Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, March 10, 1995 TAG: 9503100066
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: PALM BEACH, FLA. LENGTH: Medium
While there's no end in sight to the seven-month strike, baseball owners voted unanimously Thursday to add the Arizona Diamondbacks and Tampa Bay Devil Rays for the 1998 season.
``We strongly believe the time is right,'' said expansion committee chairman John Harrington, also the head of the owners' negotiating committee.
Major-league players walked out Aug.12, and the move brings some extra cash to the 28 current teams, who claim to have lost more than $200 million last year.
The new teams will pay $130 million each in franchise fees, but the payment schedule and an exclusion from national broadcasting, All-Star and postseason money for up to five years brings the actual franchise cost to about $155 million.
Initial payments, about $25 million per team, are due July 1. The final portions are payable by November 1997.
``If there was a greater day in the history of Tampa Bay, I don't know what it is,'' said Vince Naimoli, head of the Devil Rays ownership group.
For Tampa Bay fans, the final moment was especially sweet. Seven previous efforts to land major-league teams had failed. Naimoli's eyes appeared to well when acting commissioner Bud Selig made the announcement.
``We didn't wait as long as Tampa-St.Pete, but we're as excited as they are,'' said Diamondbacks owner Jerry Colangelo, also president of the NBA's Phoenix Suns.
Owners in both the American and National leagues said they would like to see the teams added to their circuits.
In the same resolution, they also approved adding two more teams in a second wave of expansion, expected to take place in 2000. Northern Virginia, which had two groups bid for a team in this round, became the early favorite in that race.
A group headed by Bill Collins, one of the two Northern Virginia bidders, said it planned to talk with current teams about relocating.
by CNB