2001 - The Pacific Coast League is modernizing, at a price.
The sale of the Albuquerque Dukes to Portland is just another piece of a real estate board game which will make the owners rich, but leaves the dedicated fans who've been helping them pay the Bank with a sour taste in their mouths.

After 28 years, the Albuquerque Dukes are leaving the "Duke City." Sold to a sports entertainment company in Portland, Oregon, the soon-to-be renamed Dodgers AAA farm club will be moving at the end of the 2000 season.

Fans were notified at the beginning of the season by Pat McKernan, the team's General Manager, with little fanfare and no warning.

"Before anyone could say anything, it was a done deal," lamented one fan calling into the Bob Clark show, the afternoon sports talk show on KNML-1150AM radio in Albuquerque.

And it was. McKernan said that he was caught unaware by the annoucement that owner Bob Lozinak had sold the team to Portland to generate capital for improvements to his Altoona Curve franchise. "You can say whatever you want about the Dukes sale to Portland, but the fact is that Albuquerque's been punked by Altoona Pennsylvania." quipped Clark during his call-in on the sale of the Dukes.

Fan reaction was strong, and upset with the way that the sale had been handled. Within hours of the deal's announcement, PCL President Branch B. Rickey released a statement that Albuquerque would get another AAA franchise from the PCL, provided that they build a new stadium to house it. The Albuquerque Sports Stadium, built in 1969, while fan friendly, has aging facilities which are not in keeping with today's baseball palaces equipped with modern locker rooms and indoor batting cages.

"Certainly Albuquerque is a terrific city for baseball." noted Rickey in an email letter to a staffer at MLN. "However, in spite of efforts to find a solution for selling the franchise to a local individual or local group, no such solution could be identified."

No one in New Mexico is quite sure what "efforts" Rickey and the PCL took to find a local owner. MLN contacted the Mayor's office, the Economic Development Council, the Chamber of Commerce, the Governor's office and all state Senators and Congressmen. All stated that neither the owner, Bob Lozinak, nor the Pacific Coast League made any overtures to anyone with the means to acquire the Dukes.

General Manager McKernan may have been the only one in the baseball power structure who wasn't aware of the deal. Tom Kayser, President of the AA Texas League, was notified prior to the sale, as were officials with the Los Angeles Dodgers

Why keep New Mexico in the dark about the sale of their team?

Portland, who lost their AAA franchise to an aging stadium and a lack of political will to build a new one, completed their stadium building and needed a team. A deal for the Edmonton Trappers, the Angels AAA franchise, had fallen through.

Team Owner Bob Lozinak, upgrading the stadium in his home town of Altoona, took the opportunity to move his investment in the Dukes into the Curves' new stadium.