Russell Wilson’s baseball roots are now spreading to Portland.
The Seahawks quarterback and his wife Ciara are investing as owners in a group trying to bring Major League Baseball to Oregon’s Rose City.
The Portland Diamond Project announced Friday morning Wilson and his singer-songwriter wife are investors in its effort to fulfill what has been a decades-long dream in that city three hours south of Seattle.
“As owners, investors, and partners in this incredible opportunity, we plan to change the game of baseball and impact the lives of kids everywhere,” Wilson wrote in an announcement on TraceMe, the entrepreneurial quarterback’s Seattle start-up.
“We believe Portland is the next great Major League Baseball city, and that’s why Ciara and I are excited to announce we are a part of the Portland Diamond Project,” Wilson, a former college and low-Class-A minor-league infielder, said in a news release issued hours before he practiced for the Seahawks Friday in organized team activities in Renton.
“It is time for MLB in Portland.”
Ciara was quoted in the news release saying: “Athletics has always been important to me. As a young girl growing up in Atlanta, I was a tomboy who ran track and worked the hot dog stand at Turner Field (former home field of MLB’s Atlanta Braves). I am excited about the opportunity to bring the (camaraderie) of the game to the city of Portland. I want to see this vision come to life and empower more women owners in major sports franchises.”
This week the Willamette Week reported the Portland Diamond Project has inquired to the Port of Portland about possibly using a site on the west bank of the Willamette River near Portland’s Fremont Bridge for a major league stadium. It’s the third known site the group is considering for big-league baseball in Portland.
Now the project has some name recognition behind it.
“Having Russell and Ciara sign on as owners and investors in PDP is game-changing, and has elevated our campaign significantly,” PDP founder and president Craig Cheek said in the news release. “I got to know Russell and Ciara when we signed Russell to his Nike endorsement deal. I saw firsthand their passion, pursuit of excellence and impact they bring to every endeavor. We know they will bring that same energy, sense of legacy and entrepreneurialism to the Portland Diamond Project.”
Wilson spent part of this offseason participating in the spring training camp of the New York Yankees, appearing in an exhibition game for them in Florida in early March. The Super Bowl-winning quarterback, who has two years remaining on his $87.6 million contract with the Seahawks, had cameos with the Texas Rangers in spring training in previous NFL offseasons.
Wilson has put some more of his money into an effort to bring the National Basketball Association back to Seattle. In 2016 he joined Chris Hansen’s investment team trying to build a new arena for the NBA next to the Mariners’ Safeco Field and down the street from the Seahawks’ CenturyLink Field in Seattle’s SoDo district.
The Seattle city council voted to support a competing offer to remodel KeyArena in Seattle Center instead. That latter site is the effort that is going forward to bring a National Hockey League team and, the hope is, an NBA one to Seattle.
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