PawSox: New ballpark on back burner, focus on McCoy

PAWTUCKET – Amid concerns of sliding attendance caused partly by last year’s failed attempt to build a new baseball stadium in Providence, Pawsox owners are trying to make amends with fans and the team’s hometown of Pawtucket.
On Monday, Larry Lucchino, chairman of the Pawsox, known formally as the Pawtucket Red Sox, penned a joint letter with Pawtucket Mayor Donald R. Grebien to all “members of the Pawsox community,” asking for them to help refocus the organization’s priorities.
“New ballpark planning has been put on the back burner, and our primary focus this year is on our fans and the McCoy Stadium experience,” according to the letter.
A year ago this month, Lucchino’s ownership group finalized the purchase of the Pawsox from the Mondor family, which had owned the Triple-A affiliate of the Boston Red Sox for about 40 years. The new ownership group promptly announced plans to build a new baseball stadium in Providence, where the club would play its home games. The proposed plan, however, which asked for both state and city subsidies, ultimately failed after it was met with great public opposition.
The ownership group since has largely kept quiet about future plans, although Monday’s letter would suggest an attempt – at least in the short-term – to repair its fractured relationship with both the city of Pawtucket and its fans, the latter of which could go a long way toward helping the team curb its sliding attendance numbers.
“Relations between the team and the city’s officials have rebounded and are now open, candid and collaborative,” according to the letter. “We fully recognize that there remain serious challenges to the Pawsox given the competitive advantages newer facilities afford many clubs in the [league], and the troublesome decline in attendance at McCoy stadium over several years.”
Attendance has declined since the 2008 season, but the team believes at least some of last year’s decline was because of “the slight many fans felt by the unsuccessful roll out of the plan to move to Providence,” according to the letter.
Lucchino and Grebien seem intent on reversing this trend and while it remains unclear what could happen to the state’s iconic team in the long-term, the ownership group and the city are trying to focus on the upcoming season, which begins April 7.
“We hope the members of the Pawsox community … will join with us in making this a fresh start in the next great era of Rhode Island, Pawsox and Red Sox baseball,” according to the letter. “Our traditions and baseball roots run deeply in this part of the country, and probably nowhere more deeply than right here in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. Let’s revive them, strengthen them and enjoy them anew.”

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  1. Mayor Grebien and the PawSox owners should be lobbying to improve and electrify the Providence & Worcester (P&W) rail right of way between Worcester and the East Side Railroad tunnel in Providence. This P&W right of ways runs parallel to the new Blackstone River Valley National Park’s historic sites and passes within 1200 feet of McCoy Stadium’s parking lot. A shuttle train commuter rail line could be built to serve the new National Park’s historic sites and McCoy Stadium. Hundreds of tourists would be available during the summer months to make sure that the PawSox would always play to sold out crowds.