Though I’m no Braves fan, I’m already on record in calling Atlanta’s Turner Field an unfortunate candidate for demolition, what with the local baseball franchise’s planned move to a new stadium in nearby Cobb County in 2017. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Tim Tucker reports an Atlanta advertising executive, Mike McDonald, is proposing an American League expansion team be created to fill the vacancy at Turner (link swiped from Creative Loafing’s Max Blau) :
Tucker has presented the idea to some local politicos and business folks. He has talked to lawyers about how to challenge MLB. He even wrote a letter to the Tampa Bay Rays, asking if they’d be interested in relocating. The Rays haven’t responded and McDonald has decided he’d prefer the fresh start of an expansion team.
[…]McDonald already has a name in mind for the AL team he seeks: the Atlanta Surge, drawn from the city motto Resurgens (Latin for rising again). He envisions the city and county receiving an equity stake in the team in return for use of the venue, and an investor group operating the team with him. He says MLB should waive an expansion fee as a way to settle the damages of the Braves leaving the city limits.
He expects people to “take shots” at his plan and says that is fine.