I find it very,
very hard to believe that the Portland movers and shakers that I follow here and in The Oregonian would ever be organized enough to actually begin the long and hard work of attracting a MLB team to Portland, let alone actually succeed in winning a franchise expansion slot or steal a team from another city.
And then of course there would be the issue of actually building a 50,000 seat stadium that has wind turbines on the roof, four MAX stations covering all four sides of the facility, and only serves organic beer at the snack bars.
Oh, and you can't have any sponsor put a billboard up in the outfield that looks too "corporate", lest you degrade the Portland experience.
Portland could barely get a soccer team that won't get any major media exposure to take over a 60 year old baseball stadium, and even that isn't a done deal.
Just for
SOCCER, of all things!
MLB and the mega-stadium it would need will require a major sea change in political thinking from Portland's city hall and the people who grease the wheels of politics there.