Richmond Braves
The Richmond Braves were an American minor league baseball club based in Richmond, Virginia, the Triple-A International League affiliate of the Atlanta Braves from 1966 to 2008. Owned by the parent Atlanta club and colloquially referred to as the R-Braves, they played their home games at a stadium called The Diamond on Richmond's Northside built for them in 1985, and before then Parker Field on the same site. The franchise moved to Gwinnett County, Georgia in 2009 to play in the newly built Coolray Field as the Gwinnett Braves. The R-Braves came to Richmond  in 1966; the Milwaukee Braves' move to Atlanta that year displaced their Triple-A club, the Atlanta Crackers, and Richmond's Parker Field had been left open by the previous year's move of the Richmond Virginians, a New York Yankees affiliate that moved in 1965. At the time of the R-Braves' departure to Gwinnett, only the Baltimore Orioles and their Appalachian League affiliate, the Bluefield Orioles, had held a longer affiliation agreement in a single city than Atlanta/Richmond's 43 seasons. The Braves played their final game on September 1, 2008, against their long-time intrastate rivals , the Norfolk Tides. Richmond won, 9–3, in front of a sellout crowd of 12,167. After the game players and alumni threw balls and other keepsakes to fans in the stands, and fans were able to walk onto the field. In 2010, the Double-A Eastern League's Connecticut Defenders, a San Francisco Giants affiliate (but independently owned), moved to Richmond to play as the Richmond Flying Squirrels. Titles. The R-Braves won the Governors' Cup, the championship of the International League, five times, and played in ten championship series.