MLB owners have approved the sale of the Astros from Drayton McLane to Jim Crane, commissioner Bud Selig announced today, according to Danny Knobler of CBSSports.com (all Twitter links). The commissioner also confirmed that the Astros will move to the American League West in 2013.
Alyson Footer, the Astros' Senior Director of Social Media, reports that the move to the AL was mandatory for the sale to be approved (Twitter links). Crane told Jeff Wilson of The Fort Worth Star-Telegram that he Rangers are the model he'd like to follow as the team rebuilds. The Astros finished the worst record in baseball this season at 56-106, and they haven't finished higher than third place in the NL Central since 2006.
Mike Axisa contributed to this post.
About Time!
Now, Fire Ed Wade!
That’s that. Now we can get down to business.
Well, technically speaking, the Astros’ move to the AL is contingent upon the players association’s approval of the collective bargaining agreement with that language included. I suspect that they will approve it, but you never know for sure until their final vote is taken. Selig and the owners can’t unilaterally move a team, to my knowledge.
Mark Cuban can’t get approved, but all it takes for a racist war profiteer to gain acceptance is moving to the AL and receiving $70M dollars off the purchase price.
That doesn’t seem right…
I still find myself wondering from time to time why the Brewers were ever allowed to move as a single team from the AL to the NL without a reciprocating move at the time. The only people helped by the move were the Brewers ownership. (They got to move into the Griffey Jr., Sosa, Big Mac division and out of a mediocre one.)
THe move by a team to the AL was much needed, but it’s too bad that there will be no NL baseball in Texas anymore
The original move in 1998 in order to keep an even number of teams in each league was first offered to the Kansas City Royals. They turned it down. That’s when the Brewers were offered the opportunity.
Actually, the move was originally the idea of the Brewers, but to be fair, they had to let other teams have the opportunity to move if they wanted. No team agreed, thereby letting the Brewers do what they wanted.
And now if we can sell off Ed Wade…..
You’d have to pay someone to haul him away. Maybe the Phillies want him back since he helped stack their roster?
Man, I hope this starts up a nice little rivalry in TX, but I imagine watching the Rangers pound the ‘stros for at least the next few years probably isn’t going to do much to help build the Astro’s fanbase. The Rangers already have a pretty size-able foothold in TX, don’t they? I don’t live there, so that’s an honest question.
People in TX will cheer for whoever is winning out of the two.
I will never cheer for the Stros’ now that they are in our league. Good thing is that it will be a lot of fun for the Angels and Rangers to beat up on another lowly AL West team.
That’s what I don’t get. Rivalry? The Rangers and Astros have played their Silver Boot series every year…Uncle Drayton always tried to outdo Hicks and vice-versa…beyond that…what rivalry? It won’t exactly be UT-Texas A&M…ever.
I think the hope of the two Texas teams playing each other in a World Series was the only real hope for a lasting rivalry. As for popularity, the Astros were the more successful franchise and had their AAA and AA teams in Texas, unlike the Rangers for a while there…so the Astros were likely the more popular team. Right now for these last 2 years, it is the Rangers…but we’ll see if that lasts. I guess it depends on if Crane hires a total dummy to be his next GM…or keeps Ed Wade (same difference).
yea, just thought it’d be nice if one ever developed. i’d actually argue that having to play a team 16 times a year would probably help. i can’t imagine the braves would care about playing the mets or the phillies if both of those teams were in, say the central division for some reason. figured i’d see what tx people thought on all that.
Ok I’m a bit confused so maybe someone can help me. With the Astros moving to the AL West, there is going to have to be a interleague game everyday (or almost everyday)correct? And if so I have not heard anything about adding games. So where are these games going to come from? Are they going to take away from divisional games to account for the increase in interleague games?
I don’t know for sure, but I would expect to see less divisional series, yes. I wonder if some of this is a move to calm Texas baseball fans who are p*ssed about not having all those NL teams coming to Houston to play anymore?
72 divisonal games
60 league games
30 interleague games
Thank you, get them out of the NL so this awful team doesn’t sweep the Phillies in September like they seem to do every year.
they will sweep phillies during inter-league now, which will happen whenever during the regular seasons so watch out.
Crane isn’t exactly going to be welcomed in with open arms in Houston with all his controversy and with the Astros looking like a little league caliber team. If Crane wants some PR in his favor, he needs to ax Wade and Tal Smith immediately and commit to a great GM who can rebuild this franchise in 3-5 years…and stick to the plan.
If I were Crane, I would have walked away when Selig forced the AL move on me.
Why? He put 80M in his pocket – Who paid that?
I’m not sure that I put much stock in those reports. That seems like a bit of a ruse to deflect the upset fans’ anger away from the team and new owner and towards the league and Selig. Even without the bounty, I can see this move being profitable to the team’s bottom line over the long haul.
Why in 2013? If they can add 2 playoff teams in 2012 and change free agent compensation in the middle of the 2011 offseason, then why can’t they move the Astros to the AL in 2012? Why wait?
Perhaps because next year’s schedule is already done, and it may be too time-consuming to re-do it.
I disagree. I think that it’s harder to go from the AL to the NL, than the reverse. Here’s why. The DH. If an AL team has a DH signed to a long term deal at the time they have to switch, what are they supposed to do with that guy? The DH is locked into a guaranteed contract.
OTOH, a team going from NL to AL can either sign a DH, or not bother with a regular DH and rotate players thru the position.