While it is the baseball offseason, the Binghampton Rumble Ponies have been very active with two huge announcements for the franchise. First and foremost, the organization announced the sale of the team from Evans Street Baseball to David Sobotka of Southpaw Enterprises, LLC. On Twitter, Sobotka introduced himself to the fans:

https://twitter.com/RumblePoniesBB/status/1462848299627651077?s=20

Kevin Stevens of Press Connects reports the terms of the sale have not been announced. Sobotka was a partner in the $18 billion hedge fund Capula Investments, and he is “director on the board of BWC Terminals, a portfolio company of the JP Morgan Infrastructure Fund, and treasurer of the board of DREAM, an organization serving 2,500 youth in the communities of East Harlem, the South Bronx and Newark through charter schools and out-of-school programming.”

John Hughes of Evans Street Baseball was the previous owner who oversaw the rebranding of the franchise as the Rumble Ponies. He also oversaw the renovations of what is now dubbed Mirabito Stadium. Speaking of Mirabito Stadium, the new Rumble Ponies ownership and the City of Binghamton have announced a new 23 year lease for the ballpark.

As part of the lease, Binghamton will provide an additional $3.1 million in public funding to continue upgrades to the ballpark. Many of these upgrades were necessitated to bring the ballpark into Minor League Baseball ballpark compliance. This was a significant issue when Major League Baseball announced the contraction of 42 minor league teams.