The City of Worcester may in fact be trying to land a minor league professional baseball team – but Ben Mondor and Mike Tamburro have no involvement, according to a Pawtucket Red Sox spokesperson. In recent weeks the Pawtucket Red Sox offices have fielded calls from the Worcester Telegram and the Worcester Business Journal.
But Bill Wanless, a spokesman for the AAA-affiliate of the Boston Red Sox, said that Mondor, the long-time owner of the Pawtucket Red Sox, and his partner, Tamburro, the team’s president, do not have any interest in starting another ball club in Worcester. In terms of Major League Baseball, said Wanless, the Pawtucket Red Sox have the rights to a geographic area that includes Worcester. A professional club located there, he said, would be an independent operation, not one affiliated with a Major League team.
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”There was an article in the Worcester Telegram a couple of weeks ago and they mentioned Ben and Mike, but they weren’t quoted,” said Wanless. “I wouldn’t put any credence in that idea. There is nothing going on.”
Wanless suggested that talk of a team in Worcester – and in other Bay State cities such as Pittsfield and Springfield – has come on strong as a result of plans to build a new Fenway Park. With so much public financing going into that project, there has been a swell of interest on the part of other cities to get their own share of professional baseball, he said.
That Worcester is making news for professional baseball comes as no surprise. Prior to the recently completed $16 million reconstruction of McCoy Stadium in Pawtucket, Worcester and Fall River were among the cities reported to have been attempting to lure the Pawtucket Red Sox from Rhode Island.
The reconstruction of McCoy Stadium was completed last spring. The result has earned rave reviews. It is now a first class ballpark with a seating capacity of 10,000. Last season, 596,624 fans visited McCoy – the third largest attendance of all minor league baseball teams in America.
With an outfield berm, giant scoreboard, shining concessions and restrooms aplenty, the present McCoy Stadium bears no resemblance to the one that was built in 1942.
