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The Hops have a 10-year contract with Major League Baseball and the Hillsboro GM is looking to the future asking, ‘What does a premium outdoor entertainment facility look like?’
I’ve been wanting to catch up with K.L. Wombacher for some time. Not only were the Hops one of my first beats as a professional journalist, but the Hillsboro president/general manager just navigated his franchise through some awfully tough waters.
The Hops, a Single-A affiliate of the Arizona Diamondbacks, had their entire season canceled in 2020. Then they survived Minor League Baseball’s downsizing in December and just played their first year as a full-season franchise in 2021 — all the while sharing their Ron Tonkin Field home with the Vancouver Canadians.
Wombacher joined The I-5 Corridor podcast on Wednesday. Here are some of the highlights, including some big plans for stadium expansion.
This is a fun one for me because one of my first beats here was working out at the Hillsboro Argus with Jeff Smith and Dan Itel, and we got to tell the stories as you guys were building this thing that first year of the Hops. Now you guys are somehow eight seasons in and have won what, three championships? It seems like things are going pretty well. I don’t know if you’re the nostalgic type, but has this all gone by fast? And can you put that in perspective after moving from Yakima?
First off, what a crew that was. You and Dan and Jeff. When I look back at the three of you guys and seeing your careers blossom, it was great. And I think a lot of your work back in the day — we had a lot of coverage back then — I think it really helped make us the baseball team in town. And that was one of our primary goals. There was a basketball team in town. A soccer team in town. A hockey team in town. And now, there’s a baseball team back in town and the media coverage really helped us elevate our brand quickly and give us credibility. There are times when that feels like yesterday.
And there are times when that feels like 20 years ago.
To see the fanbase we’ve been able to grow — it really hit us during the pandemic when our season was canceled and we had to figure out how we were going to survive financially. The only option we had was to not refund money. We had a lot of money that we had collected from season ticket holders, sponsors, mini plan holders and groups for the 2020 season, and if we had to refund that money it would have put us out of business. And we had 96 percent of season ticket holders that said, “Nope. Don’t need a refund. Let’s push it forward.” And truthfully, that saved us financially. But it also made us realize how much support we’ve built and how much people like us in this community.
A story I wanted to write at The Athletic this summer before, well, you know, was about how you guys and the Vancouver Canadians shared a stadium for the entire summer. I’m assuming just about every night of the week there was a ballgame going on.
We had 122 professional games on our field. Basically it was every day of the week from May to the end of September. Other than Monday, there was a baseball game here. It was crazy and I’m still surprised that story never really got told. We got to know those guys pretty well…It was cool having them in town. But it was a drain. Not for me personally, but for our food and beverage team and our grounds crew that is managed by the city. They were here literally every night. Whether there’s 200 people in the building or 5,000, you’re still doing catering, you’re still staffing up, your managers are still here.
As part of last year’s minor league reorganization, the Hops signed a 10-year deal with Major League Baseball to be an affiliate with the Arizona Diamondbacks. As part of that deal, you guys made the jump to high-level single-A and your season expanded from 76 games to 132 games. Along with more games, you previously talked about potential expansions here at Ron Tonkin Field. What can you share?
It’s definitely an exciting future. The shift to now being aligned with MLB versus being a part of Minor League Baseball has been pretty exciting. And we were pretty bullish on it from the start. There are a lot of minor league operators that felt that it was a hostile takeover, and maybe you could make an argument that it was. But you needed to make some changes within minor league baseball, and the power the MLB has with the table they sit at from a national advertiser standpoint and national broadcast standpoint, it makes a lot of sense. They’re going to open a lot of doors for us and I think they’re going to professionalize minor league baseball like we’d like to see it professionalized.
But part of what we had to agree to is new facility standards that hadn’t been updated since 1990. So by 2024, there are some modifications we’re going to have to make that are pretty significant — and they all have to do with player development and wellness. They want the player experience to be a lot more modernized in a lot of better ways, which is way overdue. So it’s probably at least $5 million to $10 million to make the modifications to meet the new MLB standards. So we’ve been having conversations with the city, “Well, if we’ve got to invest in this facility, let’s look long term.” If we’re going to open up that door so to speak, let’s look at what we’re going to need for the next 20 to 30 years — not only for our franchise but for the community and metro area. So we’re looking at: What does an outdoor entertainment facility look like? A year-round, premium outdoor entertainment facility that could host concerts and community festivals and corporate rentals, Division I baseball and national tournaments that we could recruit into town because we have one of the best facilities in the country.
So we’ve got pretty big ambitions of what we want this facility to look like in the future.
Dansby Swanson just won a World Series with Atlanta. Before he got there, Arizona trusted its former-No. 1 pick in your guys’ care at the start of his career. Do you have any good stories from his time?
He was incredible. I mean, we couldn’t be happier for him because he’s the type of player that just does things the right way. He’s a good teammate. He works his tail off. He’s athletic, but he’s not going to wow you with his athletic prowess. It was just, the bigger the moment, Dansby was a better player. When he was here, people thought I was crazy, but I compared him to Derek Jeter, mainly because of the intangibles he brings — like the way he runs to his position is different than any player. The way he puts his arm around a teammate was different than anything I’d ever seen. He came into a clubhouse in mid-August, an established clubhouse, and he walks in and on Day 2 he’s the leader of the team. And he didn’t come in saying “I’m the leader and follow me.” It was just the way he went about his business and the way he treated his teammates. He was different.
My favorite story is the day he arrived in 2015. It’s kind of a whirlwind of a day for him. We’ve got the AP here, national media covering his first game and we had MLB authenticators here authenticating the game ball and his bat and his jersey. I never even knew there was an MLB authenticator that would fly in from New York. It was great. They gave us an inventory list of all the stuff we had to have that they were going to authenticate that day. Then they put the little stickers on it and it’s pretty neat.
But after the game there was a section full of about 400 people out in right field that stuck around and wanted his autograph. So he celebrated with the team, goes back out on the field and started signing autographs. He was there for about 20 minutes, so I walked out and said, “Hey Dans, it’s been a long day. We’ll cut the line off here and you can go shower.” And he’s like, “It’s OK. I’m good. I got nowhere to be.”
So 40 minutes go by and I walk out there again and it’s the same thing. He’s still going. He signed for every single person. And it wasn’t just one of those things where he never looks up when he’s signing. He engaged with almost every person. If it was a kid he would ask them if they played baseball and what position and if they wanted to take a picture. He was the most engaging player with fans that I’ve ever seen. So to see him as a fan favorite in Atlanta is no surprise.
Are you more of a winter meetings or spring training guy? I used to always read the Seattle Times’ blog about what was going on at winter meetings when I was younger, and it always just seemed like it was wheeling and dealing. A lot different than the relaxed spring training vibe.
I love the winter meetings. And the reason I love the winter meetings so much is it’s almost like a family reunion every December. Over the course of the 20 years that I’ve now been in baseball, you build so many different relationships over time. Different GMs, or whatever they are for different teams. And you become friends with these people. And the winter meetings is the one place where you’re all going to be together. So there’s a lot of late nights. Hotel bars are from four o’clock to probably four o’clock. They get a fair amount of business. It’s just so social.
Is that on the Diamondbacks expense account or yours?
There might be a night or two on the Diamondbacks’, but most of the time it’s on the personal account. But it’s just fun to see everyone, so everyone’s in a good mood. We talk baseball and work, but really it’s just good friends that you develop really good relationships with.
Spring training is fun. We typically take our front office if we hit our sales goals. It’s great and the Diamondbacks really take good care of us when we go down there. Mark Grace was our hitting coach in 2014 and we saw him there in March of 2015, and he said, “You know, K.L., we never really got to celebrate that championship in 2014. Why don’t you bring the staff over to my place Saturday night and we’ll have a little barbecue and drink some wine.”
So we all went over to Mark Grace’s house, and he’s showing us his little casita with all his Silver Slugger awards and Gold Gloves and pictures with Michael Jordan and all the celebrities he was around in Chicago. It was a great time and it’s just those relationships that you build through baseball — and then having those types of experiences — that make it pretty special.
— Tyson Alger
