A league of their own

As the Padres surge to the top of their division in Major League Baseball, it would seem to be an inopportune time to launch a minor league baseball team in San Diego.

But Dave Kaval, a co-founder of the Golden Baseball League, an eight-team league that includes the San Diego Surf Dawgs, said

With Surf Dawg ticket prices for the best seats at Tony Gwynn Stadium on the campus of San Diego State University going for $10 and beers maxing out at $3.50, the emphasis is on making America's once-favorite pastime affordable to everyone, he said.

"We're going after a different group of people. Maybe they'll go to one or two Padres games a year, but they can't afford to go to more," said Kaval, the Golden Baseball League's chief executive officer. "The majority of our fans are middle income, folks with large families, and folks who harken back to what the baseball experience was maybe 50 to 100 years ago, when people would go to a lot more games."

Kaval was inspired to start a minor league in California after seeing what was done in a few minor league parks in the East and Midwest. The Cleveland native went home to visit family several years ago and discovered a new, $28 million minor league ballpark just 20 minutes from Jacobs Field, home of the American League's Indians.

Despite operating in the shadow of the popular Cleveland ballpark, the Class A Lake City Captains were doing just fine, pulling in respectable crowds of avid baseball fans who came because they loved the sport and the baseball atmosphere, Kaval said.

Hatching A Plan

So certain was he that a minor league could work elsewhere, Kaval decided to make it the focus of his graduate business studies at Stanford University. With fellow Stanford student Amit Patel, the duo honed their business plan during an eightmonth course called "Evaluating Entrepreneurial Opportunities." At the conclusion of the class, they presented the plan to teachers and venture capitalists, several of whom supplied the initial funding.

In all, about dozen investors put up $5 million to get the new league started, he said.

The key to making the Golden Baseball League work is singleentity ownership, meaning the league is entirely owned and controlled by investors, not by a major league club, as most minor league franchises are.

Under the arrangement, salaries for all players, managers and team employees, plus all the necessary expenses, such as equipment and leasing facilities, are paid by the league based in Pleasanton. The single-entity format is used by Major League Soccer and several other sports leagues.

The Golden Baseball League is a developmental league for pro players, the equivalent of Class A, and fields mainly players coming out of college or junior college, along with a smattering of veterans with some minor league or major league experience.

Salaries range from $700 to $3,000 a month, with the fattest contract so far going to former Padre and future Hall of Famer Rickey Henderson, who was signed by the Surf Dawgs May 9.

Henderson, 46, the major league record holder in stolen bases and runs scored, is not only the oldest player, he may be the best, Kaval said.

The signing of Henderson was a coup for the Golden Baseball League and the Surf Dawgs, which saw a spurt in ticket sales.

"We're building momentum in the community and the announcement (of signing) about Rickey has helped us. It's brought a familiar face to the Surf Dawgs," said Juliana Paoli, the team's general manager. "Our season ticket sales jumped 3 5 percent (after the news hit)."

Home Schedule

Season tickets for the best seats for 53 home dates cost $450. Paoli said the team has sold about 200 full season packages and hopes to draw an average of 1,750 fans per game to break even.

"We're approaching about 1,500 tickets sold for our home opener, and the stadium holds about 3,000."

Locating the Surf Dawgs at San Diego State was the result of some discussions the league had with California State University officials to use the college baseball ballparks once their seasons ended.

"It's a great deal for both sides," Kaval said. "We get to use their ballparks, which lay empty for the entire summer, and they get to collect some money for a few months."

As part of the league's agreement with San Diego State, it installed about 1,100 individual seats in the upper reserved part of the ballpark, which previously held unbacked benches, Those seats cost $8, and general admission is $6.

The Surf Dawgs have seven full-time employees and six parttimers, but will hire some 30 temporary workers for each game for ticket sellers and takers, ushers and greeters, Paoli said. Concessions are handled by Aztec Shops, a subsidiary of San Diego State. So far, the team hasn't lined up a broadcast partner.

In addition to San Diego, the Golden Baseball League consists of a California division in Chico, Fullerton and Long Beach. The Arizona division is made up of Mesa, Surprise, Yuma, and a team of players from Japan. The foreign team, called the Samurai Bears, doesn't have a home field and plays all 90 games on the road.

Major Talent

As for investors, Kaval was able to attract a few famous names, including "Wheel of Fortune" host Pat Sajak, and retired Kansas City Chiefs fullback Christian Okoye. The group also includes Todd Anson, co-founder of Cisterra Partners, LLC, the San Diego developer of office projects including DiamondView Tower, just outside Petco Park.

The new league got a nice lift when Safeway Inc. and its subsidiary Vons, also based in Pleasanton, inked a three-year, $1 million deal as a sponsor.

Part of what convinces Kaval that he's onto something is his own experience growing up with baseball and attending games with his family. It was a different time and place, Cleveland in the 1970s and '80s, when the Indians were awful and seats at nowextinct Municipal Stadium were plentiful and cheap.

"We'd go to a lot of games, and those are times that I will never forget," he said. "We didn't go because of the Indians. We went because it was a great way to spend time with our family."

San Diego Surf Dawgs

Home Field: Tony Gwynn Stadium at SDSU

Manager: Terry Kennedy

Season: May 26 to Aug. 28

League: Golden Baseball League

No. of Teams: 8

Opening Day: May 26, 7:05 p.m. vs. Long Beach Armada

Tickets: $6, $8 and $10

Sales: (619) 282-HITS