The bid to bring professional baseball back to Ottawa is facing long odds after the projected majority owner and one of the big-name minority ownership partners have apparently backed out, the Citizen has learned.
A Texas-based businessman, who was considered the front-runner to finance much of the purchase price of the Double-A Eastern League?s Binghamton Mets and provide a majority of the operating capital for the new Ottawa franchise, is believed to have pulled the plug within the last two weeks for undisclosed reasons.
The Binghamton team, which has struggled near the bottom of the Eastern League in attendance, had already been earmarked as available for purchase, and the franchise was to relocate to Ottawa and become the Double-A affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays. It was slated to begin play in 2014 at the refurbished Ottawa Stadium.
The identity of the Texas businessman has been shielded by the Boston-based Beacon Sports Capital Partners, who were entrusted with both brokering the purchase of the Binghamton franchise and putting together an ownership group for Ottawa, with a minority component of local investors.
When the would-be majority owner pulled the plug, so too did the would-be minority ownership group headed by baseball Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan and his Ryan-Sanders Entertainment Group.
The potential majority owner and the Ryan-Sanders group had previous business dealings in Austin, Texas.
The Ryan-Sanders group already owns two minor league franchises in Texas and would have been responsible for the transformation of Ottawa Stadium, which would have included a reduction in seating capacity from 10,000 to around 7,500, with new restaurants and terraces overlooking the field.
Just where that leaves the 20-25 local business people who were prepared to put up a collective $1 million as minority investors is anyone?s guess. The Beacon people had also been looking for a substantial minority investor to cough up a $5 million stake towards the purchase price, believed to be in excess of $15 million.
The Beacon people had hoped to pitch the potential sale of the Binghamton franchise to the Eastern League governors at baseball?s annual winter meetings that just concluded in Nashville. The moving pieces didn?t fall into place in time, however, and the Ottawa bid was granted an extension towards Apr. 1, 2013, to secure the necessary financing and final approval from the City of Ottawa on extensive renovation plans for Ottawa Stadium.
?All we did was bring together some Ottawa business people who all said we wanted to see (pro baseball) work in Ottawa,? said Mark Sutcliffe, a Citizen columnist and Ottawa business owner.
Shares in the small local stake would have begun with an investment of $25,000, with the ability to purchase multiple shares.
?We would only have been a small stakeholder in this,? Sutcliffe said. ?All the pieces seemed to be there. That included what we saw as a great deal with the city on a lease.?
Sutcliffe said he was uncertain of where the fate of majority ownership in the franchise rested at present.
To date, only Patrick McGarry, a partner in the chain of locally-owner funeral homes Hulse, Playfair and McGarry, has stepped forward publicly to declare his intention to invest.
David Gourlay, who headed the Champions for Ottawa Baseball campaign that gauged interest through season ticket pledges, said he was unaware where the potential makeup of an Ottawa ownership group stood.
The Citizen was unable to reach Beacon COO Richard Billings Thursday.
dcampbell@ottawacitizen.com
Source: http://feeds.canada.com/~r/canwest/F291/~3/t6igEtSDR5E/story.html
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