Weekly Sports League and Franchise Report

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PCL Pacific Coast League

Weekly Sports League and Franchise Report

by Dan Krieger
October 28, 2024 - Pacific Coast League (PCL)


BASEBALL

American Association: The independent American Association announced its 2025 season schedule will feature the same 12 teams as last season and again aligned in 6-team East and West divisions. Each team will play a 100-game schedule from May 8 through September 1, 2025.

Arizona State League: The proposed new independent ASL, which was originally announced as the Arizona-Mexico League and plans to start play in 2025 with six teams, now lists four of its first-season teams: the Cananea Miners (Sonora, Mexico), Tucson (AZ) Cowboys, Tucson (AZ) Indios and Sierra Vista (AZ) Gray Hawks. A proposed team called the San Luis Amigos, based in San Luis Rio Colorado (Sonora, Mexico), was recently moved to become the Tucson Indios due to concerns over travel costs. The ASL plans to add two more teams by the end of the year.

Pacific Coast League: After playing the 2024 season as the Oklahoma City Baseball Club, the Triple-A PCL team has selected the Oklahoma City Comets as its new permanent name in honor of baseball legend and Oklahoma native Mickey Mantle, who was known as "The Commerce Comet." The PCL team, which remains an affiliate of the Los Angeles Dodgers, was previously known as the Oklahoma City Dodgers (2015-23) but came under new ownership after the 2021 season and eventually decided on a name change. With Major League Baseball's Oakland Athletics planned relocation to a new stadium in Las Vegas for the 2028 season, the team confirmed it will play home games over the next three seasons (2025-27) at the home of the PCL's Sacramento River Cats.

Carolina League: The Hickory (NC) Crawdads of the Low-A Carolina League will play select games in the 2025 season as the Hickory Goat-Karts in a tribute to the area's wagon making and auto racing history.

BASKETBALL

American Basketball Association: The men's semi-pro ABA started its 2024-25 season last week and currently lists 124 teams in four regions (East, Central, South and West) that are further aligned in Red, White, Blue and Black divisions.

National Basketball Association: The NBA started its 2024-25 regular season this week with the same 30 teams and alignment as last season. The Eastern Conference features five-team Atlantic, Central, and Southeast divisions while the Western Conference features five-team Northwest, Southwest, and Pacific divisions. Each team will play an 82-game schedule through April 13, 2025. Included in each team's 82-game schedule will be the league's in-season competition called the Emirates NBA Cup 2024 (formerly the NBA In-Season Tournament). The 30 teams will be aligned in six five-team groups for group-play (November 12 to December 3) followed by quarterfinals, semifinals, and a championship in December.

Unrivaled Basketball: The new Unrivaled 3-on-3 women's professional basketball league announced the names for the six teams that will begin the inaugural eight-week season in January 2025. The team names are the Laces Basketball Club (Laces BC), Lunar Owls Basketball Club (Lunar Owls BC), Mist Basketball Club (Mist BC), Phantom Basketball Club (Phantom BC), Rose Basketball Club (Rose BC) and Vinyl Basketball Club (Vinyl BC). All games will be played at a single venue in Miami with a traveling tour-style model to be used in 2026. The league currently owns all teams but will consider selling franchises in the next few years and potentially attach teams to specific cities. Unrivaled was created to give elite women's basketball players an opportunity to keep playing in North America during the Women's National Basketball Association's off-season.

The Basketball League: The men's minor professional TBL announced an expansion team called the Rochester (NY) Kingz has been added for the 2025 season and it will be part of the league's East Conference.

Women's National Basketball Association: The ownership of the National Basketball Association's Milwaukee Bucks is reported to have submitted a proposal to bring a WNBA expansion team to Milwaukee. The WNBA wants to add one more team in its current round of expansion to reach 16 teams by the 2028 season. Other markets like Philadelphia, Austin, Kansas City, Miami, Central Florida, Nashville, Charlotte, Denver and possibly Cleveland are said to be under consideration.

FOOTBALL

Arena Football One: The new AF1, which was formed by eight teams from the 2024 Arena Football League and has since added three expansion teams, announced its 12th team for the inaugural 2025 season will be the Oregon Lightning to be based in Redmond, just north of the Central Oregon city of Bend. The Oregon Lightning is a rebrand of a team called the Oregon High Desert Storm that played three seasons (2021-23) as part of the indoor American West Football Conference that shut down after the 2023 season. The Lightning will play home games at the Deschutes County Fairgrounds & Expo Center, which was also home to the Oregon High Desert Storm.

International Football Alliance: The proposed new outdoor minor professional IFA, which plans to start play in May 2025 with teams based in Mexico and the United States, officially announced the six teams for the inaugural season will include the Dallas Pioneros, Tampa Bay Tornadoes, Alabama Beavers (Huntsville), Baltimore Lightning, Chihuahua Rebelión (Mexico) and San Antonio Caballeros. Previously announced Mexican teams called the Cancun Sharks and Tequileros de Jalisco (Guadalajara), along with the announced Las Vegas Kings, have disappeared from the IFA.

Midwest Arena Football League: The new 8-on-8 developmental MAFL started its inaugural season last weekend with five teams called the Detroit Bandits, Indianapolis Enforcers (Noblesville, IN), Mid-Michigan Grizzlies (Novi), Midwestern Bulldogs (Elkhart, IN) and the Tri-State Bucks (Toledo, OH) road team. Each team will play five to six games through November 30, 2024.

HOCKEY

American Premier Hockey League: The semi-pro APHL recently started its 2024-25 season and currently lists eight teams in a single-table format. Early in the season, the Soo Nordiques (Sault Ste. Marie, MI) dropped out after two forfeited games and the league added a team called the Buffalo Tempest.

SOCCER

National Women's Soccer League: The Chicago Red Stars of the professional NWSL announced the team has rebranded and will be known as the Chicago Stars Football Club (Chicago Stars FC) going forward. The Chicago Red Stars started in the 2009 season and were a charter member of the NWSL in the 2013 season. A group called HerGame Nashville LLC has formed an ownership group to try to bring an NWSL expansion team to Nashville. Other groups in Denver, Cleveland, Cincinnati and Philadelphia are also vying for the league's next expansion team expected to be announced next month.

USL W-League (United Soccer League): The women's pre-professional USL W-League announced teams called the West Seattle Rhodies FC and the SC Blue Heat (Santa Clarita, CA) have been added for the 2025 season.

USL Championship (United Soccer League): The group known as Pro Iowa, which has been trying the past three years to build a new 6,000-seat soccer stadium in Des Moines for a team in the Division-II professional USL Championship, has received additional funding for the project from Polk County. The group is still trying to secure the remaining $20 million needed for the stadium that was originally scheduled to be completed in 2024 and the team starting in 2025. The owner of the Des Moines Menace in the pre-professional USL League Two is behind the Pro Iowa stadium effort and the USL Championship team.

OTHER

TGL Golf (The Golf League): The new indoor TGL Golf league, which will have six teams playing all matches at a 2,000-seat custom-built virtual indoor golf course simulator in Palm Beach Gardens (FL), announced the inaugural 2025 season will feature each team playing five matches from January 7 through March 4, 2025, followed by playoffs. Teams will be comprised of players from the PGA Tour and will be called the Jupiter Links Golf Club (Jupiter, FL), Boston Common Golf, Atlanta Drive GC, Los Angeles Golf Club, New York Golf Club (New York City) and the Bay Area Golf Club (San Francisco).

Dan Krieger is the creator of the Weekly Sports League & Franchise Report, which has been tracking the changes in the sports world's leagues, teams, and nicknames since April 2007.

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