2009 Press Release About Working With United League Baseball Teams
The CBL had league meetings in February 2009 in Addison, Texas (north of Dallas). After that meeting there was a blog post announcing the CBL working with teams from the United League Baseball (which had started bankruptcy process after the 2008 season); and the announced teams were the Amarillo Dillas, San Angelo Colts and Laredo Broncos – possibly the Edinburg Coyotes (previously known as the Roadrunners).
Here is a link to that post: http://texsportpub.blogspot.com/2009/02/continental-baseball-league-forms.html
A legal situation between the original founders of ULB versus those which controlled the league and started bankruptcy later on went into a legal situation between the CBL and the original founders of ULB. That is why the 2008 ULB teams which were coming to the CBL in 2009 never happened.
Here is more on that lawsuit from an early 2009 post by BallparkDigest.com: https://ballparkdigest.com/200901071243/independent-baseball/features/united-league-united-no-more
Here is a follow-up to that post mentioning how the original founders of ULB got their teams back and took over control again of ULB from 2009 onward: http://thegmsperspective.com/united-league-baseball-to-return-for-2009-season/
After the February 2009 league meetings, this was the intended league for the 2009 CBL season:
- Alexandria Aces (from ULB)
- Amarillo Dillas (from ULB)
- Bay Area Toros (2008 CBL champions)
- Dallas Aviators (replacing the 2008 CBL’s McKinney Blue Thunder)
- Edinburg (from ULB)
- Laredo Broncos (from ULB)
- San Angelo Colts (from ULB)
- Texarkana Gunslingers (returning from CBL 2008)
At the time of the meeting, the Big Bend Cowboys (Alpine Texas) were not yet finalized. The 2009 schedule ultimately had these teams play roughly 3-1/2 months after the league meetings:
- Alexandria Aces (staying in the CBL instead of going back to ULB for 2009)
- Bay Area Toros
- Big Bend Cowboys (new team for 2009)
- Coastal Kingfish (last-minute travel/road team to replace the Aviators which folded the first day of spring training in May 2009)
- South Louisiana Pipeliners (semi-travel team, which hosted “home” games in possible Louisiana locations when facing the Kingfish)
- Texarkana Gunslingers
As you can tell, the league’s intended teams for 2009 changed quite dramatically in just over a 3 month period. Many consider this to be a pivotal turning point in the CBL’ s history as the inclusion of the ULB teams could have helped the league financially and/or helped the CBL teams (returning or new ones) possibly draw more ticket sales and sponsorships. Additionally, having just one major independent league in Texas at the time (including Alexandria) as the only two other Texas teams were the Grand Prairie AirHogs and Fort Worth Cats (both in the American Association at the time) — and neither the Sugar Land Skeeters nor the Laredo Lemurs had yet been formed, could have led to league-wide sponsorship opportunities or better media coverage.
The extra exposure and sponsorship money could have kept teams in better profitability situations. Such a situation could have fortified the league’s stability going into 2010 as it could have attracted other markets to open up their stadiums, attracted better-funded investors, and/or boosted overall ticket sales due to intended promotions (which never happened) as well as increased overall awareness across Texas for people to want to see CBL games.