Wichita could announce new baseball team by end of year | The … – Wichita Eagle

Wichitans can hope for an announcement on a new affiliated baseball team coming to Wichita by the end of 2017, Mayor Jeff Longwell says.

“By the end of this calendar year, we feel confident that we will be able to announce a team, who the team is, all of the above,” Longwell told The Eagle Tuesday afternoon. “We hope that we can complete all of those conversations by the end of this year and be able to announce a contract in place.”

City officials have been in discussions with minor-league baseball teams throughout the year about the possibility of relocating to Wichita to play in a new downtown ballpark, which would replace Lawrence-Dumont Stadium.

“There are multiple teams interested and we’re working our way through that list right now,” Longwell said. “So we are diligently working at bringing an affiliated team to Wichita.”

Longwell would not say if there was a frontrunner for relocation or what their affiliation would be.