Down East, Hickory affiliates sold

The Texas Rangers have sold the Hickory Crawdads and the Down East Wood Ducks to Diamond Baseball Holdings, per an announcement released this morning. The Crawdads are the Rangers’ high-A affiliate, while the Wood Ducks are the team’s low-A affiliate.

The Rangers had acquired these teams several years ago, and as Tepid explains, this was part of an effort to stabilize the relationships between the major league franchise and the minor league affiliates, in order to ensure continuity from year to year. Tepid notes that the Rangers have development agreements in place with both Hickory and Down East through 2030, so they are locked in through the end of the decade.

Diamond Baseball Holdings has been gobbling up minor league franchises in recent years, and now has...I don’t know exactly, but a lot. At least a couple of dozen, I think. UPDATE — Tepid and Scott Lucas say it is 18 or 19. Given there are now only 120 actual affiliated minor league teams outside of the complex leagues, Diamond Baseball Holdings has a big chunk of the total.

UPDATE II — Down East is apparently moving from Kinston, North Carolina, to Spartanburg, South Carolina, once the Spartanburg stadium is built. Per Evan Grant, that is 2025.

The announcement is below: