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Cedar Rapids to Twins Jump to page : 1 Now viewing page 1 [50 messages per page]
Posted 2012-09-19 4:39 PM (#1829807) Subject: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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Location: Along the mother road.
This leaves three Midwest League teams seeking new affiliates: the Quad Cities River Bandits, Burlington Bees and Beloit Snappers will end up with the Houston Astros, Oakland A's or Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim as a parent.
Posted 2012-09-19 4:56 PM (#1829820 - in reply to #1829807) Subject: Re: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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Angels should head to Beloit, simply because the River Bandits matches the A's AAA theme with the Rivercats, and the Angels already have a Bee as a mascot in AAA, ruling out the Burlington Bees.
Posted 2012-09-19 8:41 PM (#1830229 - in reply to #1829807) Subject: Re: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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Well that'd be just inconvenient to go anywhere but Beloit lol. I mean having two Bees in the system, it'd get confusing when random Prospect X tweets "Playin' for the Bees tonight!". And we can't change their name, we'd have to design a new stationary and replace all the ads and come up with new unis and a cool mascot. Too much hassle.
Can't play for Quad Cities because that's just a lot for us prospect lovers to type out "Quad Cities River Bandits" and shortening it to QCRB is just dumb. Plus in the system we have an Owl, a route, a mobile person and a Bee. We gotta stick with a theme, be it people or things that fly. A River Bandit is basically a raccoon and raccoons are neither bipedal or can fly. On top of which where will random prospect X say he's arriving at. "I'm flying out to Quad Cities in the mornin'" well which Quad Cities, I mean there's gotta be thousands of groups of 4 cities in the nation.
I mean that really only leaves the Beloit Snappers. And if the facilities really do suck that bad we can say 1. Mike Scioscia loves to haze the youngsters or 2. The Angels have a bunch of money and can pinch in a little to clean it up.
Posted 2012-09-20 9:23 PM (#1832203 - in reply to #1830410) Subject: Re: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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socaliente - 2012-09-19 9:21 PM
Where that hell are these places?
I vote for Beloit Snappers. I like turtles.
Beloit is about an hour south of Madison, two hours northwest of Chicago.
Quad Cities is actually five cities. The River Bandit play in Davenport, which is about 90 minutes southeast of Cedar Rapids at the Iowa/Illinois border.
Burlington is another 90 minutes south of Davenport, really in the middle of nowhere... 2.5 hours from Bloomington, Ill. Home to the Crookedest Street in the World.
Posted 2012-09-25 8:49 AM (#1836789 - in reply to #1829807) Subject: RE: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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Location: Illinois
I live really close to Beloit, and yes, the facilities and town are a dump, but I would love it because it's so close. Got my first look at Mike Trout there when they played Cedar Rapids. Rockford is very close to Beloit and while you don't want to go downtown, that's where you'd want to stay overnight and go out to eat. What I don't understand is there is a great stadium in Rockford, but they are independent league. Not sure why they cant hook up with a team.
Posted 2012-09-25 4:51 PM (#1837210 - in reply to #1837167) Subject: Re: Cedar Rapids to Twins
Posts: 1
I feel bad for you guys. Burlington is widely considered the worst spot in the Midwest League. Worst attendance in the league, a pretty bad stadium, and located in the middle of nowhere. Oakland was pretty desperate to get out of there after serving their 2 years there.
Beloit's not much better than Burlington, and the stadium itself is probably worse (the players still have to walk through the concourse to get from the dugout to the clubhouse!) but its got a reputation for having a great staff, and its location near Janesville and Rockford, and relatively close to Madison, Milwaukee, and Chicago give it a pretty significant edge over Burlington for most teams. Its a big reason why they were able to keep Minnesota around for 8 years.
I was hoping to see the Angels go to Beloit, since I briefly live in California and really enjoyed the couple of games I went to in Anaheim. I'll be curious to see how long the Angels stay in Burlington, considering the history they have of long minor league relationships, but they've only got a 2 year deal and it looks like there could be a lot of openings again in 2014.
BTW, Rockford had a midwest league team, but it folded/moved to Dayton. In fact, even now despite being in a nearly new stadium and being a city much larger than Beloit, Their Frontier League team only averages a few hundred more fans per game than the Snappers, and they don't even have games in April to drag down their attendance.
Posted 2012-09-25 8:55 PM (#1837587 - in reply to #1837307) Subject: Re: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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Salt Lake is definitely hitter friendly. So that's 4. And Inland Empire isn't hitter friendly. It's the least hitter friendly in the Cal League which makes it pretty neutral overall. The entire Midwest is pretty much pitcher friendly, so going to the relatively hitter friendly Burlington more or less makes that one a neutral park as well.
Personally, I think the Angels need to get out of their AA and AAA stadiums. That AA environment isn't helping Angels pitching prospects grow the way they need and the AAA hitting environment isn't helping the hitting prospects grow.
Posted 2012-12-20 10:46 AM (#1908266 - in reply to #1837587) Subject: Re: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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ScottyAllenLAAI - 2012-09-25 8:55 PM
Salt Lake is definitely hitter friendly. So that's 4. And Inland Empire isn't hitter friendly. It's the least hitter friendly in the Cal League which makes it pretty neutral overall. The entire Midwest is pretty much pitcher friendly, so going to the relatively hitter friendly Burlington more or less makes that one a neutral park as well.
Personally, I think the Angels need to get out of their AA and AAA stadiums. That AA environment isn't helping Angels pitching prospects grow the way they need and the AAA hitting environment isn't helping the hitting prospects grow.
Go here for minor league park effects. http://statcorner.com/index.php BUR is pretty hitter happy. IE massively suppresses power numbers.
Posted 2012-12-28 12:46 AM (#1911611 - in reply to #1910959) Subject: Re: Cedar Rapids to Twins
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My family is from a small town south of Burlington and it's closer than Cedar Rapids was.
As much as I'll miss the Kernels and the cheap Cedar Rapids titty bars, I've already planned a trip to see the Bees play when I visit my family next summer.
Looks like there's a casino in town, too, so I'll have that vice to fill my evenings, even if there are no strip joints in Burlington.
Summer (especially a warm summer night) in small Midwest towns is a magical thing. I can't wait.
Even if there are no titty bars in Burlington. They should open one, though.
Cedar Rapids to Twins
