Russ Smith writes that MLB should move the Florida Marlins.

Back in 1999, while on a trip to Miami, my older son and I did go to a Marlins game, and with the possible exception of the now-abandoned (again) RFK Stadium in Washington, DC, I’ve never been to a worse venue for baseball. Not only did it take an hour to get there from our South Beach hotel, but also there couldn’t have been more than 2000 people in the stands, and most of them were entirely bored. So sure, if the team’s owners can bamboozle the state into a risky deal–there’s been no indication so far that businesses would pop up in Little Havana and thus jobs created, justifying (sort of) the burden on the pockets of residents–a half-hearted mazel tov is in order. But in today’s economic climate, I find it hard to believe that this transaction will ever be completed, and meanwhile, while MLB continues to sock away immense revenues, the Marlins players and their tiny base of fans will be left to flounder.

He lists some cities where the Marlins might do better. Of those, San Antonio is my favorite, although no one ever talks about Nashville.

Bleacher Banter sees an opportunity for the Nats as the Braves pull their minor league team out of Richmond, VA.

Sean Kirst remembers a grim anniversary for New York baseball fans.

Alfred Kelly wants to see a commemoration of the Dodgers’ move away from Brooklyn:

This year, quite appropriately, Major League Baseball honored the 60th anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s debut as a Dodger. Somehow, baseball should acknowledge the 50th anniversary of our beloved Bums’ move West.

In another 20 years or so, there will be very few people who remember the Brooklyn Dodgers. I hope in the next expansion, MLB brings a team back to the burough.
Correction: Fixed typo.

It looks very likely that the Oakland Athletics will move to Fremont:

I’m excited about the concept of a new stadium and what it could do to help the A’s in the long-term. I don’t think it means that they will be more likely to re-sign someone like Zito this year, but when some of the other contracts come up down the road, like Nick Swisher and Milton Bradley, perhaps the A’s open the wallet a little more. It also puts a little needle right into the Giants because the A’s are essentially moving right next door to where the Giants draw the majority of their fanbase. The tide may turn in the Giants/A’s casual fan battle just by simple geography.

Correction: Fixed spelling of Fremont.

FishStripes notes the end of the San Antonio deal to host the Marlins. He also notes that MLB is now very interested in putting a team in the Texas city:

If a deal can’t be struck in Hialeah, San Antonio will most likely be the front runner for the team’s new home.
Okay, that isn’t altogether a shocker though I can think of three better locations. But what is surprising is: since when did Major League Baseball start being upfront with possible relocation cities?
I can’t remember ever seeing this before.
All I can conclude is San Antonio played this like masters. Putting up an offer – setting a deadline and being open if MLB and the Marlins really want to move to the city in the future.
I must say: well done San Antonio.

Indeed. Unlike Portland or Vegas, San Antonio refused to be used as a pawn and put a legitimate deal on the table. It appears that MLB respects that.
Update: Sorry, I forgot to include the link before.

FishStripes has the news that the Marlins declined to meet San Antonio’s deadline. That’s good news for the Marlins staying in Florida. Kudos to San Antonio, too, for not letting itself be used as a pawn to get a better deal in Florida.

According to this article, the Athletics are close to a deal for a new stadium in Fremont, California. That’s about 30 miles south east of Oakland.
The site is just off I-880, called Pacific Commons. Here’s the aerial view of the site, although this doesn’t show the current development. For more, check out this photo essay of the possible sites in Fremont from the The New A’s Ballpark blog.
One economist sees Oakland as the big winner in all this:

Oakland could be the biggest winner of all if the A’s actually do move to Fremont, according to Porter, the economics professor.
“If the A’s keep the name ‘Oakland’ when they move, Oakland gets the best of all worlds,” Porter said. “They don’t have to spend millions to build a stadium, they don’t have to give up land for a huge stadium that would be vacant for all but 81 days a year, and they would still keep the name recognition.”

Stay tuned.

Fishstripes parses a radio interview with David Samson as killing the San Antonio deal.

FishStripes rounds up the news on the deadline imposed by San Antonio on the Marlins. The Texas City wants an answer by May 15th.

I don’t see anyway MLB and the Marlins will be able to meet this deadline. If the city really thinks pressuring the two is going to cause them to bat an eye, they are sadly mistaken.
I don’t know if San Antonio is setting a quick deadline because they want out or if they don’t understand how slowly things move within baseball.

I bet they’re setting the deadline because they know exactly how slowly things move in baseball, and they don’t want to be jerked around like Portland or Las Vegas. They don’t want to be a pawn to get the Marlins a better deal in south Florida. They want the team. If the team doesn’t want them, they won’t be leverage. Good for San Antonio.

Fishstripes notices that according to one source, a Marlins move to Hialeah might be farther along than we thought.
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Fish Stripes looks at the latest news on a possible move by the Marlins to San Antonio and makes a snide comment about Nolan Ryan. After quoting Ryan on the viability of a team in the Texas city Craig writes:

With all due respect to Mr. Ryan, I don’t remember reading his work in the field of economics in the AER or the QJE. But maybe I missed a few issues of the journals.

Nolan Ryan is a banker.

Following his retirement, Nolan was able to further pursue his business ventures. He is the majority owner and Chairman of the Board of The Express Bank in Alvin and Danbury, Texas, and owns Nolan Ryan’s Waterfront Restaurant and Bass Inn near Three Rivers, Texas. Nolan also owns and operates several cattle ranches in South Texas. In May of 1998, he joined his son Reid and a group of investors in bringing a professional baseball franchise to Central Texas by purchasing the Jackson (Miss.) Generals, a Houston Astros Double-A affiliate, and moved the team to Round Rock, Texas.

So maybe he doesn’t have a degree from Harvard Business School, but I bet Nolan knows something about demographics and economics, or at least has some people working for him who can inform him on the subject.
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San Antonio appears to have it’s act together in attempting to lure the Marlins:

Wolff’s proposal follows the same plan used to build the AT&T Center for the San Antonio Spurs, which opened in 2002 at a cost of $189 million.
Voters in 1999 approved increases in the hotel-occupancy and car-rental taxes to finance the county’s $146.5 million share. The Spurs provided the rest of the funding, including $41 million from the arena’s naming rights.
Wolff said voter approval would be needed to refinance the bonds, pay off the AT&T Center debt early and use new bonds to pay for a baseball stadium. The plan would not incorporate sales or property tax, he said.
The Marlins would choose the site for a stadium.

If California can support five teams, Texas can certainly support three. Wolff speaks as if this would be an easy issue to get by the voters. Can anyone from San Antonio comment on that issue? Usually, when a team picks a site for a stadium, the neighbors try to move it somewhere else.
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The City of Anaheim lost again:

A judge rejected a request Thursday by the city of Anaheim to force the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim to change their name back to the Anaheim Angels.
Orange County Superior Court Judge Peter J. Polos ruled that he had no authority to reverse the ruling of a jury that three weeks ago decided in the team’s favor.

Good for judge Polos. A jury trial should not be easily overturned at the whim of a judge. I guess the city can try an actual appeal now, but they need to remember that three strikes and they’re out.
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There may be a problem with continuing to call the Washington franchise the Nationals.

According to a report in The New York Times on Tuesday, the United States Patent and Trademark Office granted a request for federal trademark registration on the name Washington Nationals to Bygone Sports last week. The Cincinnati-based company, which specializes in historic trademarks and sports apparel, applied for the trademark in September 2002.
According to the Times, Major League Baseball, aware of Bygone Sports’ claim to the Washington Nationals name, thought it had reached an agreement with the company for the name’s rights when the franchise was moved from Montreal in 2004.

It all comes down to whether an oral agreement is binding. My suggestion for a name is here.

Fishstripes heard a rumor about the City of Hialeah coming up with the money to build a stadium for the Marlins. I find nothing on Google News. Did anyone else hear this?
When my sister was born, my mother wanted to give her a name that didn’t lend itself to a silly nickname. She named her Leah. When she brought her home from the hospital, she put her in a cradle in the living room. My two cousins and I gathered around the cradle, waved and chanted, “Hiya Leah, Hiya Leah, Hiya Leah!” One of my parent’s best friends, who likes to play the ponies says, “Hiya Leah, how are things at the race track?” whenever he sees her. Needless to say my mother failed in her quest.

David Samson described his meeting with Portland mayor Tom Potter as a first date. If so, I don’t think Samson will be getting another:

Mayor Tom Potter said Monday he has a “very strong sense” that most Portlanders don’t care about landing a major league baseball team and reiterated his position that the city will not help finance a ballpark for the Florida Marlins.
Potter spoke after meeting with Marlins president David Samson and other team officials, who are touring potential new homes for the franchise.
“My concern is that Portland is facing a crisis is education,” Potter said. “That’s my top priority, to find funding for that. And I expressed that today.”

Maybe Samson thinks Potter is just playing hard to get. 🙂

The Florida Marlins will visit Portland, Oregon Monday as they look for a new home.

Upon hearing of Florida’s relocation interest a month ago, baseball proponents in Portland sent the team a copy of the presentation they made to Major League Baseball during the Expos’ relocation process.
Outlined in those materials is a finance plan that has a much greater gap than the Marlins face in Florida but one that proponents hope will serve as a starting point for serious negotiations down the road, with the Marlins, the Oakland Athletics or some other franchise.

I’ve been to one game in Portland. It was on a Monday night, and the game was very poorly attended. The current stadium was recently renovated, and some nice astethics, and was easy to reach by public transportation. The game was very exciting, but despite all that only a handful of people showed.
There are a lot of minor league cities that do better than Portland. Why not put a team in Louisville, KY? They’ve had great attendance for years.

Ray Ratto reports on a potential soccer deal that may lead to the Athletics building a stadium in San Jose:

Then suddenly, the A’s put out a news release announcing that (you cannot make up this stuff, I swear) they would be very interested in owning said expansion team.
So you ask yourselves, “What? Who? Why?” That leads to the next question, “How unspeakably dim are these people?”
But because Fisher is nobody’s yutz, and Wolff can hear a piece of re-bar hit a snowbank at 1,500 yards, “unspeakably dim” isn’t the question at all. Earthquakes IV (after the indoor and outdoor Quakes of the old NASL, and Earthquakes III of MLS) need a stadium. The A’s want a stadium. The land for both is right near Sharksville.
Connect the dots, Marmaduke. The A’s are playing the leverage game.
You see, MLS teams make no money whatsoever. It’s a loss leader for Anschutz, who is so loaded that he has first call on money that hasn’t been printed yet, but as an investment for newbies, it’s right up there with soaking your cash with lighter fluid and rubbing two sticks together.
So Fisher couldn’t care less about the soccer team. But land, in San Jose, there for the stadiumizing … that, he could care about.

Buy a soccer team, get a stadium, knock it down and build one for your baseball team. Looks like the owner plays Moneyball, too.

There’s a link at MLB.com to a press conference by David Samson in which he says that a new stadium in Miami won’t happen. They’re looking at other sites in south Florida, but they’ve received permission from MLB to look into relocating the team.
These threats usually work. We’ll see if Miami and the state of Florida are intimidated by this.
Update: Here’s a summary story.

It looks like the Washington Nationals will go for around $450 million dollars. MLB paid $120 million dollars for the team. So it looks like each team will receive over $10 million each when the franchise is sold. Look at it this way; twenty nine teams get to buy a #2 starter for a year!

I’m going to start referring to the city name of the Angels as LAnaheim. Every time I want to refer to the Angels by their place name I end up typing Anaheim, then having to change it. I never know, however, what to type instead. Los Angeles isn’t complete. Los Angeles of Anaheim is awkward. I sometimes do LA/Anaheim, but this is a bit shorter and makes fun of the whole naming debacle. So from now on, they’re the LAnaheim Angels here.

The Washington Nationals are officially up for bids. If you have a spare $300-$400 million dollars, it’s MLB has a team for you. Sounds like the current MLB owners are going to make a tidy profit. The Expos were sold to MLB for $120 million dollars. If they go for $400 million, the 29 other clubs will basically get to spilt $10 million in profit each. That’s enough for everyone to buy a front line starter for one year.

If you want to buy the Nationals, you have until May 31 to get your bid in to Bud.

Bill Young has thoughts on opening day in Washington, having spoken with many people who have fond memories of the franchises days in Montreal as the Expos.