Friday, June 27, 1997

Fort Worth officials considering expansion possibility

By LANCE FLEMING / Abilene Reporter-News

The city of Fort Worth is on a mission to "Bring Back the Cats."

To that end, several city officials were in Abilene Wednesday night to watch the Texas-Louisiana League game between Abilene and Rio Grande Valley and begin the process of placing a T-L League team in the Metroplex.

Fort Worth has been without a professional baseball team inside its city limits since the legendary Fort Worth Cats folded in 1964. The city has been trying to get a minor league team for several years, and now the T-L League has its sights set on moving into Cowtown.

The league would like to expand into Fort Worth, Austin and possibly Lafayette, La., before the 1998 season starts, giving the league nine teams. To get an even number in the league would mean an existing team would fold or that only two of those cities would get a team.

Fort Worth is definitely interested, but right now it's too early to say for sure what's going to happen.

"We're basically on a fact-finding mission," Fort Worth assistant city manager Mike Groomer said Wednesday night at Scott Field. "We want to see what goes into the operation, if it's worth it financially and if it's something that's viable for the city of Fort Worth. We'll go back and schedule more visits around the league and see how those teams operate."

The T-L League has been looking to expand since before the 1996 season, because when this season ends it will have played two years with just six teams.

In its inaugural season of 1994, the league played with eight teams. But before the 1995 season started, San Antonio and Beaumont were dropped and Abilene, Lubbock, Laredo and Pueblo were added to bring the league to 10 teams.

However, at the all-star break that season both Laredo and Pueblo were dropped because both teams were losing too much money. That dropped the league to eight teams to finish the season.

Then before the 1996 season, Mobile (Ala.) and Corpus Christi were dropped from the league, bringing it to its current status of six operating teams.

Groomer admitted that the league's franchise instability is a concern for his group.

"We were talking about that earlier with (league president) Byron Pierce," Groomer said. "We have to explore and develop the questions we need to ask about that to be able to move forward with this. From a business standpoint, we need to know what the upside is to this."

For Fort Worth, the upside is bringing professional baseball back to the city.

The Fort Wort Cats, who were a major draw in the old Texas League, developed a huge fan following in the city, and now some of those old fans are trying to get a team back in the city. One of those fans, Jim Shell, was also in Abilene Wednesday night.

"My excitement for this goes to my memories of watching the Cats play when I was a kid," said Shell, who is the vice chairman of the city's Sports Authority. "I remember sitting on metal stands like these (at Scott Field) and getting a rally going by stomping your feet on them.

"I remember going to games in my Cub Scout uniform and watching a ballgame," Shell said. "I still remember sitting there one night when our troop leader stuck his big paw out and caught a hard line drive in his bare hand. You don't forget those things, and I want a new generation of Fort Worth kids to have those memories. I get a great feeling by being here. To me this is what professional baseball is all about.

"Baseball is a game, and this is the essence of the game," he said. "This is affordable family entertainment, and I like that. I think Fort Worth and Abilene share a lot of the same attitudes when it comes to supporting family values and things like that."

But before a team is placed in Fort Worth, that city's leaders have a few questions to answer. Among them:

n Where and how will a stadium be built?

Groomer said a stadium will be built on the site where old LaGrave Field sat. The former home of the Cats is located just north of downtown on Main Street on the banks of the Trinity River.

If a stadium is built there, downtown Fort Worth would be visible over the right field wall.

The stadium would have to be built from the ground up, and Groomer said preliminary indications are that it would cost somewhere between $3 million (for a bare-bones facility) to $10 million (for a top-of-the-line stadium).

The team would share the stadium with Texas Wesleyan University, which is looking for a new place to play. But the Sports Authority would own the stadium, making TWU a tenant, much the same way the Prairie Dogs are a tenant at Abilene Christian University's Scott Field.

The Sports Authority helped in the building of the massive Texas Motor Speedway in far north Fort Worth, and would help in the construction of a stadium for baseball.

"But we really haven't even begun to discuss all the financial issues involved in this," Groomer said. "A lot of people are excited about this, but as far as looking at all the financing, no, we haven't done that."

n What about beer sales?

Groomer said he didn't think having beer at the stadium would be a problem, since the stadium would be owned essentially by the city.

Abilene is the only Texas-Louisiana League team that doesn't sell beer at its stadium, and that's because its lease agreement with ACU forbids the sale or advertisement of alcohol.

But even though Texas Wesleyan is a church-affiliated school, Groomer said something would be worked out where beer would be sold during the T-L League season but wouldn't be for sale at TWU games.

n What about the presence of the Texas Rangers just 30 miles to the east?

Neither Groomer nor Shell thought the existence of a major league franchise so close in proximity would hurt the minor league club.

"I think there's a market for this kind of baseball in the neighborhood we're talking about," Groomer said. "It's a predominantly blue-collar neighborhood, and those are the kind of people who aren't going to go every night to the Ballpark in Arlington.

"But this is an affordable brand of baseball," he said. "It probably costs a family of four about $125 to go see the Rangers, and here they'll probably spend about $35-$40. People that might go see the Rangers once a year can come out several times to see minor league ball."

Shell said that even though the teams would be less than 50 miles from the other they could peacefully co-exist.

"There's room in baseball and in spectator baseball for the Rangers and the Texas-Louisiana League," he said. "This league is a completely different attitude and experience than what you find at the major league or Triple-A level. This wouldn't do anything to detract from the Rangers' attendance."

n And, if Fort Worth does get a team, what will its nickname be?

"Oh, you gotta call them the Cats," Shell said. "There's not even a question about that."