Facing a potential forced relocation by Major League Baseball, the San Antonio Missions minor league baseball team has appealed to Bexar County to formally get the ball rolling on a downtown stadium.
On Tuesday, county leaders voted unanimously to allow Bexar County Judge Peter Sakai to draft a letter of intent that the team’s investors can give the MLB to buy them some time.
“It is our understanding through the local ownership that without this letter, after August 1, the San Antonio Missions could be subject to removal process by Major League Baseball,” Sakai told reporters Tuesday.
“All we’re trying to assure Major League Baseball is that we are doing our very best to work, in good faith, to find a contract or a financial arrangement with the local baseball ownership,” he added. “That is it.”
Sakai told reporters he was “optimistic” about the possibility of using a public-private partnership to finance the proposed stadium, but declined to specify how much the county would be willing to contribute. He said he would want to see “significant equity provided by the private sector and by the local baseball ownership.”
Publicly funded sports stadiums have often come under fire as a bad investment for taxpayers, and Tuesday’s discussion was kept under wraps as long as possible. Sakai said he was approached months ago by the Missions’ investors, but his office waited to add the agenda item until late last week, surprising some commissioners.
The agenda item made no mention of the baseball stadium, and was discussed behind closed doors in executive session before Sakai confirmed the details after the meeting.
Hope Andrade and Bruce H.C. Hill, two of the team’s local investors, attended the meeting, but did not address the commissioners and declined to comment to the media.
Sakai said after the meeting that since the conversation is in its infancy, he didn’t want to give the public the impression there was a deal in the works.
“Obviously, these are the type of negotiations that affect private property rights, or… perhaps, the financial liabilities of both the city and the county,” he said.
Hill has warned in the past that a number of other cities have lost their minor league baseball teams in the last two years because the facilities did not meet MLB standards. Sakai said he hasn’t seen any documentation that the team is at risk, but is taking its investors at their word.
He said potential funding sources could include a visitor’s tax, or a tax reinvestment zone that would partner with the City of San Antonio, though the city is not a part of the letter of intent. Mayor Ron Nirenberg has said in the past that he doesn’t support public funding for a new baseball stadium.
Changes for the Missions
A group of investors known as Designated Bidders acquired the Texas League team in Nov. 2022, buying the Missions from longtime franchise owner Dave Elmore and the Elmore Group. Ryan Sanders Baseball — owned by the families of Major League Baseball Hall of Famer Nolan Ryan, CEO Reid Ryan, and Don Sanders — joined Designated Bidders as owners and operators of the Missions.
Sports legends Roger Clemens and Craig Biggio are part of the Ryan Sanders ownership and others in the group include San Antonio civic leaders such as Henry Cisneros, Berto Guerra, Max Navarro and restaurant owners La Familia Cortez.
The Missions have played at the Nelson W. Wolff Municipal Stadium on San Antonio’s Southwest Side since 1994. When the team changed hands in 2022, the City Council gave its approval to reassign the lease agreement held by Elmore. The lease runs through 2031.
Months before the new ownership took control, rumors had circulated that a local group was working to assemble parcels of land downtown for a new stadium that would better meet MLB standards that also cover Triple-A baseball.
Missions owners declined to confirm the summer deadline Sakai said they faced in providing evidence to the MLB that change is in the works.
“The Missions are encouraged that the county has taken this step to show its intent to help negotiate a plan to keep the Missions in our community,” said Bob Cohen, a Designated Bidders board member. “We will of course be ready to present the plan publicly when and if it is agreed upon.”
The urban core also was targeted to position the ballpark in proximity to tourism and growing development, and since then, downtown developer Weston Urban has bought up several parcels of land near San Pedro Creek.
“You’ll see that the title of the agenda pretty much indicates the location where the local ownership would like to go, and that’s the San Pedro Creek Park District,” Sakai told reporters.
As part of that discussion, commissioners voted Tuesday in favor of amending the Bexar County Community Arena Freeman Coliseum Agreement. Sakai said the coliseum’s advisory board would need to grant permission for the creation of a new stadium.
