Astros High A moving to Richmond?

[Duman]

This didn't seem like a possibility in the off season when the Red Sox group bought the Avalanche franchise and plan on moving their High A team from Lancaster of the California League to Salem next season. 

Baseball America is reporting the the Carolina League has an agreement in principle to purchase two affiliates from the California League.  That would extend the Carolina League to 10 teams.  The only Cal League team who has a MLB affiliate in the East or Central Time Zones ,other than the Red Sox, is the Texas Rangers.  That would make the Astros and the Rangers likely courters for the two new teams in the Carolina League.  Richmond is the place that is most desirable at this time for a new Carolina franchise.

"Right now, because of the quality of that territory, it is like everything connects to Richmond," O'Conner said. "I'm not going to be able to create a new franchise for Richmond, so therefore acting on Richmond alone is not possible. There will be a domino effect. For someone to go to Richmond someone will have to leave somewhere else. We may have waves of shuffling once the shoe drops."

[J.D. of Salem]

The problem with Richmond is the City has been fighting for 10 years about building a new stadium. Baseball people want it but can't get the thing passed. Thats the reason Atlanta pulled out and built there own stadium and moved the team south.

The Diamond is pretty run down.

[Duman]

the latest is that it will take more time for the two Cali teams to move to the Carolina League.  So the Astros might have to have an affiliate in the Cal league for one year before moving to the Carolina league. 

It looks like Bakersfield (Rangers) and High Desert (mariners) will be moving to Richmond Va & Fayetteville NC. 

Look for the Mariners to get the Red Sox affiliate (Lancaster) and then the Astros get the High Desert franchise.  The Rangers will be looking to move to the Carolina League as well, so I don't see them breaking ties with team ownership.

[Duman]

Looks like things have slowed down

A previous plan that included moving Bakersfield or High Desert into Richmond has lost momentum. "That is less likely than more likely at this point," O’Conner said,

but plan is still pretty much in place.

"There is no lack of enthusiasm or desire (for the shift), it boils down to markets and buyers and timing," O’Conner said in a recent interview. "Doing it for 2009 was admittedly ambitious, but the project is not dead. We’ll come to a point here real soon when we’ll have to decide if it is going to work . . . I don’t want to convince clubs to move west to east and put them in markets that are worse than they are coming from.

"In an oversimplified explanation, we have to find (Carolina League) markets to move into. A more accurate way to put it is that we have to find two markets with facilities within the Carolina League geography that can handle that level with a facility that can be built or remodeled. That  has not been real, real easy."