New England League (1948-1949)
International League (1950-1953)
Tombstone
Born: 1948
Folded: Winter 1953 – The Cubs cease operations
First Game:
Last Game:
New England League Championships:
International League Championships: None
Stadium
Pynchon Park
Opened: 1853
Demolished by Fire: 1966
Ownership & Affiliation
Owner: Chicago Cubs
Major League Affiliation: Chicago Cubs
Background
The Springfield Cubs were a farm club of the Chicago Cubs for six seasons. The ball club formed in 1948 to compete in the eight-team Class B New England League. But the NEL folded at the end of the 1949 season and temporarily left the Western Massachusetts city without a team. Shortly thereafter Chicago purchased the Newark Bears, the former New York Yankees farm club in the Class AAA International League, and moved the team to Springfield’s Pynchon Park for the 1950 season.
1950: Moving Up To The International League
The shift to the International League brought a much higher caliber of player to town. While only four players from the Cubs’ two New England League clubs ever made it to the Major Leagues, the 1950 Springfield team alone featured nearly two dozen players who saw Major League service time. Locals flocked to Pynchon Park that summer and the Cubs sold a reported 213,000 tickets in 1950.
Springfield’s fortunes declined over the next three summers. The Cubs had another Class AAA farm club at Los Angeles in the Pacific Coast League, so Springfield didn’t get to enjoy all of Chicago’s top prospects. Springfield dropped to 63-90 in 1951 and bottomed out at 51-102 in 1953. The bottom fell out the box office, as crowds drop over 60% between 1950 and 1953.
Demise
Chicago put the Springfield team up for sale in September 1953. No savior stepped forward and the Springfield Cubs folded during the winter that followed. The demise of the Cubs left the Boston Red Sox as the only professional baseball team operating in the New England states during the summer of 1954.
Links
###
