Carolina League

The Carolina League is a Minor League Baseball league which has operated along the Atlantic Coast of the United States since 1945. Having been classified at various levels throughout its existence, it operated at Class A-Advanced from 1990 until its demotion to Single-A following Major League Baseball's 2021 reorganization of the minor leagues. The league temporarily operated for the 2021 season as the Low-A East before reassuming its original moniker in 2022.
The organization that later became the Carolina League formed in 1945, just as World War II was ending, and consisted of eight teams, six from North Carolina and two from southern Virginia. This later grew to as many as 12 teams at times.

WWW carolinaleague.com

History

The Carolina League was announced on October 29, 1944, after an organizational meeting at Durham, North Carolina. It was a successor to the Class D Bi-State League that existed before World War II. The league began play in 1945 with eight teams based in Burlington, Durham, Greensboro, Leaksville, Raleigh, Winston-Salem, along with Danville and Martinsville from Virginia.
A few of the many Carolina League players who have gone on to star in the Major Leagues include Baseball Hall of Famers like: Johnny Bench, Wade Boggs, Rod Carew, Chipper Jones, Willie McCovey, Joe Morgan, Dave Parker, Tony Pérez, and Carl Yastrzemski. Other notable future Major League players who honed their skills in the Carolina League include Barry Bonds, Dock Ellis, Dwight Evans, Dwight Gooden, Zack Greinke, Andruw Jones, Andy Pettitte, Jorge Posada, Darryl Strawberry, and Bernie Williams.
Director and screenwriter Ron Shelton's 1988 film Bull Durham, starring Kevin Costner, Tim Robbins, and Susan Sarandon, depicted a fictionalized account of the Durham Bulls, at that time a Carolina League team. Before he began making films, Shelton had a five-year minor league career in the Baltimore Orioles' organization, which included a stint in the International League.
The Carolina League added two expansion teams for the 2017 season to fill two vacant spots at the Class A-Advanced level previously occupied by the California League's Bakersfield Blaze and High Desert Mavericks, which ceased operations at the end of the 2016 season. These additional teams were the Down East Wood Ducks in Kinston, North Carolina, and the Buies Creek Astros in Buies Creek, North Carolina. After the 2018 season, the Buies Creek Astros relocated to Fayetteville, North Carolina as the Fayetteville Woodpeckers. After the 2019 season, the Potomac Nationals relocated within Northern Virginia to Fredericksburg, rebranding themselves as the Fredericksburg Nationals.
The start of the 2020 season was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic before ultimately being cancelled on June 30. As part of Major League Baseball's 2021 reorganization of the minor leagues, the Carolina League was demoted to Single-A and temporarily renamed the "Low-A East" for the 2021 season. In the realignment process, the Frederick Keys were demoted out of professional baseball into the hybrid amateur/professional MLB Draft League, the Wilmington Blue Rocks and Winston-Salem Dash were shifted to the South Atlantic League, and five teams were moved from the old SAL to bring the CL to twelve member teams. Following MLB's acquisition of the rights to the names of the historical minor leagues, the Carolina League name was restored effective with the 2022 season.
In July 2024, MiLB announced that the Hickory Crawdads will join the Carolina League in 2025, replacing the Down East Wood Ducks.

Current teams

Division	Team	MLB affiliation	City	Stadium	Capacity
North	Delmarva Shorebirds	Baltimore Orioles	Salisbury, Maryland	Arthur W. Perdue Stadium	5,200
North	Fayetteville Woodpeckers	Houston Astros	Fayetteville, North Carolina	Segra Stadium	4,786
North	Fredericksburg Nationals	Washington Nationals	Fredericksburg, Virginia	Virginia Credit Union Stadium	5,000
North	Lynchburg Hillcats	Cleveland Guardians	Lynchburg, Virginia	Bank of the James Stadium	4,000
North	Salem RidgeYaks	Boston Red Sox	Salem, Virginia	Salem Memorial Ballpark	6,300
North	Wilson Warbirds	Milwaukee Brewers	Wilson, North Carolina	Wilson Stadium	4,500
South	Augusta GreenJackets	Atlanta Braves	North Augusta, South Carolina	SRP Park	4,782
South	Charleston RiverDogs	Tampa Bay Rays	Charleston, South Carolina	Joseph P. Riley Jr. Park	6,000
South	Columbia Fireflies	Kansas City Royals	Columbia, South Carolina	Segra Park	7,501
South	Hickory Crawdads	Texas Rangers	Hickory, North Carolina	L. P. Frans Stadium	5,062
South	Kannapolis Cannon Ballers	Chicago White Sox	Kannapolis, North Carolina	Atrium Health Ballpark	4,930
South	Myrtle Beach Pelicans	Chicago Cubs	Myrtle Beach, South Carolina	Pelicans Ballpark	6,599

All-time teams (1945–present)

All teams that have competed in the Carolina League since its founding in 1945:

League timeline (1945–present)

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Period = from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/2026
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Colors = id:barcolor
id:line value:pink
id:bg value:white
id:Full value:rgb # Use this color to denote a team that is a current league member
id:Past value:rgb # Use to indicate a former team
id:OtherC1 value:rgb # Use this color to denote a team that has moved to another current league
PlotData=
width:15 textcolor:black shift: anchor:from fontsize:s
bar:1 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/1955 text:Burlington Bees / Burlington-Graham Pirates
bar:1 color:Past from:01/01/1958 till:12/31/1972 text:Burlington Indians / Senators / Rangers
bar:2 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/1958 text:Danville Leafs
bar:2 color:Past from:01/01/1998 till:12/31/1998 text:Danville 97s
bar:3 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/1971 text:Durham Bulls / Raleigh-Durham Mets / Phillies / Triangles
bar:3 color:Past from:01/01/1980 till:12/31/1997 text:Durham Bulls
bar:4 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/1968 text:Greensboro Patriots / Red Sox / Patriots / Yankees / Patriots
bar:5 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/1947 text:Leaksville-Draper-Spray Triplets
bar:6 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/1949 text:Martinsville A's
bar:7 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/1953 text:Raleigh Capitals
bar:7 color:Past from:01/01/1958 till:12/31/1967 text:Raleigh Capitals / Mets / Cardinals / Pirates
bar:8 color:Past from:01/01/1945 till:12/31/2020 text:Winston-Salem Cardinals / Twins / Red Birds / Red Sox / Spirits / Warthogs / Dash
bar:9 color:Past from:01/01/1948 till:12/31/1955 text:Reidsville Luckies / Phillies
bar:10 color:Past from:01/01/1950 till:12/31/1956 text:Fayetteville A's / Highlanders
bar:10 color:Full from:01/01/2019 till:12/31/2026 text:Fayetteville Woodpeckers
bar:11 color:Past from:01/01/1954 till:12/31/1958 text:High Point-Thomasville Hi-Toms
bar:11 color:Past from:01/01/1968 till:12/31/1969 text:High Point-Thomasville Hi-Toms / Royals
bar:12 color:Past from:01/01/1956 till:05/11/1957 text:Kinston Eagles
bar:12 color:Past from:01/01/1962 till:12/31/1974 text:Kinston Eagles / Expos
bar:12 color:Past from:01/01/1978 till:12/31/2011 text:Kinston Eagles / Blue Jays / Eagles / Indians
bar:12 color:Past from:01/01/2017 till:12/31/2024 text:Down East Wood Ducks
bar:13 color:Past from:01/01/1956 till:12/31/1968 text:Wilson Tobs
bar:13 color:Past from:01/01/1973 till:12/31/1973 text:Wilson Pennants
bar:14 color:Past from:01/01/1962 till:12/31/1975 text:Rocky Mount Leafs / Phillies
bar:14 color:Past from:01/01/1980 till:12/31/1980 text:Rocky Mount Pines
bar:15 color:Past from:01/01/1963 till:12/31/1971 text:Peninsula Senators / Grays / Astros / Phillies
bar:15 color:Past from:01/01/1974 till:12/31/1974 text: / Pennants
bar:15 color:Past from:01/01/1976 till:12/31/1992 text: / Pilots / White Sox / Virginia Generals / Peninsula Pilots
bar:16 color:Past from:01/01/1963 till:12/31/1968 text:Tidewater Tides
bar:17 color:Full from:01/01/1966 till:12/31/2026 text:Lynchburg White Sox / Twins / Rangers / Mets / Red Sox / Hillcats
bar:18 color:Past from:01/01/1967 till:12/31/1967 text:Asheville Tourists
bar:19 color:Full from:01/01/1968 till:12/31/2026 text:Salem Rebels / Pirates / Redbirds / Buccaneers / Avalanche / Red Sox / RidgeYaks
bar:20 color:Past from:01/01/1969 till:12/31/1969 text:Red Springs Twins
bar:21 color:Past from:01/01/1978 till:12/31/1983 text:Alexandria Dukes / Mariners / Dukes
bar:22 color:Past from:01/01/1984 till:12/31/1998 text:Prince William Pirates / Yankees / Cannons
bar:22 color:Past from:01/01/1999 till:12/31/2019 text:Potomac Cannons / Nationals
bar:23 color:Full from:01/01/2020 till:12/31/2026 text:Fredericksburg Nationals
bar:24 color:Past from:01/01/1981 till:12/31/1988 text:Hagerstown Suns
bar:25 color:Past from:01/01/1989 till:12/31/2020 text:Frederick Keys
bar:26 color:Past from:01/01/1993 till:12/31/2020 text:Wilmington Blue Rocks
bar:27 color:Full from:01/01/1999 till:12/31/2026 text:Myrtle Beach Pelicans
bar:28 color:Past from:01/01/2012 till:12/31/2024 text:Carolina Mudcats
bar:29 color:Past from:01/01/2017 till:12/31/2018 text:Buies Creek Astros
bar:30 color:Full from:01/01/2021 till:12/31/2026 text:Delmarva Shorebirds
bar:31 color:Full from:01/01/2021 till:12/31/2026 text:Augusta GreenJackets
bar:33 color:Full from:01/01/2021 till:12/31/2026 text:Charleston RiverDogs
bar:34 color:Full from:01/01/2021 till:12/31/2026 text:Columbia Fireflies
bar:35 color:Full from:01/01/2021 till:12/31/2026 text:Kannapolis Cannon Ballers
bar:36 color:Full from:01/01/2025 till:12/31/2026 text:Hickory Crawdads
bar:37 color:Full from:01/01/2026 till:12/31/2026 text:Wilson Warbirds
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text:^"Carolina League Timeline"

> If the chart uses more than one bar color, add a legend by selecting the appropriate fields from the following three options Leave a blank line after the end of the timeline, then add a line with the selected values from the list, separated by a space. <#