Sox Purchase Salem
Link (Baseball America)
"Fenway Sports Group, the sports sponsorship company owned by Boston Red Sox principal owner John Henry, reached an agreement with Hardball Capital to purchase the Salem Avalanche. After months of rumor and speculation, the deal was made public on Monday at a press conference in Salem."FENWAY SPORTS GROUP LEADS INVESTMENT GROUP THAT ACQUIRES MINOR LEAGUE BASEBALL’S SALEM AVALANCHE
Link (Salem Avalanche Official Site)
"This transaction marks just the second time the Avalanche has seen new ownership in the last 23 years. Kelvin Bowles, a former Major League Baseball scout and the man credited with saving baseball in the Roanoke Valley, sold the Avalanche to Atlanta-based Hardball Capital in November 2006 after having owned the team for 21 years."Update:
Red Sox buy Avs
The Salem minor-league franchise will remain with the Astros in 2008
Link (Roanoke Times)
"None of the parties involved in the sale would reveal the price, but Atlanta-based investment group Hardball Capital paid roughly $8 million for the Avalanche last year, a source close to that sale told The Roanoke Times at the time.
Jason Freier, managing partner of Hardball Capital, said "We really didn't intend on selling the team, but it was something they [FSG] really wanted to do."
Freier, whose group also owns a franchise in Fort Wayne, Ind., said Hardball Capital intends to remain in the baseball business and "ultimately to own several teams." But FSG had the resources to overcome Hardball's "economic and emotional reasons to stay" in Salem."
4 comments:
Any reason or speculation on the reason for the sale? I'm already envisioning every HS opponent saying this is a preview of what's to come in Fort Wayne.
Rachel - Wait & See. I give Hardball 3 to 4 years after opening day and they are gone.
Can't find anything on the reasons for the Salem A. sale - It's not even mentioned yet on the Hardball web site. But, notes say this has been coming for some time. Usually the local Salem newspaper would have some comment - but there is nothing. But then, the governmental group in Salem probably is being "secretive" about this action like Fort Wayne was about HS.
John B. Kalb
I knew we could count on John's neverending cup-half-empty thinking.
So John- you're saying we can look foward to the Wizards being bought by a MLB team? That doesn't sound so bad.
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