Ripken A Potential Buyer For Minor League Team’s Ballpark

Ripken Looking Into Acquisition Of Minor League Ballpark

Ripken Stadium, the home of the Single-A New York-Penn League Aberdeen IronBirds, is “such a financial drain” to the city that Mayor S. Fred Simmons “wants to sell it,” according to Justin Fenton of the Baltimore SUN. Simmons said that he has had “conversations with several potential buyers but that the most promising involve” IronBirds Owner Cal Ripken Jr., whose youth baseball program has its headquarters nearby. The IronBirds pay $1 annually to use the ballpark, and the club “keeps virtually all of the money generated from games.” An adjacent development project “that was counted on to help pay for the stadium ... has been delayed,” and the city annually loses “several hundred thousand dollars -– a significant problem for a city with an annual budget of only $16[M].” Chris Flannery, who is representing Ripken in the process, said, “The operating expenses of the stadium would never have been completely offset by the income of the stadium. Just as you find in many other minor league parks (and) arenas, the stadiums themselves are not a break-even proposition, but become a catalyst for growth and improve the overall tax base” (Baltimore SUN, 3/25).