New owners of the Nashville Sounds have finalized their purchase of the minor league team, just as the major league affiliate tells the club it needs a new home.
Major League Baseball signed off on the team’s sale this week and the roughly $20 million transaction closed Wednesday.
Steve Posner – one of the three businessmen in the ownership group – says he’s sunk north of $2 million into renovating 30-year-old Greer Stadium, which has pleased the parent club.
“But we heard one other thing from the Milwaukee Brewers – that Greer Stadium is not a long-term solution. It is not the type of facility they want to see their future major league players go through.”
The new owners signed a five year lease with the city for Greer, but the Sounds’ player development contract expires at the end of the 2010 season. Posner says the Brewers haven’t set a timeline for building a new stadium, just stated that Greer is inadequate.
WEB EXTRA
The new ownership group also named George King as general manager. He’s spent 12 years working for the Pacific Coast League, most recently as Vice President of Business and Operations.
The Sounds are part of the PCL. As part of King’s duties in recent years, he acted as a league envoy during tense negotiations between the team and Metro over building a new stadium.
King says he’s moving his family to Nashville in the coming weeks, something Glenn Yaeger never did as GM under the former owner.
On Air - 90.3 WPLN-FM