Cardinals to buy Memphis franchise
Posted on September 17th, 2008 by erik in Memphis Redbirds, PDC'sThere was a bit of an ongoing soap opera as to whether or not Memphis would renew their player development contract with St. Louis, but news came out this past week that they did for another four years. Now it looks like the Cardinals may never need to worry about renewing again. It appears that the Cardinals are following the models set by Atlanta, Boston and the Yankees by purchasing the franchise for themselves.
The only possible speed bump is the Memphis Redbirds is a non-profit organization due to their funding of youth baseball in their community, including the RBI (Returning Baseball in Inner Cities) program.
I’m not a business expert, but this seems like a win-win situation.
The Cardinals own the Springfield, Palm Beach and Johnson City franchises right now.
See PH8 for more info and his take. Interesting development, to be sure.
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Great move.
Next, taking back the Peoria franchise.
I (obviously) think this is a great move for the Cardinals. Stability in the Memphis market can only benefit both the Cards and the Redbirds in the long term.
I just really hope that DeWitt stays committed to the RBI and STRIPES programs that have already done so much for youth baseball in the Memphis metro in a short time.
Taking back Peoria would take the QC River Bandits away from Erik, not sure he would be happy about that ;)
Nah,
Leave QC where it is… Now I would love to see another A Club or even AA Club ala similar to what the A’s do. Unless it has changed, they have two teams in the California League earlier this decade.
I’m out for #1 here, hugo. Screw Davenport and it’s suburbs. They can’t make tractors like Peoria and they can’t house a baseball team like Peoria.
My take: This is yet another step toward the creation of a regional sports network for the Cardinals. With controlling stakes in the highest profile minor league clubs (AA and AAA), both of which are based in decent sized cities, the Cardinals have provided themselves with a solid base of programing for a Cards-centered TV network, possibly showing Memphis, Springfield, and Major League games on the channel along with other programing.
Ouch that hurts alex. I say screw D-Port too since I was never a big fan living there. But that stadium was built to stand up against the floods and did quite well. And John Deere has no challengers…what is in Peoria?
I think I remember the Memphis organization having to settle out with the IRS…the IRS tried to take back their non-for profit status based on the fact that a corporation was benefiting directly from the relationship (the Cardinals)…I believe the IRS made them pay a little money and decided they would never hand this status out to a minor league ball club again…I wonder if they sold the franchise if the Cardinals would be able to keep the status…based on the comments from the IRS I would doubt it.
So do they use the teams as minor league development for some executive positions?
Just to expand on Erik’s comments – in addition to owning all or part of the Springfield, Palm Beach, Johnson City franchises, the Cards also own the GCL Cardinals, DSL Cardinals & VSL Cardinals franchises.
I don’t care, Peoria can have them. I only see them when they come to Cedar Rapids. Unless they want to buy the Kernels, give them a real team name then I will see them 2 x’s year whether in Davenport or Peoria. I will say they get a pretty good following in the QC, though.
Has anybody seen BA’s top 20 prospect lists for the GCL and Appy?
The Cards have just one player on the two lists — Nike, who’s #13 on the Appy League list.
The scouts they talked to aren’t impressed by his bat speed, power potential, plate discipline, speed, or first-step quickness at shortstop.
Which is weird, considering that his stats are better than just about anyone else in their top 20. Then again, almost all the guys ahead of him are just 17 or 18, so maybe they’re projecting the younger guys’ tools will play better than Niko’s at higher levels.
GForce, Peoria is the World HQ of Caterpillar. I do find it funny though that John Deere and Cat are both IL based companies.
Ah, it has been quite awhile since I lived in the Eastern Iowa/Down South part of Illinois. I fondly remember Peoria from having good basketball teams when I was a sports writer in a previous life. So Alex could be right, my family tells me JD is overpriced and CAT sells a lot to the military.
Hugo, both being in the same state is interesting, and see you do learn something new everyday ;)
Down South? My wife would not like hearing that ;) It is funny how Peoria is considered “downstate” or “southern IL” by some people (not saying you consider it that) yet it is technically in the Northern half of the state. I never liked the downstate term either, not sure why. And since I grew up in Western KY Carbondale is Southern IL and Belleville isn’t. Now that I live near the Lou I feel differently. Which just goes to show that everything is relative to where you are now.
Hugo —
I wondered if someone was going to pick up on that. I covered high school wrestling in Illinois during college, and a team from the QC (Moline High) had a nice run at state. Everyone I talked to kept saying ‘down south’ when they talked about anything lower than Chicago…this was a head-scratcher for me until I finally asked another reporter. He laughed and said there is a big misconception that there are chicago sports teams and everyone else in the state. I guess some people in the windy city don’t like being beat my peoria teams or anyone else. Sounds like a big bunch of whiners to me :-)
Cardinals need to bring the midwest league team to the home town area. I have always thought this would be a great idea. The booming suburb of O’ Fallon, MO has a solid ballpark that holds the River City Rascals. Few people attend or care about the Frontier League anymore…my thought is to buy the ballpark, add a few thousand more seats and bam-O’ Fallon Redbirds located 30 minutes west of Busch Stadium. I guarantee the masses would sell out that field continually. Prospect watching is becoming more an more enticing to us local fans. What I wouldn’t give to be able to drive around the corner and sell some of the future stars getting a start to their career. Bring it here!