The Ever-changing Pioneer League

The Pioneer Baseball League has, in simple terms, three new faces in its 12-team lineup for 2026: The Modesto (Calif.) Roadsters, the Long Beach (Calif.) Coast and the RedPocket Mobiles.

One of these is not like the other — the Mobiles don’t have a home ballpark and will be on the road for all of their 96 regular-season games — but those others continue a tradition nearly as old as the league itself, which dates to 1939.

The original six-team lineup, including the Twin Falls Cowboys, lasted one season; the Idaho Falls Russets replaced the Lewiston Indians in 1940.

Skipping the years where the league was dormant during World War II, the Great Falls Electrics and Billings Mustangs came aboard in 1948 and the Salt City Bees went away in 1959 (and came back in 1967, for three seasons).

You see the pattern. Even when the PBL was affiliated with Major League Baseball, there was movement. Thirty cities have hosted a Pioneer League team, with a few repeating in different eras.

Missoula had the Timberjacks from 1956-60, making Bob Uecker and Jim Kaat the Garden City’s most famous baseball alums before the Lethbridge Black Diamonds moved in as the Missoula Osprey in 1998. Now you might have to go with Paul Goldschmidt.

Then came minor league contraction and now the PaddleHeads call Missoula home as the 16th incarnation of a PBL charter member (Pocatello Cardinals, 1939).

Back to the present: The Mobiles replace the Northern Colorado Owlz, who moved from Orem, Utah, when the PBL became an MLB “Partner League,” in 2021. Early last season financial and league issues caused the franchise to fold. It became the Colorado Springs Sky Sox and shared the stadium of the Rocky Mountain Vibes, a little.

The Vibes are gone, too. The former Helena Brewers moved to Colorado Springs in 2019 (the Mobiles/Owlz were also in Helena for a minute), also folded and have been replaced by Modesto.

The Modesto Roadsters, by the way, are a rebranding of the original nickname of Glo Riders, though the club will still use that moniker from time to time.

That leaves the Grand Junction Jackalopes. From 1978-2000 the club was called the Butte Copper Kings before a move to Casper, Wyo., as the Casper Rockies (and later, Ghosts) and another in 2012 to Grand Junction. There they became the Rockies again but then adopted the Jackalopes mascot in 2023.

The Jackalopes’ departure for Long Beach leaves Colorado without a team and California with four, including the defending champion Oakland Ballers, who come to Kalispell next Tuesday.

Montana also has four in our Glacier Range Riders along with Missoula, Billings and Great Falls, Idaho (Idaho Falls, Boise) has two and Utah (Ogden) has one.

Pioneer League president Mike Shapiro remains positive about the league.

“I think we’re looking at a very exciting season with new teams,” he said Monday. “Modesto has a newly renovated facility.

“And Yuba-Sutter is going full ABS on balls and strikes, not just appeals.”

This is where the term “Partner League,” which the PBL is at least through 2028, applies. Officials are mum how much (if any) financial support MLB still gives the PBL, but the lower league has brought in innovations that big leagues monitor closely.

Examples: The ABS system came to the PBL first; so did the Knockout Round to replace extra innings, which has been implemented in the Major League All-Star game.

“We look as what do as a league as a bellwether for the Major leagues,” Shapiro said. “And that’s exciting.”

So yes, Yuba-Sutter relocated from Davis, Calif., to Marysville two years ago and rebranded from the “High Wheelers” to the “Freebirds.” Twelve teams is still three times as many as the PBL had in 1964, and while Shapiro would love to find a permanent home for the Mobiles, he’s excited.

“It’s a lot of fun and it’s affordable,” he said of the circuit. “We do a great service for young players who are trying to climb the ladder and give them an opportunity to play pro ball. So there are a lot of good reasons for the Pioneer League.”