The Potomac Nationals (High Class A; Carolina League) are going way retro on us during the team’s 35th anniversary season: On August 10 the team will don the uniforms and the caps of the 1978 Alexandria Dukes.
The Dukes played for six years at Four Mile Run Park in Alexandria, added to the four-team Carolina League as an independent team and entering the league along with the Kinston Eagles. The team landed an affiliation in 1979 and were renamed the Alexandria Mariners, but the deal didn’t last, and the team went back to unaffiliated status in 1980, as well as the Dukes name. (That year also saw another unaffiliated team, the Rocky Mount Pines, enter the Carolina League as well.) The team then enjoyed the 1981-1983 seasons affiliated with the Pittsburgh Pirates, which saw the likes of Bobby Bonilla and Joe Orsulak pass through town. In 1984 the team moved and became the Prince William Pirates, another predecessor of the current P-Nationals.
The jerseys will be auctioned off after the game.
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