El Paso businessman Paul Foster, foreground, joined businessman Woody Hunt, to his left, outside city council chambers Tuesday after council voted to build a baseball stadium to host a Triple A baseball team that they plan to purchase and bring to El Paso. At left is Hunt's son, Joshua Hunt.
El Paso must now wait on Pacific Coast League officials and team owners to determine whether the Sun City will again be home to affiliated professional baseball.
MountainStar Sports Group -- the local ownership group pursuing a team -- on Friday made a presentation to the Pacific Coast League Executive Committee in Dallas trying to sell El Paso as a home for Triple-A baseball.
No decision was made, and no timetable has been set for an answer, the local investors said.
If the league does not approve El Paso and the ownership group, the city will not obtain a baseball team.
"We spent a very productive three hours with the Pacific Coast League today," Josh Hunt, a member of MountainStar Sports, said in a prepared statement. "We believe we made a positive, compelling case for El Paso as a viable Triple-A baseball market, and we hope for a favorable response."
The Pacific Coast League, one of two Triple-A leagues, said it had no comment. Generally, the league takes a few weeks to review and research sales and relocations.
The league's public relations and operations assistant, Dylan Higgins, described the process of sale and relocation as complex. There must be a team for sale, because new ones cannot be created; a viable ownership group; and an arrangement with the new city, which requires the proper facilities, he said, and the league must sign off on the deal.
El Paso appears to have three of the four crossed off the checklist.
Prominent businesspeople
Woody Hunt, Paul Foster, Joshua Hunt and Alejandra De La Vega Foster make up the MountainStar Sports Group. The City Council on Tuesday committed to build a $50 million Downtown baseball stadium if a team is secured. The Tucson Padres, a Triple-A affiliate of Major League Baseball's San Diego Padres, is for sale. Triple-A is the closest level to Major League Baseball."In some ways, those first few pieces of the puzzle were the most difficult," said city Rep. Cortney Niland, who added that the stadium, though the term sheet has been approved, would not be built unless a team is secured. "Now, this is the last hurdle. Unfortunately, it's out of our hands, and we're all very anxious."
El Paso also took steps to make sure its pitch conformed to the Pacific Coast League's preferences. They included a Downtown stadium -- and the need to raze City Hall -- and a non-compete clause, despite already having the Diablos, whose ownership just put $750,000 in renovations into city-owned Cohen Stadium.
"We feel the city did everything we could to make a strong pitch," Niland said.
The key concerns could be security, given El Paso's proximity to Mexico, and marketability, Niland said.
Besides the local ownership group, consultants Alan Ledford, founder of Perfect Game Ventures LLC, and Dan Barrett, principal of Barrett Sports Group LLC, spoke in support of Triple-A baseball in El Paso.
"We believe we thoroughly addressed all of the league's questions, and presented the many good attributes of our city," Hunt said.
If the Pacific Coast League approves a team for El Paso, officials hope to begin play in 2014, depending on the construction of the ballpark.
MountainStar Sports Group, despite the waiting time, continues to prepare for a baseball team in El Paso. The group has secured several websites, including ElPasopadres.com. The name, which is registered to Franklin Mountain Management, owned by Foster and Scott Weaver, provides another clue that the team that could come to El Paso is the Tucson Padres.
ElPasopadres.com showed a silhouette of a baseball player with a yellow sun and the iconic Star on the Mountain at the top right. Later in the evening Friday, the website was a blank orange. Other websites owned by the group include elpasobaseball.com and elpasotripleA.com.
Evan Mohl may be reached at emohl@elpasotimes.com; 546-6381. Follow him on Twitter @EvanMohl.
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