Minor League Baseball - Edmonton Trappers
Edmonton Trappers Sold to Round Rock, Texas Group
October 23, 2003 - The Pacific Coast League and the
Edmonton Eskimo Football Club announced the sale of the
Edmonton Trappers Baseball Club to Texas-based Round
Rock Baseball, Incorporated. Pending approvals by the
PCL, the National Association of Professional Baseball
Leagues and Major League Baseball, the franchise will be
relocated to Round Rock in time for play in the 2005 PCL
season.
Eskimos President and CEO Hugh Campbell and PCL
President Branch B. Rickey made the announcement in a
press conference held in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
The sale and subsequent move of the Edmonton
franchise is a positive step forward with regards to the
PCL refining its geography and improving its air travel
connectivity. Since the relocation of the Calgary
Cannons to Albuquerque in 2002, the Edmonton franchise
has been an isolated League destination and the sole
franchise outside of the United States. The PCL
currently has 16 teams, spanning from Nashville and
Memphis in the east to Tacoma and Portland in the west.
Despite losing 11 games to foul weather in 2003,
Edmonton drew 333,000 fans to Telus Field. “Although we
are sorry to part ways with the first-class operation in
Edmonton, the PCL gains outstanding leadership and a
very positive and successful atmosphere in Round Rock,”
stated Rickey. “There are also significant advantages to
bringing in an Austin-area franchise which is much more
geographically central to the League than is Edmonton.”
The agreement, scheduled to close in October of 2004,
calls for the Eskimos to continue to operate the
Trappers, currently the Montreal Expos’ Triple-A entry,
for the ‘04 season. Round Rock Baseball, Inc. currently
owns and operates the Round Rock Express Baseball Club,
the Double-A affiliate of the Houston Astros in the
Texas League. Relocation plans call for that Texas
League franchise to move to Corpus Christi, Tex.,
following the 2004 season with the Express becoming a
Triple-A club in the PCL.
Round Rock currently ranks third in all of Minor
League Baseball, trailing only the PCL’s Sacramento and
Memphis clubs, drawing better than 685,000 fans this
year to The Dell Diamond ballpark.
This article was taken from
www.pclbaseball.com. All rights
reserved.
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