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The Tulsa Drillers are a minor league baseball team based in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The team, which plays in the Texas League, is the Double-A affiliate of the Colorado Rockies major-league club. The Drillers play in Drillers Stadium , located in downtown Tulsa.
The Drillers came into being in 1977, when the Lafayette, Louisiana transferred to Tulsa. Before that time, the Triple-A Tulsa Oilers had been the city's only minor league club, but owner A. Ray Smith moved the team to New Orleans, Louisiana due to concerns over the dilapidated condition of Oiler Park. Tulsa County completed 8,000 seat Robert B. Sutton Stadium in 1981, naming it for its chief benefactor, a local oil executive. Sutton, however, was convicted in 1982 of fraud, and as a result the County renamed the park Tulsa County Stadium. In 1989, Drillers Stadium received its current name. The stadium now seats over 12,000.
From 1976 to 2002, the Drillers were the Double-A affiliate of the Texas Rangers. In 2002, Rangers owner Tom Hicks purchased the Shreveport, Louisiana Texas League franchise with the intention of moving the team to Frisco, Texas, a suburban city north of Dallas. At the time, the Shreveport Swamp Dragons were affiliated with the San Francisco Giants; Hicks cast aside this association and bought out the remaining two years of Tulsa's Player Development Contract . The Drillers then signed a two-year agreement with the Colorado Rockies.
Notable former Drillers include Sammy Sosa, Ruben Sierra , Ivan Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, and Kevin BrownKevin Brown (born March 14, 1965) is a Major League Baseball right-handed starting pitcher who currently plays for the New York Yankees. Born in McIntyre, Georgia, Brown eventually attended Georgia Tech and had originally planned a career in marine biolog. The Drillers have been Texas League champions twice: 1982 and 1988.
ESPNESPN which stood for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network was founded as an American cable TV network dedicated to sports 24 hours a day, by Scott Rasmussen and his father Bill Rasmussen. It launched on September 7, 1979. Its signature telecast, S Sportscenter anchor Jon AndersonJon Anderson (born October 25, 1944) is a British musician, the lead singer of the progressive rock band Yes. He was born as John Roy Anderson on 25th October 1944 in the town of Accrington, Lancashire, England, his parents being Albert and Kathleen Ander has often alluded to team alumni as "former Driller(s)" on-air. Anderson was a weekend sports anchor for Tulsa CBSCBS Columbia Broadcasting System is a major radio and television network in the United States. CBS was one of the three commercial television networks that dominated broadcasting in the United States before the rise of cable television. In the days of rad affiliate KOTV before joining ESPN.
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Minor league baseball teams
