A One-on-One With PCL President
Branch B. Rickey III
(Continued from Page Three )
MLN: You're currently trying to get a new stadium to bring baseball back to Albuquerque. You have some negative reaction to public financing there. How do you deal with that?
BR:"In those circumstances where public support is seen as negative, it is very difficult. Yet in my involvement with stadia, new ones, the experience is most extraordinary.
The large percentage of people in Albuquerque have never seen a new stadium. They haven't been to [a place like] Memphis to see the spark.
There is incontrovertible evidence that new stadia, under the right combination of government and private consensus, can impact the community in a positive way.
In Memphis, where nearly every building in the downtown area was in decay, people said 'You don't want to move downtown.' Yet look at downtown Memphis today. We are bringing solutions to urban problems."
MLN Follow-up: Solutions? How so?
BR: "We had an outgoing mayor in Fresno oppose a new stadium. A new stadium's not yet built there. And his accusation was 'The Fresno Grizzlies are going to get more out of the City of Fresno than the city is ever going to get out of them.'
This is the message that we fight so hard to convey. It may take a generation, and I'm not talking about a familial generation but a baseball generation... I'm not sure what that is... eight years, ten years, six years... We're in the midst of a renaissance. And that renaissance is leaping into municipal politics and the electorate before these municipalities and electorates are ready to recognize what's going on."
MLN Follow-up: In Albuquerque you bring in something that's probably felt more strongly in a place like New Mexico: Tradition. It's called the Duke City, after all. People tell us that they felt 'ambushed' when it was announced that the Dukes were being shipped off to Portland. No debate. Just good-bye, and oh... we'll give you back AAA baseball if you build a modern stadium.
What do you say to people who want the old stadium remodeled because they took their grand-kids there, or they like having a beer and watching the moon rise over the Sandia mountains?
BR: "There is a special character about New Mexico. So many people have moved there to capture that character. It's simple and profound to those people who participate in that tradition.
We can look at attendance in Albuquerque over the past five years. AAA baseball has no future in Albuquerque if we expect the people who are traditionally bound to our support to be the only group that is there for us.
Memphis has traditions in minor league baseball dating back before the National Association of Minor League Baseball. On the Negro League level and in the white leagues.
We had, roughly at Tim McCarver Stadium, 3,500 fans a game. Last season, we were in excess of 12,000. There did not materialize in Memphis suddenly 8,500 new baseball traditionalists. Those are recreational fans.
That is where we have to broaden out our attack. We cannot appeal to baseball fans in Albuquerque.
We need to be a league and an industry that caters to the needs of the modern American family. If we stand alone, we are done."
MLN: So you would say that the public's investment in a minor league baseball park is worthwhile?
BR:"The public investment is being repaid many times over. There is a salubrious effect [from the construction of a new ballpark.] You cannot go and visit one of these cities and find a naysayer after they're built.
This is the thing that's so knock-you-over evident.
Go to the primary cities [where major league baseball is played.]. The cost of doing business in these cities building new stadia is $400 million, $380 million.
Now step down to the secondary cities [where minor league baseball is played]. You're looking at investments of $30 million to $40 million. Over the lifespan of the stadium, these are knock 'em dead successes."
MLN: In Albuquerque, you're running out of time for the owners to negotiate a deal with the City, to get a vote on the ballot to approve partial funding for a new stadium.
BR:"You're looking at time as a corrosive. Time is our greatest ally.
I accept all of the flaws built into the stadium issue. If we had been able to give voters one more year, this would not have been nearly as charged. We're asking the Albuquerque voters to be twice as insightful. If you're used to Model Ts, you don't have a good idea of what a supersonic jet is."
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