You saw this coming

The Oakland County Cruisers will not have a ballpark to call their own this season. That's no surprise to the people who follow the Frontier League.

The Cruisers announced Saturday – one day before league meetings in Avon, Ohio – that funding for a ballpark in Waterford Township, Mich., has fallen through.

The Cruisers planned to open a new 4,000 seat stadium – called Diamond at The Summit – behind the Summit Place Mall. The team held a groundbreaking ceremony last December and Rob Hilliard, pictured, one of the owners, said earlier this year that construction would start by mid-April. The Cruisers had arranged to play at Eastern Michigan University until a July 16 series against the Wild Things, which was was to be Oakland County's home opener in the new temporary ballpark. The final phase of the ballpark's construction was to be completed after the 2010 season.

According to the Cruisers, they have rescheduled all but one of their home series. They will use the ballparks at Eastern Michigan, Oakland University and something called Ford Field in Livonia, Mich. I haven't seen an updated scheduled to tell you where the Wild Things will be playing the Cruisers July 16-18 and July 31-Aug. 2.

The ballpark's original $9 million funding plan consisted of a combined Small Business Administration/U.S. Department of Agriculture hybrid financing system. When that fell through, the Cruisers hooked up with a Southern California private lending group, working on a construction loan and takeout financing package.

Hilliard told the Oakland Press that the ballpark could be ready for the 2011 season.

“Clearly, we hope and believe this is the case given the timing,” Hilliard said, “but we’ve been at this for three years, so I don’t think we could honestly say anything at this point other than the people we’re dealing with now are very committed to getting this done and they understand what our time frame is.”

Money from sales of 2010 tickets and corporate sponsorships has been kept in an escrow account. All interest earned on those funds will be applied to the full cost of tickets and sponsorships for the 2011 season.

For the Frontier League, this is bad P.R. The league had to know that you can't build a ballpark in three months, so it should have stepped in months ago and made the Cruisers schedule their home games at another location or make them (again) a traveling team. The warning signs were apparent last winter, when the Cruisers started selling home games to opponents. They did talk to the Wild Things about purchasing home dates but, according to one source, the Cruisers found the Wild Things' owners too troublesome to deal with, so the idea was dropped.

The Cruisers' ownership has been shabby at best, shady at worst. It has likely killed the Detroit market for the Frontier League.

According to the Oakland Press, the Cruisers are likely to be sold. Remember, the Frontier league has a new team in Woodstock, Ill., coming into the league in 2011.

Read the story here.

Young cruises into the FL

Dmitri Young, pictured, who spent more than a decade in the major leagues as an outfielder and first baseman, has joined the Oakland County Cruisers as vice-president and senior adviser-baseball operations for Diamond Heroes of Southeast Michigan, Inc., the ownership group of the Cruisers.

Below is a link to the story about the hiring from the Oakland Press.

Read the story here.

What I found interesting about the story is the Cruisers' ballpark is still not under construction. Apparently, owner Rob Hilliard has been attempting to get a group of investors from Long Beach, Calif., to provide additional funding. Hilliard said he wants construction to begin no later than April. The Cruisers will play some of their home games at Eastern Michigan University (again). The site for a July 6-8 series against Normal is listed on the Cruisers' homepage as "TBD" and the July 16-18 series against the Wild Things is still listed as the first game in Waterford Township at the new ballpark.

Three months to build a ballpark? Here's saying it won't be close to being ready by July 16.

What I found extremely entertaining about the article are the reader comments. If you thought this blog had wild comments, then this story is must-read material.

Cruisin' into the FL

The Midwest Sliders are playing their final week with Ypsilanti, Mich., as their home. WJPA Radio's Randy Gore conducted a two-part interview with Sliders president Rob Hilliard that was aired Saturday prior to the Wild Things' doubleheader games against Midwest, and Hilliard said the team will be moving to Waterford Township, Mich., for the 2010 season.

The plan all along was for a new ballpark to be built for in Waterford Township for the Oakland County Cruisers of the Frontier League. Some problems with financing caused team to play as the Midwest Sliders and as a traveling team in 2008. This year, the Sliders were based out of Ypsilanti.

"Sept. 6 is the last day of the regular season. Sept. 7 we'll be the Oakland County Cruisers," Hilliard said proudly.

The Cruisers will hold the groundbreaking for their new ballpark Oct. 29. It won't be completed until after the 2010 season, but there will be enough done for the Cruisers play there next May.

"We'll put in the seating bowl and playing field in the early spring and finish out the ballpark at the end of next season," Hilliard said.

The ballpark should be a good one for hitters. The outfield walls will be only 310 feet down the lines and the alleys will be 360. It will be 400 to straightaway center field.

"We'll have 2,800 stadium seats, 14 rows, and some benches with backs," Hilliard said. "We'll have bleacher sections down the left- and right-field lines, seven skyboxes and a media center behind home plate. The permanent clubhouses will be behind home plate and the players will enter right through the stands. You wouldn't want to do that in New York, but here in the Midwest we can do it."

The two seasons as the Sliders have been difficult for Hilliard and field manager Eric Coleman. Obviously, they are excited about the team finally becoming the Oakland County Cruisers and moving into a new ballpark.

"I think we'll be able to recruit better," Hilliard said. "We've been in a difficult situation being in the center of the economic situation morass here in Ypsilanti and being a lame-duck franchise. We've had some double-figure evenings in terms of fans. Our players like to play in front of a lot of fans, whether they're friendly or hostile. We've played some of our better games on the road."

Hilliard said the Cruisers' ability to start building their ballpark was hindered by the economic situation in Waterford Township (about 10 miles from Auburn Hills, Mich., where the Detroit Pistons play their home games). The team is currently conducting a public stock offering.

"Two of our principal owners, in terms of shares, are in retail, and the Summit Place Mall is clearly hurting," Hilliard said. "Another owner lost the equivalent of $3.5 million with two chain stores going out of business."