Buffalo Bisons

Professional baseball returned to Buffalo in 1979 when an investment group led by Mayor James D. Griffin purchased the Jersey City A's of the Double-A Eastern League for $55,000. The team adopted the historic Bisons name and played at War Memorial Stadium — the same venue where the Buffalo Bills had once hosted AFL games.

The franchise's fortunes changed dramatically when Robert E. Rich Jr. purchased the team for $100,000 in 1983. Rich had a vision for Buffalo as a major league city, and he began by upgrading the Bisons to Triple-A in 1985 after acquiring the Wichita Aeros of the American Association for $1 million. The construction of Pilot Field in downtown Buffalo in 1988 was the centerpiece of his strategy — a state-of-the-art ballpark that could hold over 21,000 fans and serve as evidence of Buffalo's readiness for the big leagues.

The gambit nearly worked. The Bisons became a national phenomenon, drawing over a million fans in four consecutive seasons and setting the all-time minor league single-season attendance record of 1,240,951 in 1991. Buffalo was a serious contender for the 1993 MLB expansion, but the franchises went to Miami and Denver instead. Despite the disappointment, the Bisons had established themselves as the gold standard of minor league operations.

The mid-1990s through early 2010s represented the Bisons' most successful period on the field. After affiliating with Cleveland (1995-2008), the Bisons won division titles in 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2004, and 2005, capturing league championships in 1997, 1998, and 2004. The 1997 and 1998 back-to-back titles established Buffalo as the International League's dominant franchise.

During the Cleveland years, future major leaguers like Richie Sexson, Bartolo Colon, and C.C. Sabathia passed through Buffalo. Manager Marty Brown led the club from 2003 to 2005, guiding the 2004 squad to both a division title and a league championship. Torey Lovullo — who would later manage the Arizona Diamondbacks to a National League pennant — skippered the Bisons from 2006 to 2008.

The franchise switched to the New York Mets organization in 2009, bringing a new wave of prospects to Sahlen Field. Tim Teufel, Wally Backman, and other former Mets managed the club during this period, maintaining the team's competitive tradition even as the parent club's fortunes fluctuated. The affiliation lasted through 2012 before the Bisons made the switch that would define their modern identity.