The Chattanooga Lookouts and Cincinnati Reds soon could be reuniting after a decade apart.
Chattanooga, a member of the Class AA Southern League since 1976, is expected to have a new parent club for the 2019 season after the Minnesota Twins elected earlier this month not to extend their player development contract. The Lookouts and Twins signed a four-year agreement on Sept. 17, 2014.
"We just haven't come to an agreement with the Minnesota Twins at this point, and I don't know that I can really say anything else," Lookouts general manager Rich Mozingo said late last month. Mozingo has since declined further comment.
Cincinnati, Minnesota and the San Diego Padres are the three Major League Baseball teams that did not have player development contracts in place with their Double-A affiliates after the 2018 minor league season. San Antonio has been San Diego's Double-A affiliate but will move up to Triple-A in 2019, with Amarillo filling the vacancy in the Texas League.
Lookouts officials are holding a Tuesday afternoon news conference "for an announcement regarding the upcoming 2019 season on the field." Should the event be in regard to a player development contract, that likely would eliminate the Twins - the Lookouts never have held a news conference simply to renew with a parent club.
Cincinnati is the strongest choice as a replacement because it is the second-closest MLB city to Chattanooga behind Atlanta, and that proximity would be beneficial for both parties. Reds games also are televised on Chattanooga-area cable packages.
The Reds have been partnered with the Pensacola Blue Wahoos, but Pensacola chose to terminate that player development contract according to an article this past week in the Pensacola News Journal. Discussing the breakup with the Reds, Blue Wahoos owner Quint Studer said, "I think they were stunned."
Studer has met with both Twins and Padres representatives, according to the News Journal, with the Twins being attractive as the only one of the available big-league teams still conducting spring training in Florida.
"When I met with the Twins, they said we were a breath of fresh air," Studer told the News Journal.
Chattanooga's four-year partnership with the Twins yielded a Southern League championship in 2015, which was the first for the Lookouts since 1988, and a league co-title in 2017. The 2017 championship series was scratched due to the expected impact of Hurricane Irma.
The 1988 title for the Lookouts occurred in the first year of what became a 21-year partnership with Cincinnati. That ended after the 2008 season, when Frank Burke, the Lookouts' owner at the time, elected to sign with the Los Angeles Dodgers. Chattanooga was the Double-A affiliate of the Dodgers for six seasons, from 2009 to '14.
Cincinnati won World Series titles in 1975 and '76, when the team was nicknamed the "Big Red Machine," and earned another crown in 1990. This century has not been nearly as kind - the Reds already have clinched their fifth consecutive losing season and their 15th losing season in 18 years.
Two of the most prominent Reds players of the past decade, first baseman Joey Votto and pitcher Homer Bailey, were members of the 2006 Lookouts. Votto hit .319 in 136 games that season, while Bailey went 7-1 with a 1.59 ERA in 13 starts.
Votto has since gone on to be a .311 career MLB hitter and ran away with the National League MVP voting in 2010. Bailey has two career no-hitters.
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524.