carolinaleaguebaseball-history

   Over it's first half of a century, the Carolina League has established itself as one of baseball's premier minor leagues, a circuit renowned for hot prospects, intense rivalries, memorable pennant races, and excellent play.
    The league has fielded anywhere from four to twelve teams in places ranging from metropolitan centers to tiny Red Springs, NC, with only 4,000 people. It has hosted a U.S. President, as George Bush attended two games at Frederick in 1991 and 1992. Literally hundreds of current and former Major Leaguers played in the Carolina League, and dozens of big league umpires, broadcasters, and executives have worked in the league.
    Founded during World War II, the Carolina League's inaugural 1945 season featured two Southside Virginia cities. But throughout the 1940's and 1950's it was known as a predominately North Carolina league. In those days it was unusual for talented players to make a career out of minor league baseball. Some of the league's colorful greats from the era (many still hold league records) included Muscle Shoals, Willie Duke, Woody Fair, Harvey Haddix, and Crash Davis, whose name was immortalized by the movie Bull Durham.
    Later in the 1950's, Willie McCovey, Carl Yastrzemski, and Earl Weaver, who all eventually entered the Hall of Fame, were quite the rage of the league.
    During the 1960's, the minors became more closely affiliated with the Major Leagues, as the league crept up into central Virginia. During this period Carolina League stars such as Rod Carew, Curt Flood, Joe Morgan, and Johnny Bench found themselves on the fast track to Major League stardom.
    Though Carolina League playing talent remained strong with such stars as Wade Boggs, Dave Parker, Cecil Cooper, and Dwight Evans, the 1970's were a difficult time financially throughout minor league baseball. A number of cities found that they could not support teams, and the Carolina League membership dwindled to four clubs. Hanging in there were Winston-Salem (the only club to play in every Carolina League season), along with Lynchburg and Salem, neither of which missed a season since entering the Carolina League in the 1960's. The fourth club was in several different locations in the 1970's, but since 1993 it has been the Wilmington (Delaware) Blue Rocks.
    In a series of bold moves in the late-1970's and early-1980's, the Carolina League went as far north as Maryland (first Hagerstown, now Frederick) and re-established the Durham Bulls franchise. Also coming in during that period were Kinston and Alexandria (now Potomac). This brought the league to its current number of eight clubs. The moves were bold, because there were not enough Major League affiliations for all the new clubs.
    But the gamble paid off, and in 1983 the Carolina League began a run of thirteen straight years where attendance showed an increase over the previous year. In 1989 the league went over the million mark for the first time since 1947. New all-time records were set for nexy six straight years, topping out at 1,816,913 in 1995.
    On the field the fast track never slowed. In fact, it got faster. The 1980's and 1990's were an era of Dwight Gooden, Lenny Dykstra, Barry Bonds, Bernie Williams, Moises Alou, and Andruw Jones, just to name a few. In recent years it has not been uncommon for a player to become a regular in the Majors in the season following his Carolina League time.
    The Carolina League closed out the 1990's by going deeper into Carolina than ever before with the addition of Myrtle Beach (formerly Durham and Danville). With that move, fully half the ballparks occupied by Carolina League clubs will have been built in the 1990's and feature all the modern amenities. Two others were renovated in the 1990's, and the remaining two cities have new stadiums on the drawing boards to open sometime after the 2001 season.