In minor league baseball, players get "promoted" to a higher level on a regular basis. It's very unusual for a franchise to get "promoted" to a high level, but that's what happened to the Round Rock Express.
The franchise began as a member of the double-A Texas League in 2000, a Houston Astros affiliate. They set a Texas League attendance record the first season, then broke it each of the next four years as well. Still, you don't just "promote" a franchise from double-A to triple-A, without a lot of help.
The owners (Nolan Ryan, his son Reid Ryan, and Don Sanders) bought the triple-A Edmonton Trappers from the Pacific Coast League and moved them to Round Rock. In their first year at triple-A, the Express drew a franchise-record 700,277 fans. Every year since, they've ranked in the top-five in all of minor league baseball. The "promotion" was clearly warranted.
The old double-A team was moved to Corpus Christi, Texas and remains owned by the Ryan-Sanders group. That's become one of the most successful double-A franchises in the country. They do love baseball in Texas. Oh yeah, the nickname Express is carved from Nolan Ryan's nickname "The Ryan Express."
One of my favorite features of Dell Diamond are wooden rocking chairs located at the top of the left field grass berm.
It seems like we get rained on everywhere we go. This was no different during our four days in Round Rock/Austin. We somehow avoided significant rain and played the first two games as schedule. On Saturday, the rain was enormous, drenching the greater Austin area, leading to tornado warnings all night, and flooding in the area.
The game was postponed due to the rain and field conditions. It was only the ninth rainout in 16 seasons of double-A and triple-A baseball in Round Rock.
Because our flight out of town was scheduled for Sunday night, we were forced to play a rare Sunday morning doubleheader. The first game started at 10:30 am, which is one of the earliest I can recall. Even for the School Day Matinees that are a staple for minor league teams, those usually start at 11 am, maybe at 10 am. To play a game starting that early on a Sunday is extremely rare.
We played two quick games on Sunday, saw the sun for the first time all weekend, then got out of town just in time.
Three of my closest college buddies joined me for the weekend. Thanks to Ferris Shahrestani for playing secretary, Ben Saxe for taking the photo, and Gabriel Elizondo for sending his best from an airplane heading back to New York City.
The day after leaving Round Rock, even stronger rain poured down to the city and ballpark. This photo, which I found on Twitter, shows just about the entire outfield grass flooded.
What's so impressive about new ballparks, like Dell Diamond, is how quickly they drain. It's truly a state-of-the-art system. The next day, the field was dry, showed no signs of the massive flooding, and they played a doubleheader.
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