One deal is kaput. Formulating a fresh one is the next step for Richmond Baseball Club LC.
RBC has a Sunday deadline to meet the $15.4 million sale price of the Double-A Connecticut Defenders. That transaction will not take place, RBC spokesman Pete Boisseau confirmed yesterday. RBC is short on funds, sources said. That situation does not discount the possibility of the Richmond group, with significant assistance from an outside group, buying the Defenders or a different Double-A franchise from the Eastern League.
Minor League Baseball has assured Richmond Mayor Dwight C. Jones that there will be an Eastern League team here next season. It would play at The Diamond until a new ballpark is built.
Reid and Reese Ryan, of Texas-based Ryan-Sanders Baseball, visited Richmond yesterday and will remain in town today. The sons of Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan are determining whether the Richmond market is a place in which their group wants to invest as a majority owner, probably with RBC as minority/operating partner.
"If we're not a fit or it doesn't work for us, maybe we can help the process, find the right fit," Reid Ryan said. "Because Richmond's a great baseball town and it deserves to have a quality ownership group, and it really needs to have baseball.
"This is more about just trying to educate our group with what's going on in the market and just trying to get a feel for what's happening with baseball in Richmond."
Ryan-Sanders Baseball owns and operates two minor-league franchises and also has designed and built two highly successful minor-league ballparks in Texas, one reason the firm is looked on favorably by Minor League Baseball in Richmond's situation. "There's no apples to apples in any of these stadiums across the country," Reid Ryan said. "Every [situation] you look at is completely different. It comes down to what is the market, what do the people in that community, the ownership, and all of the [other involved parties] really want to do."
RBC seemed close to buying the Defenders a few times in the past month, but the economy was the primary factor the deal "did not mature," Boisseau said. RBC, a source close to negotiations said, has paid nearly $1 million in earnest money to the Defenders' ownership, providing incentive for RBC to continue pursuit of that franchise.
Local attorney Stan Joynes, the registered agent for RBC, met the Ryan brothers and was scheduled to be the one introducing them to community leaders last night. Bryan Bostic, the face of RBC, has not returned numerous requests for comment the past two weeks.
Joe McEacharn, the Eastern League president, was also in town yesterday to accompany the Ryans. "The Ryans are not the only people from the industry that we will be bringing in here," McEacharn said. "Others from within the industry will be coming as we seek to form that group that will get here."
McEacharn projected a "very tightly managed process throughout this as we seek that perfect partnership for Richmond. We want a long-term success story."
He said that for Eastern League scheduling purposes, Aug. 1 is the deadline to complete a deal for a new Richmond franchise.
Contact John O'Connor at (804) 649-6233 or joconnor@timesdispatch.com.
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