Financial risk and speculation strikes out would be a good way to describe the recent decision by the Brownsville City Commission to change its mind about financing a proposed minor league baseball stadium.

It was a wise call - and the commission should have never approved the deal in the first place. The notion is a noble one. Bringing minor league baseball to Brownsville is a good idea, in theory, but the reality of the city taking a substantial risk on such a venture would have been remarkably irresponsible, especially given the economic times we are currently enduring.

A team in Brownsville would have been part of the United League Baseball, an independent group with no affiliations to major league baseball. The ULB has regenerated itself many times over, starting in the mid-1990s as a league with teams in Texas and Louisiana. Harlingen has always been part of some version of the league, which has seen teams and cities come and go.

Edinburg joined one version of the league in the early part of this decade, with the city spending major dollars to construct a multi-million dollar baseball stadium near the University of Texas-Pan American campus. Harlingen has also spent over $1 million to renovate its old stadium to make it more appealing for minor league baseball.

The league in its current form appears to be on shaky footing. Litigation and dissension define the league as much as the game it tries to feature. Partners and owners are wrangling for control and rights of the ULB. For the city to finance upwards of $7 million to build a stadium on Alton Gloor Boulevard to host a team in such an uncertain league would have been unfortunate. That a majority of Brownsville’s City Commission approved doing such a thing in the first place calls into question the judgment of those officials who would go along with such a deal.

Attendance and interest in the Harlingen and Edinburg teams has waned over the years. The two teams generate scant interest in their communities. This is the risk of independent leagues such as the ULB. Without the necessary connection to major league baseball and the credibility and steady flow of good, young players that such operations bring, independent leagues are like gypsies of the diamond, never knowing if they will be around the following year.

Corpus Christi decided a few years back to kick in major financing for a double A minor league baseball stadium. Key element: The team would be tied to the Houston Astros. The stadium was built by the Corpus Christi ship channel in the shadow of the big bridge linking the city with Gregory-Portland. The Corpus Christi team with its link to the Astros and major league baseball has prospered.

Independent leagues are much more hit-and-miss. Some have prospered and endured, mostly in the western and northern parts of the country. There’s no real harm in trying, as long as public financing of such risky ventures is not attempted. Some developers and business interests say they will proceed with the Brownsville team and stadium even without public support. More power to them as they seek private financing in their attempts to push this project forward.

The Brownsville Charros, as the team would be called, may happen someday, but it ought to be on the dime of the private sector, not a local goverment that is being asked to service many more pressing needs than supplying the city with an independent minor league baseball team.

- R.D. Cavazos

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