A Brief History Of Baseball In The Pacific Northwest

Baseball fans in the Portland area are mere days away from the start of the season for the Northwest League, and as I keep bumping into folks commenting on my Hillsboro Hops cap I get quite a few questions about how it all works. What league are they? Why is that season so short? Well, to prep everyone before opening day, here’s a brief history lesson.

The Hillsboro Hops came flying out of the gate in 2013 as a franchise move for the Yakima Bears, and in only two seasons they have become a powerhouse in the tiny NWL, a division of Minor League Baseball. All eight teams in the NWL play a three-month season and short playoffs while acting as farm teams for Major League Baseball franchises, with the Hops affiliated with the Arizona Diamondbacks. But while the somewhat unconventional format (dubbed “Single-A Short Season”) is relatively new to the suburbs of Portland, it had a rich tradition going back half a century.

There has been some form of a Pacific Northwest baseball league since the turn of the century, but the major leagues didn’t come to the west coast in serious force until the 1950s. Because of this, minor and regional leagues thrived as a feeder system for the dominant triple-A circuit, the Pacific Coast League, which operated somewhat in between minor and major league status. The PCL was making enough money to offer players salary amounts comparable to the majors, and many players made entire careers out of staying in the lower league. In addition, the west coast climate made for longer seasons and fewer players looking for off-season jobs. If you were to ask anyone at the time, it looked as though the PCL would be the third major league in America. Unfortunately, several mitigating factors led to the decline of the PCL in the ‘50s—namely the migration of the Brooklyn Dodgers to Los Angeles and the New York Giants to San Francisco, and television broadcasts of major league games.

Here in the Pacific Northwest, the Western International League was a Class B circuit feeding the PCL from franchises in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Canada. The league stretched all the way to Calgary at one point, and was a regular fixture of the sport from 1937 to 1942, starting back up again for the 1946 season after many players came back from World War II. It was in 1952 that the WIL was granted Class A status, but there was still no connection to the farm system used by the majors.

In 1954, there was a meeting that dissolved the WIL and reorganized it as the Northwest League. That name has stuck since, and charter teams at the time including the Eugene Emeralds and Spokane Indians are still up and running. Other founding teams included the Salem Senators, Lewiston Broncs out of Idaho, the Tri-City Braves, and the original incarnation of the Yakima Bears.

With the popularity of televised sports, however, minor leagues declined in popularity as a local activity. By 1966, the league had dwindled down to four teams during the restructuring into the Single-A Short Season we know today. The chief advantage of Short Season, besides a much lower overhead for salaries and operating costs, is the opportunity for young players. With an offer from a Short Season team, high school and college level players still have the ability to finish out their current season and sign with the Single-A team without messing with their stats or eligibility. Not to mention, a Short Season team can do much better business in a smaller market, such as the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes have since 1997.

Opening day at Ron Tonkin Field for the Hops is next Monday, June 20. Until then, the Hops will begin the season on the road against the Volcanoes this Friday, June 17. So if you’re a diehard fan, or all this talk about Oregon baseball history has given you a spark, it’s a quick jaunt along Interstate 5 to start your weekend with nine good innings.