If the Braves move to Cobb County as planned, then Major League Baseball should put an American League team in Turner Field. At least that’s the vision and the crusade — some might say the wild pitch — of Mike McDonald, a long-time Atlanta advertising executive and baseball fan.
He has presented the idea to some local politicos and business folks. He has talked to lawyers about how to challenge MLB. He even wrote a letter to the Tampa Bay Rays, asking if they’d be interested in relocating. The Rays haven’t responded and McDonald has decided he’d prefer the fresh start of an expansion team.
His position is that the city of Atlanta and Fulton County have invested financially and psychologically in MLB for almost a half century and are owed a team in return.
“Can metro Atlanta be like several other markets with two major league teams?” McDonald asked. “I think I can make that case.”
And for all the reasons against it all happening — not the least of which is that the MLB constitution assigns the Braves the exclusive right and obligation to play home games in a territory that includes the city of Atlanta and Fulton, Cobb, DeKalb and Gwinnett counties — McDonald offers a list of reasons it should happen.
In fact, he has prepared a lengthy slide show, which he shared with a reporter in his Fulton County (Sandy Springs) home.
One slide offers this slogan from the ad man: “Let’s Turner Lemon into Lemonade!”
Another throws down the gauntlet: “MLB’s days as a legal cartel are numbered. MLB wants to avoid, at virtually all cost, any challenge to this irrational, obsolete antitrust exception. Atlanta’s unique historical relationship with MLB for almost 50 years can be adroitly and/or boldly employed to bring a brand new MLB American League East franchise to Atlanta & Fulton Co.”
Asked about the huge obstacle of the Braves’ territorial rights, McDonald said he thinks a “hardball” legal challenge could strike it out.
Other than some groups opposed to public funding of a new stadium in Cobb, there has been little organized backlash against the Braves’ plan to leave Turner Field after the 2016 season. This is the story of one man who wants to change that.
McDonald, 82, says he has been a baseball fan since he was a 7-year-old kid in New York. He and his mother were Brooklyn Dodgers fans. The rest of the family rooted for the New York Yankees. McDonald didn’t like the Dodgers’ move to Los Angeles in 1958 any more than he likes the Braves’ plan to move to Cobb now.
His advertising career brought him to Atlanta as a young man. In 1969, he co-founded McDonald & Little, which became the largest independent ad agency in the city and one of the largest in the South.
The agency’s memorable work included First Atlanta’s “Tillie the all-time teller” campaign, Southern Airway’s “Nobody’s second class on Southern” campaign and the Atlanta Flames’ “The Ice Age cometh.’”
In 1981, McDonald & Little was sold to Ted Bates Worldwide, then the world’s fifth-largest ad agency. In 1985, Bates closed McDonald & Little, reportedly because of the two firms’ conflicting clients.
In recent years, McDonald said, he has consulted for a number of former and new clients, focusing on marketing communications strategy and branding.
“I’ve failed at retirement several times,” he said.
At the moment, he is consumed with strategizing Atlanta’s baseball future. Books about the business of baseball are stacked high on his dining room table.
McDonald already has a name in mind for the AL team he seeks: the Atlanta Surge, drawn from the city motto Resurgens (Latin for rising again). He envisions the city and county receiving an equity stake in the team in return for use of the venue, and an investor group operating the team with him. He says MLB should waive an expansion fee as a way to settle the damages of the Braves leaving the city limits.
He expects people to “take shots” at his plan and says that is fine.
“This is being done in daylight, not under the cover of darkness. This is the antithesis of what the Braves did,” McDonald said, referring to the secret negotiations that culminated with a Nov. 11 announcement of the planned move to Cobb. “That’s why I’m doing it.”
The Braves declined to comment for this story.
Robert Boland, a professor of sports business and law at New York University, said Atlanta “doesn’t meet the size standards in terms of population and (fan) following to support a second team.” He stopped short of dismissing the possibility entirely, noting Turner Field “would be a major league-ready stadium for a team looking to relocate.”
J.C. Bradbury, a Kennesaw State professor of sports management and author of two books on baseball, was blunter. “I can’t even imagine how this would come to fruition,” Bradbury said. “I don’t see that there is any pent-up demand for baseball here that is not being satisfied.”
But Fulton County Commissioner Robb Pitts, who has discussed the concept with McDonald, called it “a magnificent idea.”
“It’s the kind of out-of-the-box thinking that has made Atlanta what it is,” Pitts said. “I told him he should move forward and see what happens. The worst thing that can happen is nothing. … The possibilities are endless should the right people get involved.”
Only four markets have two MLB teams: New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco/Oakland.
McDonald said other people are engaged with him on the project but that he is not at liberty to name them.
“One of the missions is to get the city and Fulton County to have the will to do this,” he said.
