He really has the fan at heart and is not looking at how he can squeeze the last buck out of the team. He just loves the game of baseball. But Kip is good guy. Sports eventually took him to Bowdoin College in Maine, where he earned three varsity letters playing outfield for the Polar Bears.
Horsburgh returned to college a year later in After graduating from Stanford, Horsburgh joined forces with Fazio and the two started their career as sports owners.
A year later, the pair sold their interest and purchased the Elmira Pioneers, based south of the Finger Lakes, near the Pennsylvania border. Horsburgh left winter sports to get back into professional baseball by becoming the marketing director for the Texas Rangers. During his time in Texas, Horsburgh met his wife, Jean, to whom he has been married for 23 years. They have two children, year-old Mark, a second baseman with Hawken, and year-old Brian.
Stadium votes usually pass It's the same voting pattern that occurs on most city issues. He's terrified that baseball will bankrupt Eastlake. Komarjanski, says Mahler, is the main reason there hasn't been full disclosure of funding.
You're wasting your money. A council member for 20 years, he claims he's been uncooperative only for the last eight, which happen to coincide with DiLiberto's reign. But during that time, he's become a tad ill-tempered in his isolation.
When told of his opponents' views, Komarjanski's face reddens; he folds his arms and smiles contemptuously. That's why he drafted a charter amendment that would require large expenditures -- read: those on the scale of a stadium -- to be approved by citywide vote. Two thousand Eastlakers signed the petition, which was turned in to council last week. If council doesn't put the amendment on the November ballot, "Then we're talking about legal action," he says.
Komarjanski insists he's not against baseball per se, but his amendment might unleash enough legal fallout to delay construction. That could upset the agreement between Horsburgh and Eastlake, jeopardizing the team's future in the city. This scenario has occurred to Komarjanski, but he reasons that a lost baseball team is better than forgotten democracy. The mayor has taken 18 months to stoke public interest. He's courted Indians management and potential owners. He's charged through red tape, chased public grants.
Yet the one man he can't convince can still unravel it all. He won't speak of his foe either, other than to acknowledge Komarjanski's nefarious presence. Indeed, to the mayor and his many allies, Komarjanski's amendment and his bid for the mayor's office are one and the same. Mahler says Komarjanski is "desperate" for votes, and that by trying to thwart the stadium plans, he's "punishing the people of Eastlake. He cites Canton, where the owner grumbled over the field's drainage system, then deserted the city before the lease ended.
In Akron, where the Aeros are hugely popular, the city threatened to evict the team, even as it was setting attendance records; the two sides couldn't agree on who should pay which bills. And while Akron's downtown is beginning to show the vibrancy baseball promised, the city has been forced to trim services to pay for the park.
Komarjanski wonders whether DiLiberto has considered these possibilities, or if he can see only as far as his next term. I'm off to Florida. DiLiberto and Chema have considered the experiences of other cities. Their findings only reaffirm their conviction that baseball will win in Eastlake. After all, Canton doesn't regret building a stadium, despite its team's move to Akron, according to Mayor Richard Watkins.
Komarjanski counters that those are far bigger cities. A ballpark won't break their budget like it could in Eastlake. It's like comparing Cleveland against Akron. And I hope they're not depending on Cleveland people [for fans]. I don't think people are going to drive 25 miles to see a Class A team.
Agganis doubts those things exist in Eastlake. The future of the stadium will be known by September 1, the deadline for the city to prove it can fund construction in time for opening day Komarjanski's charter amendment, which some in City Hall say is unconstitutional, remains the wild card.
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