Expos looking D.C.-bound...

[Marc]

Expos players were told this week that a decision on their 2005 home is near, that it won't be Montreal and that there is a strong likelihood they will be living in the Washington, D.C., area.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=1844551&CMP=OTC-DT9705204233

Personally, I want to see them contracted, but I guess D.C. could support its own team if NY and Chicago have two. Baltimore's plenty big enough to support the O's, so they shouldn't be complaining about this taking away their fans.

[Breed]

My brother has been boycotting baseball ever since the strike (in all actuality, he got married during the strike and his wife has his pen!s in a jar on the mantel), but he says he'll go back to being interested in baseball when northern Virginia gets the Expos.

[catman]

I'm glad to see the Expos stop their nomad existence. It is not good for baseball to have them without a home. I hope they have an owner that's willing to keep Frank Robinson as their manager as long as he wants to keep the job and is willing to rebuild their minor league system so they can become competitive again soon.

[Alex]

No surprise here. Hopefully they get RFK Stadium to at least look reasonable until a new baseball park opens. When I was down in DC in April the place looked like a dump from the outside.

[Breed]

Originally posted by Alex
No surprise here. Hopefully they get RFK Stadium to at least look reasonable until a new baseball park opens. When I was down in DC in April the place looked like a dump from the outside.

Ever since the Skins left, RFK has become the ugly stepchild of stadiums in DC. The United play there... and that's about it.

I'm guessing that the team will end up in northern Virginia. The economics are better there and Angelos would probably prefer a team in Virginia than DC. Although it's just semantics, as a team from DC would pull most of their fanbase from Virginia.

[KevinBeane]

Let's spare a though for that rarest of specimen, the Montreal-based Expos fans. Granted, there were not nearly enough of them, or else they'd be staying, but whenever this happens, I feel for the few guys who DID stay loyal. I became an Expos fan a few years ago simply because I felt sorry for them, they seemed to have none at all. And last year, they hung tight and were in the wild card race into September. It's a shame that their last year in Montreal is such a disaster. I'm not sure whether I will remain a fan once they move to Washington and (almost surely) change their name.

[Anthony]

If it happens, the big winners of course will be the fans in the D.C. area, while the biggest losers (in addition to, obviously, Montreal) will be the Texas Rangers, who will remain stuck in the same division with three teams two time zones away. If the Expos were to move to say, Portland or Vancouver instead, the Rangers could be gotten out of the AL West, ending their misery (not for nothing, but why the Royals were never placed in the AL West - thus giving the Rangers at least one non-West Coast division rival - has always escaped me).

[bama4256]

I'd love to see a team in D.C.