A place to follow the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers, the Midwest League, Minor League baseball, Major League Baseball, and everything in between in that order.
It may seem like a strange match, but the Huntsville Stars are offering Alabama - and Texas - fans a chance to buy an official coin of the Bowl Championship Series National Championship Game.
Buck Rogers, the general manager of the local minor league baseball team, is admittedly "not even a college football fan," but he didn't want to see local football fans miss out on this opportunity.
Gartner's plan represented the most realistic plan for the Midwest League to return to Dubuque since the Packers left dilapidated Petrakis Park following the 1976 season. Burlington Bees general manager Chuck Brockett called Gartner's plan "probably a once-in-a-lifetime deal."
Mayor Karl Dean said his administration is talking with the Sounds' ownership, which recently finished its first season in control of the Triple-A baseball team. The preliminary talks have focused on the old Nashville Thermal Transfer Plant site, where the previous owners had a deal with the city that fell apart in the spring of 2007, before Dean was elected.
Dean, a big baseball fan and Massachusetts native whose heart lies with the Boston Red Sox, said he's eager to build a new ballpark.
"I think it's a huge opportunity for downtown," he said Friday.
Alternate headline...Could Minor League Baseball NOT be coming to Dubuque?
A few key points from that video above...
"We are going to have some form of minor league baseball in this town. I can't tell you when but as soon as I can make it happen, we will make it happen," says Joe Chlapaty. Chlapaty is a prominent business leader from Ohio. In the past several years he's given millions of dollars to his alma mater, the University of Dubuque. His next mission is to bring minor league baseball to Dubuque. "The challenge we have right now is not building a stadium, it's finding a team we can move to Dubuque that's part of the Midwest league."
He checked and says there are currently no teams in that league for sale.
That would seem to be a rather large stumbling block.
He's also checking out teams in the Pioneer League.
Pioneer League? Really? I'm going to guess that they meant to say Frontier League. Because the Helena, Montana to Dubuque, Iowa road trip will be fantastic for the Pioneer League.
Also...and again...this would seem to be a pretty important fact.
You might remember that in 2003, Dubuque voters turned down a tax levy to build a minor league stadium. Chlapaty says, under his plan, private funding would pay for everything.
The Battle Creek franchise was the one that was supposed to move into that stadium. The levy was turned down and the Battle Cats/Yankees/Devil Rays are now in Midland, Michigan.
Look I really don't want to be this demotivational poster and I would be happy to make a journey to Dubuque for a Midwest League game, but unless there are two new expansion teams in the works for major league baseball and that creates a need for two more Class-A teams, I'll check back in a few years to see if this has made any progress.
