Dr. Eddie Hamilton spent almost two hours fielding questions from skeptical residents Tuesday night at Hadley Park Community Center. At times, he assured the room that his group — the privately owned Music City Baseball — had sufficient funding and a known path to another professional sports team and another expensive stadium. Just as quickly, Hamilton emphasized that the process was bottom-up and would be driven by the community around Tennessee State University, whose wetlands on the Cumberland have already been scoped for an MLB stadium.
“Baseball is not the reason for doing this,” Hamilton told the room late in the evening. “I can go anywhere and watch a baseball game. It’s about wealth creation in our community. It’s a thousand percent about economic development for Black people.”
Music City Baseball has adopted the Nashville Stars brand, a callback to the city’s semi-pro team that competed in the Negro Southern League during the 1950s. The organization touts its Black leadership, which includes Hamilton and Titans legend Eddie George. The meeting was an explicit attempt to court support in North Nashville as the team eyes TSU property for its home base. Hamilton also told the crowd that Music City Baseball expects the MLB to announce expansion teams in 2026.
Councilmemeber Brandon Taylor called the meeting amid ongoing conversations between TSU, Music City Baseball and the MLB about Nashville’s potential to acquire a professional baseball team. Two dozen people turned out, including Pastor Davie Tucker, neighborhood advocate Simone Boyd and Jamel Campbell-Gooch, who opposed Taylor in the summer's Metro Council elections.
While Taylor facilitated conversation, the room peppered Hamilton with questions about team ownership and stadium plans. Hamilton said that a stadium deal with TSU would help alleviate the university’s housing shortage and bring economic opportunity to the area.
“My personal frustration is that it apparently takes a private business to give us a fair allocation of Metro’s budget," Tucker said during the meeting. "At the end of the day, MLB is still a white-owned institution. When I hear baseball will be a magic wand to fix things in North Nashville? I’m not buying it. It almost sounds a bit patronizing as a Black person born and raised in 37208 to hear. They’re going to make billions, but a vast majority of the jobs associated with a pro sports team are shit jobs. Gig workers with no benefits.”
According to Hamilton, the group has the necessary funding for the team and a stadium. He also emphasized that the organization lacks a billionaire backer, a near-requirement to anchor a professional sports organization.
The pitch echoed similar appeals for NASCAR upgrades at The Fairgrounds Nashville and a new domed stadium for the Titans, inflaming tensions about the city’s willingness to give private sports organizations government subsidies despite needed investments in transportation, schools and housing.
Hamilton shared that Mayor Freddie O’Connell — who opposed the city’s $760 million handout for the new Titans stadium — recently told the MLB that the city could offer “land and infrastructure” toward a new baseball facility. New development often requires hookups for utilities like water and electricity as well as investment to surrounding traffic infrastructure. For the Titans stadium, surrounding infrastructure costs easily reach into the hundreds of millions of dollars.
"There are no offers out to anyone right now," says Alex Apple, a spokesperson for the mayor's office. "We want to reiterate that Freddie has not said anything privately that he hasn't also said publicly."
On Dec. 6, Politico reported that the mayor met with Jerry Reinsdorf, owner of the Chicago White Sox. Major League Baseball held its annual winter meetings at Opryland last week.
