Starting in ‘93, Angels Go to Tempe for Spring

Citing what they called “a perfect fit,” the Angels and officials of Tempe, Ariz., announced agreement Tuesday on a 15-year lease that will make Diablo Stadium the Angels’ spring training home beginning in 1993.

The long-rumored agreement will end the Angels’ 30-year tradition of spending part of spring training in Palm Springs. Next year will be their last spring at Angels Stadium, but their Class-A club will remain in Palm Springs.

The lack of spectator seating at Gene Autry Park in Mesa, Ariz., has forced the Angels to be the visiting team in Arizona exhibition games. Eager to generate revenues from ticket and concession sales to offset spring costs, the Angels found willing hosts in Tempe.

That city’s negotiations with the current tenants, the Seattle Mariners, broke down after the Mariners requested extensive renovations on Diablo Stadium and the addition of practice fields. Tempe will spend $3.8 million in renovations for the Angels, but the city won’t have to build practice fields because the Angels will continue to use their minor league complex at Gene Autry Park in nearby Mesa.

“It’s a perfect marriage because so many people in our area are from California, and this makes it easy and close for Angel fans to get to Tempe,” Tempe Mayor Harry Mitchell said at an Anaheim Stadium news conference. “We expect greater attendance than for the Mariners.”

Diablo Stadium will be enlarged from a seating capacity of 5,600 to 7,520.

Angel President Richard Brown said the club can invoke an escape clause should the Cactus League fall below six teams. There are currently eight, but the Cleveland Indians are poised to leave Tucson for Florida after the spring of 1992. However, the new Denver National League expansion franchise is expected to base its spring operations in Arizona.

Kevin Uhlich, who headed the spring training site search as the Angels’ director of stadium operations, said remaining in Palm Springs was simply not feasible.

“We had the Chamber of Commerce come to us and ask what they could do, but the city itself and city officials, there were just no negotiations,” Uhlich said. “It got to the point where it wasn’t so much the facility as how isolated it was and how far from Mesa.”

According to the Desert Sun in Palm Springs, Mayor Sonny Bono said it would have cost $15 million to renovate Angels Stadium enough to satisfy the Angels. “Obviously this city doesn’t have $15 million,” Bono said.