PROVIDENCE – The Worcester Red Sox have been sold.
Diamond Baseball Holdings, a New York City-based corporation that owns more than 20 minor league baseball teams, have purchased the Boston Red Sox AAA affiliate, the team announced Tuesday.
Local leaders Ralph Crowley Jr., CEO and president of Worcester manufacturer Polar Beverages, Jim Skeffington Jr., CEO and president of Red Beam Partners, and Larry Lucchino, chairman and current principal owner of the WooSox, will remain minority owners of the team, according to the release. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The transactions is expected to be finalized before the end of the year. The team will remain the AAA affiliate of the Boston Red Sox.
“At 78, and after 44 years in baseball, I believe it’s time to have a succession plan, one that assures a commitment to baseball and a commitment to Worcester,” Lucchino said in a statement. “There is no organization more committed to Minor League Baseball than Diamond Baseball Holdings, and we welcome Pat Battle, Peter Freund and this organization to our city. There is no local business leader more invested in Worcester and in Polar Park than Ralph Crowley, and we are pleased that he is part of the ownership group. Jim Skeffington’s late father and I set out to keep the Boston Red Sox’ Triple-A club in New England, and in good hands, and I trust that Pat and Peter will be excellent stewards.”
Lucchino, who led the group who bought the Pawtucket Red Sox in 2015 and moved them up Route 146 to Polar Park in 2021, said on the UnAnchored Boston podcast Nov. 10 that he was ready for retirement.
“It’s time to sell the team and move on and move on to a blissful retirement,” Lucchino told hosts Bob Lobel and Mike Lynch, two former Boston sports media personalities. “It’s been a good run in Worcester. We have [had] winning records and made some money. Been a very successful run.”
Lucchino was CEO and president and of the Boston Red Sox when he purchased the Pawtucket Red Sox. The PawSox signed a letter of intent to move the team to Worcester in August 2018. The PawSox played at McCoy Stadium the next two years until Polar Park in Worcester was completed for the 2021 season.
The relocation to Massachusetts followed a drawn-out process in Rhode Island that saw multiple expressions of a deal that ultimately became more expensive after an R.I. House bill removed liability from the state and placed it on the city of Pawtucket, increasing the cost of bonds that would be issued to the team.
“We did everything we could to keep the PawSox here. It just did not happen, and now we need to move on,” Pawtucket Mayor Donald R. Grebien told Providence Business News in 2021. “We knew that McCoy was too costly to renovate and reutilize as a baseball stadium.”
Pawtucket city officials now plan to demolish the 81-year-old stadium for a new, combined 482,500-square-foot high school to replace the aging Charles E. Shea and William E. Tolman high schools. Voters approved a $330 million bond for construction in November 2022.
An auction is planned to sell off the historic stadium’s seats, signage, player murals and scoreboards, though a date has not been set.
