As that window continues to close, we're going to have to look at what we feel are very good alternatives in the surrounding counties. A move would end a long and storied baseball history in Nashville. Sulphur Dell, which hosted teams from 1886 to 1963, was famous for its 45-degree uphill slope in right field. When the 10,700-seat Greer Stadium opened in 1978 just south of downtown, it was considered among minor league baseball's best, historian Bill Weiss said. And while the Sounds were the first professional sports team to call Nashville home, they have been eclipsed with the arrival of the NFL's Tennessee Titans and the NHL's Nashville Predators - each with new stadiums, said David Hersh, president of the West Tenn Diamond Jaxx.
New parks are the trend in minor league baseball.
In Jackson and Sevierville, the parks were paid for with public-private partnerships, with corporations paying for naming rights and local governments providing land or money to build the stadiums. Chattanooga and Memphis used no public money to finance their stadiums. Meanwhile, attendance dropped to 271,857 in 2000 as Nashville lost a franchise-record 77 games. The franchise hasn't paid its 2000 rent for Greer, which was tied to the team's gross revenues in a 10-year lease signed in 1998. Whether it's lack of money or leverage for a new stadium, the team is delaying payment while city leaders decide whether to make an investment.