How Did The Expos Get To Washington? Explaining Their Strange Ownership Swap

This week has been a strangely newsy 1 for nan Montreal Expos, a Major League Baseball squad that has not taken nan section since 2004.

The merchandise of a Netflix documentary examining nan team's demise—entitled Who Killed nan Montreal Expos?—was agelong planned. However, nan filmmakers astir apt didn't count connected Canada's younger MLB team—the Blue Jays—reaching nan World Series and throwing an moreover bigger spotlight connected shot successful nan Great White North.

Like galore of baseball's much celebrated relocations—the Dodgers', nan Giants', aliases (more recently) nan Athletics'—the Expos' defection to Washington to go nan Nationals marked nan culmination of a agelong and arduous process. It was besides unsocial successful that it progressive a quasi-ownership "trade" that influenced nan destiny of a franchise thousands of miles distant from Quebec.

Here's a look astatine really Canada's second-largest metropolis mislaid its team.

Liquor magnate Charles Bronfman and 5 partners founded nan Expos successful 1969—a clip erstwhile Montreal was still wide known arsenic Canada's taste superior (Toronto wouldn't jump it successful organization until Canada's 2001 census). The Expos recovered sledding reliable successful their early years, making conscionable 1 playoff quality (1981) contempt galore winning seasons. Bronfman sold nan squad to Claude Brochu successful 1991, and aft a tumultuous decade, Brochu sold a controlling liking to creation trader Jeffrey Loria successful 2001.

How did Jeffrey Loria get retired of his woody pinch nan Expos?

For overmuch of Montreal's existence, nan squad faced 1 overarching question: really would nan squad switch Olympic Stadium? The oft-derided building agelong overstayed its invited for nan 1976 Summer Olympics, and Loria quickly sought nationalist backing for a caller park. As attempts to switch Olympic Stadium dragged, MLB attempted to fold nan Twins and Expos—a move only stopped by a successful tribunal challenge. Amid this turmoil successful Montreal, Loria sold nan squad to MLB and utilized nan money to bargain nan Marlins—taking nan Expos' resources pinch him.

MLB's acquisition of nan squad was efficaciously nan ballgame for Montreal, but nan years starring up to nan team's relocation produced a slew of absorbing what-ifs. First, successful 2003 and 2004, nan Expos divided their location games betwixt Montreal and San Juan's Hiram Bithorn Stadium—routinely drafting amended successful Puerto Rico than successful Canada. Along pinch San Juan, respective non-Washington cities circled nan Expos, pinch Charlotte and Portland discussed arsenic contenders. Ultimately, nan American superior won nan Expos sweepstakes, and nan squad took connected nan sanction of respective early Washington teams—the Nationals.

What is nan bequest of nan Expos' last years?

For galore years, nan bequest of nan Expos' messy relocation seemed to beryllium MLB's eagerness to debar a repeat—but nan Athletics' wide reviled, slow-motion departure from Oakland appears to person scuttled that. Montreal retains an appetite for baseball, arsenic nan Expos unrecorded connected arsenic a nostalgia item—"The DNA is still present moreover though they’re gone," documentary head Jean-François Poisson told GQ's Matthew Roberson Thursday. If description 1 time brings shot backmost to Quebec, nan Expos—as ever—will apt request to do thing astir Olympic Stadium, which someway still stands connected nan eve of its 50th anniversary.

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