB franchise.

 

[KevFu]

Yikes, that's nuts.

The reason it's nuts is because -- while the Sacramento ballpark is awesome, and that's a Triple A team in a market larger than FIVE Major League cities... there's no reason for competition.

There's a massive shortfall in the minor leagues for western cities by population. Portland, Sacramento, San Jose, Fresno and Bakersfield are top 62 markets in the US. And Sacramento is the only Triple A team in that group.

The other four California cities are in Single A (which is ridiculous), and Portland has no team (also ridiculous).

 

[No Fun Shogun]

I could've sworn that Sacramento's ballpark was built with a background idea that it could be expanded to MLB standards, which would help explain the high price if they have an interest in the A's or Rays (or maybe even an MLS play?), but a shallow google search isn't corroborating that and is even contradicting that with speculation that they might be due for a replacement stadium.

So who knows? Seems like a high price tag when revenues are apparently down.

 

[GindyDraws]

Yikes, that's nuts.

The reason it's nuts is because -- while the Sacramento ballpark is awesome, and that's a Triple A team in a market larger than FIVE Major League cities... there's no reason for competition.

There's a massive shortfall in the minor leagues for western cities by population. Portland, Sacramento, San Jose, Fresno and Bakersfield are top 62 markets in the US. And Sacramento is the only Triple A team in that group.

The other four California cities are in Single A (which is ridiculous), and Portland has no team (also ridiculous).

Bakersfield has NO team. The Blaze folded in 2017 and the Pecos League doesn't exactly count as a baseball league.

 

[PCSPounder]

I could've sworn that Sacramento's ballpark was built with a background idea that it could be expanded to MLB standards, which would help explain the high price if they have an interest in the A's or Rays (or maybe even an MLS play?), but a shallow google search isn't corroborating that and is even contradicting that with speculation that they might be due for a replacement stadium.

So who knows? Seems like a high price tag when revenues are apparently down.

In a discussion long ago about franchise movement and realignment on a board devoted to efforts to bring MLB to Portland 20 years ago, we had someone who brought out pictures of the construction of the Sacramento ballpark, contending that what they did wasn’t really a base on which you could expand. Obviously, we’d heard speculation otherwise. I’d say it’s obvious by the way some people in Sacramento still talk about the base of a stadium built next to old Arco back in the day rather than what’s now Sutter Health Park.

BTW- Fresno had AAA. They no longer do. There’s a reason for that.. which is more to say that many people deserve better wages in the valley than they’re getting.

When I tell you that Portland has the Pickles, I want to explain this from two angles.

(1) A documentary called The Battered Bastards of Baseball might still be streaming on Netflix. It’s kind of a gem… an independent team in the minor leagues called the Portland Mavericks drew much better in the 1970s than either of the AAA Beavers efforts on either side of it. The movie concludes with the thought that affiliations were BS and independents should be encouraged. It seems like that came out just in time for many existing Indy leagues to bite the dust while MLB pushed to control the industry that much more, so shrug.

(2) The Pickles are not the Savannah Bananas; they’re in the respectable West Coast League. It’s a summer collegiate wood bat league. But there’s enough whimsy at Walker Stadium to at least draw a comparison. They get Portland. They may not draw what the Beavers drew on fireworks nights, but nobody else thinks of Exploding Whale Night, and on a regular night, the Pickles are a better draw. So give ‘em the Pickles.

 

[oknazevad]

Yikes, that's nuts.

The reason it's nuts is because -- while the Sacramento ballpark is awesome, and that's a Triple A team in a market larger than FIVE Major League cities... there's no reason for competition.

There's a massive shortfall in the minor leagues for western cities by population. Portland, Sacramento, San Jose, Fresno and Bakersfield are top 62 markets in the US. And Sacramento is the only Triple A team in that group.

The other four California cities are in Single A (which is ridiculous), and Portland has no team (also ridiculous).

Two things I've learned about the minors in my close observations over the past few years. First, class level doesn't really matter. Most fans in attendance don't really care which level it is. Secondly, compactness of leagues does matter a lot, because all levels AA and below are entirely bus leagues. Only AAA flies and it's commercial, not charter like the majors. (In fact, a big part of the reason that Fresno was dropped down was because of the dearth of direct commercial flights to Fresno, along with the imbalance of east and west teams compared to the majors that left one MLB team stuck with a AAA affiliate on the other side of the country.

As for the aforementioned cities, the Portland area has the Hillsboro Hops in the suburbs, San Jose is clearly in the Bay Area sports market (and their ballpark isn't exactly up to triple A standards), Fresno I covered, and Bakersfield is basically in the same boat (and as noted they don't even have an affiliated league, just the shoestring budgeted Pecos League).

 

[BattleBorn]

I could've sworn that Sacramento's ballpark was built with a background idea that it could be expanded to MLB standards, which would help explain the high price if they have an interest in the A's or Rays (or maybe even an MLS play?), but a shallow google search isn't corroborating that and is even contradicting that with speculation that they might be due for a replacement stadium.

So who knows? Seems like a high price tag when revenues are apparently down.

I'm pretty sure the Sacramento potential MLB ballpark was the one that's sat partially completed for decades near the Arco/Sleep Train Arena.

I think it's a lake now.

 

[KevFu]

I'm pretty sure the Sacramento potential MLB ballpark was the one that's sat partially completed for decades near the Arco/Sleep Train Arena.

I think it's a lake now.

Close. I've posted pictures before. They did lay the foundation for an MLB stadium when they built the NBA arena.

The "new" Triple A Stadium isn't anywhere near MLB upgradeable. But it was built with private money for Triple A.

 

[KevFu]

Two things I've learned about the minors in my close observations over the past few years. First, class level doesn't really matter. Most fans in attendance don't really care which level it is. Secondly, compactness of leagues does matter a lot, because all levels AA and below are entirely bus leagues. Only AAA flies and it's commercial, not charter like the majors. (In fact, a big part of the reason that Fresno was dropped down was because of the dearth of direct commercial flights to Fresno, along with the imbalance of east and west teams compared to the majors that left one MLB team stuck with a AAA affiliate on the other side of the country.

As for the aforementioned cities, the Portland area has the Hillsboro Hops in the suburbs, San Jose is clearly in the Bay Area sports market (and their ballpark isn't exactly up to triple A standards), Fresno I covered, and Bakersfield is basically in the same boat (and as noted they don't even have an affiliated league, just the shoestring budgeted Pecos League).

The compactness definitely matters a lot, which is where MLB screwed the pooch royally when they reorganized. It's hard to argue that you need to reduce travel costs and then you keep a 20-team league in Triple A.

If you're going to take over and reorganize, do it right. Wait til MLB expansion and then you can make four compact leagues of eight everywhere below Triple A. Triple A should be teams in medium-to-big cities within 2-3 hours of the big club (unless none exist), but have radical realignment for geography, unlike MLB.

It's ridiculous that the four divisions in two Triple A leagues are one five-team group 2019 mile footprint and the other three are over 2500 miles.

At Double A, and High and Low A, there should be four eight team leagues each, grouped like California League, Texas League, Ozarks League, Carolina League, Mid-Atlantic League, New England League, two Midwest Leagues, etc.

 

[PCSPounder]

The compactness definitely matters a lot, which is where MLB screwed the pooch royally when they reorganized. It's hard to argue that you need to reduce travel costs and then you keep a 20-team league in Triple A.

If you're going to take over and reorganize, do it right. Wait til MLB expansion and then you can make four compact leagues of eight everywhere below Triple A. Triple A should be teams in medium-to-big cities within 2-3 hours of the big club (unless none exist), but have radical realignment for geography, unlike MLB.

It's ridiculous that the four divisions in two Triple A leagues are one five-team group 2019 mile footprint and the other three are over 2500 miles.

At Double A, and High and Low A, there should be four eight team leagues each, grouped like California League, Texas League, Ozarks League, Carolina League, Mid-Atlantic League, New England League, two Midwest Leagues, etc.

But when California comes out squarely against public funding (through their former enterprise program for cities), then what? That’s probably why the Northwest League became a 6-team High A league and the California League became an 8-team Low A league to which Fresno was relegated, BTW.

Baseball (the org) has never given up on the stadium subsidy scheme.

 

[KevFu]

But when California comes out squarely against public funding (through their former enterprise program for cities), then what? That’s probably why the Northwest League became a 6-team High A league and the California League became an 8-team Low A league to which Fresno was relegated, BTW.

Baseball (the org) has never given up on the stadium subsidy scheme.

Right. It really boils down to, MLB wants someone else to pay for development.

Of course they should be running the minors like "Baseball colleges." For all of Low A, High A and Double-A in 120 cities and towns, they should build a mini-campus of stadium, dorms with dining hall, lounges, weight rooms, classrooms; teach their players healthy diet, balancing their checkbook, English, Spanish, little bit of Japanese/Korean, media relations, etc... Put a bar and a night club in there that's open to the public and let the players drink free. But with the "bouncers" being team employees who will cut them off, protect them and put them to bed.

MLB won't invest millions into that, but instead they'll sign Pablo Sandoval for $75 million and release him when he doesn't take care of himself. If you TAUGHT HIM to take care of himself, you wouldn't have wasted that money!