Tag: Woody Kern

Newark Orioles New York-Penn League

Newark Orioles

The Newark Orioles were a short-season Class A farm club of the Baltimore Orioles during the mid-1980’s. The club played in the tiny village of Newark, New York (pop. 10,000), not the urban metropolis of Newark, New Jersey. The community had a previous entry in the New York-Penn League, the Co-Pilots, that operated from 1968 until 1979.

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1982 San Jose Expos baseball program from the California League

San Jose Expos

The San Jose Expos were a Class A farm club of the Montreal Expos for a single summer in 1982. Peter “Woody” Kern, a 34-year old nursing home operator from Ohio, paid $65,000 for the California League’s San Jose Missions club in late 1981, changing the name when the Expos agreed to a Player Development Contract that winter.

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1978 Little Falls Mets Baseball Program from the New York-Penn League

Little Falls Mets

The tiny upstate New York city of Little Falls (pop. 6,156 in 1980) hosted the New York Mets short-season Class A farm club from 1977 until 1988. In 1984, the Little Falls Mets won their own New York-Penn League crown, defeating the Newark Orioles in a husband-versus-wife championship series. Peter “Woody” Kern owned the Little Falls Mets while his wife Susan was the nominal owner of the Newark club.

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Tampa Bay Storm Arena Football League

Tampa Bay Storm

The Tampa Bay Storm were arguably the greatest franchise in the 30-year history of the Arena Football League(s). The Storm played for 26 seasons and won 5 Arena Bowl titles. For many years the team was among the most popular box office attractions in the AFL. The Storm’s fierce “War on I-4” rivalry with the Orlando Predators lasted a quarter century from 1991 until 2016 and drew large crowds in both cities.

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Fort Worth Cavalry Arena Football League

Fort Worth Cavalry

The Fort Worth Cavalry were a failed Arena Football League franchise now residing in our One-Year Wonders file.  After one star-crossed season in Fort Worth, the team crossed the border into Mexico just in time for that country’s late 1994 financial meltdown and vanished without a trace.

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