Frederick Dropped

[TommyPickles]

10 minutes ago, bpilktree said:

Yes but not sure any of the other locations have the size or facilities to be a AA team.  They also jumped Aberdeen to high A and kept Delmarva as low A telling me stadium and facilities played a bigger role in the decision then location.

I feel like the Frederick stadium is pretty nice though...

[BohKnowsBmore]

32 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Me too. Bowie is a Washington suburb while Frederick is half way to both. Basically what they've done is lose an area that will now have young people moving toward the Gnats because they have been a winning team while the Oriole wallow in last place and battle for the 1st pick in the draft every year.

I am glad to see Aberdeen get picked up as a full season club. 

 

41 minutes ago, Roll Tide said:

Bad Orioles decision! I would have let go of Bowie as its closer to the Gnats

I think you both have the conclusion backwards. Orioles would prefer to keep Bowie specifically because it’s contested territory. Similar to the “this is birdland” billboard on 295S as you enter DC. 

[scOtt]

49 minutes ago, Roll Tide said:

Bad Orioles decision! I would have let go of Bowie as its closer to the Gnats

This is an MLB decision isn't it? Not the O's. Maybe I'm thinking wrong.

[DirtyBird]

9 minutes ago, BohKnowsBmore said:

 

I think you both have the conclusion backwards. Orioles would prefer to keep Bowie specifically because it’s contested territory. Similar to the “this is birdland” billboard on 295S as you enter DC. 

You don't think Frederick is contested territory?

[BohKnowsBmore]

4 minutes ago, DirtyBird said:

You don't think Frederick is contested territory?

Not to the same degree. Much much smaller population-wise than central Maryland (including Bowie) as well. 

[SteveA]

2 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:

That sucks.  Expected, but it sucks. 

In a perfect world this contraction would be an opening for real competitive, maybe even higher level independent leagues.  But I think that ship sailed a long time ago.  Way before I was born.  At best some of the dropped teams will join leagues like the Atlantic League, made up mostly of A- and AA-caliber talent in their late 20s.  Or this Draft League... I guess.

I assume you heard that Bluefield and other teams in its league are being converted into a wooden bat college league run under the auspices of MLB?

[SteveA]

54 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Me too. Bowie is a Washington suburb while Frederick is half way to both. Basically what they've done is lose an area that will now have young people moving toward the Gnats because they have been a winning team while the Oriole wallow in last place and battle for the 1st pick in the draft every year.

I am glad to see Aberdeen get picked up as a full season club. 

So will Delmarva now be our high A and Aberden our low A?

[DirtyBird]

4 minutes ago, BohKnowsBmore said:

Not to the same degree. Much much smaller population-wise than central Maryland (including Bowie) as well. 

One area is at about max capacity, the other is the fastest growing area in the state and about 45 minutes from both Nats and O's stadiums.

[Legend_Of_Joey]

4 minutes ago, SteveA said:

So will Delmarva now be our high A and Aberden our low A?

Delmarva stays Low A and Aberdeen becomes High A.

This sucks. Would rather have seen Delmarva get the ax. 

[Tony-OH]

8 minutes ago, SteveA said:

So will Delmarva now be our high A and Aberden our low A?

Appears its the other way around.

 

[fitzi22]

It seemed funny to me that MLB announced the 5 Draft league teams with a caveat that they were in negotiations for a sixth team.  I think the Orioles were trying everything they could to get Frederick into the Draft league just so they wouldn’t let the Nationals swoop in and gobble up the Keys.  
 

I think the orioles missed an excellent opportunity here.  Norfolk although reasonably close to Baltimore by most AAA standards is a bit of a hike for as much as the O’s use it and it is closer to the Nationals anyway.  Everyone knows the Nats were looking to upgrade from Fresno and move on from Hagerstown.  The O’s should have negotiated the Nats to have Norfolk and upgraded one of the MD affiliate stadiums to fit AAA.  That way the O’s lock down MD while surrendering VA which wasn’t a good fit anyhow.  Unfortunately this would have taken some adults to be present in the room so alas this plan had no shot.

Edited December 9, 2020 by fitzi22

[MurphDogg]

1 hour ago, Tony-OH said:

Me too. Bowie is a Washington suburb while Frederick is half way to both. Basically what they've done is lose an area that will now have young people moving toward the Gnats because they have been a winning team while the Oriole wallow in last place and battle for the 1st pick in the draft every year.

I am glad to see Aberdeen get picked up as a full season club. 

Bowie is closer to Baltimore than Frederick is, and like Frederick, is pretty close to equidistant to both cities. Prince George's Stadium is 27.3 miles to Camden Yards and 20.6 miles to Nats Park (driving distance).

With the respective traffic of the two cities, it is almost always a faster drive to Bowie from Baltimore than DC.

[ChipTait]

17 minutes ago, fitzi22 said:

 The O’s should have negotiated the Nats to have Norfolk and upgraded one of the MD affiliate stadiums to fit AAA.  

Not sure what qualifications are required for a AAA ballpark these days.  The Astros AAA team is now in Sugar Land, TX, with 7500 seats.

[LookinUp]

16 minutes ago, fitzi22 said:

It seemed funny to me that MLB announced the 5 Draft league teams with a caveat that they were in negotiations for a sixth team.  I think the Orioles were trying everything they could to get Frederick into the Draft league just so they wouldn’t let the Nationals swoop in and gobble up the Keys.  
 

I think the orioles missed an excellent opportunity here.  Norfolk although reasonably close to Baltimore by most AAA standards is a bit of a hike for as much as the O’s use it and it is closer to the Nationals anyway.  Everyone knows the Nats were looking to upgrade from Fresno and move on from Hagerstown.  The O’s should have negotiated the Nats to have Norfolk and upgraded one of the MD affiliate stadiums to fit AAA.  That way the O’s lock down MD while surrendering VA which wasn’t a good fit anyhow.  Unfortunately this would have taken some adults to be present in the room so alas this plan had no shot.

The O's obviously realized this stuff when making the decision. 

My assumption was always that the presence of a MiL team would create fan loyalty to the ML team. I wonder if I'm over reacting to that point.

As markets go, Aberdeen is the outlier here. Frederick, Bowie, Salisbury and Norfolk all seem to be much more strategically important from a market perspective. I guess Aberdeen is more important from a Ripken, and maybe facility, perspective.

 

[MurphDogg]

1 hour ago, DirtyBird said:

One area is at about max capacity, the other is the fastest growing area in the state and about 45 minutes from both Nats and O's stadiums.

There are 3.7 million people within a 25 mile radius of Bowie compared to 734,000 within a 25 mile radius of Frederick. Even if you want to cut that to 15 miles to eliminate DC and parts of Baltimore, there are 1.3 million people within a 15 mile radius of Bowie and 207,000 within a 15 mile radius of Frederick.

The two markets aren't remotely comparable. 

I love going to games in Frederick too, and I will probably check out the draft league there this season, but there was absolutely no way the Orioles were ever going to give up Bowie. 

Prince George's Stadium drew 14,000 people for the 2000 AA All-Star game, and its current capacity of 10,000 wouldn't make it the smallest AAA park. It could certainly be expanded to be a AAA stadium.

Ripken Stadium has a capacity of 6,300. If Aberdeen were to replace Bowie in the Eastern League, it would be 7th of 12 stadiums in capacity.