Without land deal, it's game delay for Eels

Ball club yet to buy land for stadium

Area baseball fans can purchase Plymouth River Eels caps and shirts and reserve season tickets on the team's website, but what they can't do is attend an Eels ballgame.

When the Eels' backers announced creation of the new independent baseball team in 2005, the timeline had the first pitch being thrown by May 2007. The idea was that the Plymouth River Eels would give the South Shore its own team to root for, and create a lively cross-region rivalry with the Brockton Rox.

But the team - and investors' ambitious plan for a $40 million 5,500-seat stadium, conference center, and office complex off Route 80 in Plymouth - appears no further along today than when the proposal was announced amid great hoopla.

Executives at the investors' group, Bay Colony Baseball and Athletics, contend that planning and marketing for the project are progressing well, although no new timeframe has been announced. Negotiations for the land purchase are active, they said.

But businessman Pierre Coll, one of the owners of a 28-acre target site, said Bay Colony Baseball has been unable to close the deal on his land. Coll said the last extension on the purchase-and-sale agreement expired in early March.

"They have no hold on that land whatsoever," Coll said. "They have no legal document saying they have a right to the property."

Coll said the land is back on the market, and he already has a couple of interested buyers. Coll complained it has been difficult to market the property since most still assume Bay Colony Baseball controls it

To date, Bay Colony Baseball has provided Coll with $110,000 in deposits on the land, and Coll said he is preparing to cash those in.

The purchase-and-sale agreement, signed in 2005, put the property's price at $5.6 million. Coll said the deal allowed him to sell off the $1 million in gravel on the site. As the economy slumped, Coll reduced the price by a half-million, to $5.1 million. Bay Colony would also get to keep the gravel.

"I know the economy is difficult and I want them to succeed, but I can't keep my land forever and pay the property taxes," Coll said. "The $110,000 in deposit money won't even cover the taxes I've paid during the last three years."

Company chief executive Thomas O'Brien, a former state representative and the current Plymouth County treasurer, said he was surprised at Coll's comments, saying negotiation is ongoing. "We were talking to him as recently as yesterday," O'Brien said last week.

Bay Colony Baseball vice president Michael Rothberg agreed that discussions continue.

"We're not going to negotiate this deal in the press," Rothberg said. "The relationship is such that he can actively market the property if he likes."

Meanwhile Bay Colony said it will continue to move toward purchasing the property.

Rothberg said those who criticize the organization for lacking an actual team don't understand the process.

"The very last component of the project is the team itself," he said. "First you build support for the brand, which we've done. We already have close to 2,000 season tickets reserved. We're not taking any money at this point, but we want to demonstrate that there's support and we want to market our brand."

He noted the $40 million price tag. "This is a work in progress like any other project of this magnitude," Rothberg said.

Plymouth selectmen, as well as Town Meeting, granted a Tax Increment Financing package, or TIF, for the project, which will afford it state and local tax breaks. Rothberg said the $3 million award shows "both the state and the town recognize this is a valuable project."

"This is much more than just baseball," Rothberg said. "It's going to bring jobs to the area."

But, according to Plymouth's director of economic development, Denis Hanks, the tax breaks go with the land. If Bay Colony fails to secure that site, they will not apply.

"I would really like to see them build a baseball stadium in Plymouth, but it doesn't look like it will be on my land," Coll said last week.

Rothberg said, in the end, it may not prove to be on Coll's land, but it will most likely still be somewhere in Plymouth. "The bottom line is, Plymouth is our focus," Rothberg said.

"We've been approached by many other towns, but this is a natural fit with Plymouth. It's a tourist area that's had trouble keeping people here for any length of time. With this, tourists could see a game, stay overnight, then head to the Cape."

Christine Legere can be reached at christinelegere@yahoo.com.