Fred Nelson, the Astros Director of Player Development, and Stefanie Brown, the River Bandits General Manager, make the announcement today about the new affiliation.

When the news broke that the St. Louis Cardinals would not be renewing their Player Development Contract with the Quad Cities River Bandits, the rumors then began flying over which Big League club would pick up the newly-free low-A club.

With Jeff Luhnow’s familiarity with the Cardinal farm system, the Astros seemed a likely fit.

The River Bandits thought so, too.

Today, the two-year PDC between the Astros and the River Bandits was announced at Modern Woodmen Park in Davenport, Iowa. Bandits general manager Stefanie Brown was accompanied by Astros Director of Player Development Fred Nelson as the two shared the news with local media.

“We’re extremely excited,” Brown said. “Jeff Luhnow has been a friend of ours … so, talking with him was very exciting. In the end we’re very excited about the direction and the rebuilding of the Houston Astros and to have them be part of this community.”

Nelson echoed her sentiments as he recalled the years the Astros had a home in the Quad Cities from 1993-1998.

“One thing that really pushed us towards the Quad Cities was Jeff Lunhow’s relationship and knowledge of the renovations, the operators of the league, and I think because of that, it might have given us a little bit of a leg up coming back into the Davenport area, back in the Quad Cities,” he said. “But, we’re thrilled to death to be here.”

“Rebranding” was the word of the hour, both for the Bandits and the Astros.

With new ownership, management, and front office staff, the Astros are on their way to fulfilling a vision Luhnow and company have — a vision that restores the Astros to the top in the Major Leagues.

“To give you an idea of the direction and the focus of Jeff Luhnow, George Postolos and Jim Crane, they’re all winners – they’re all driven to win,” Nelson said. “Jeff especially. I’ve seen a passion in his desire to win in the Minor Leagues, at all levels, and ultimately we think that will filter into the big leagues as we secure better players, players that we’ve been able to acquire in trades, and through especially this last draft which Jeff and his staff directed.”

For the Bandits, the vision now centers on the excitement of adding that fresh, newly drafted talent and introducing a whole new group to a community — especially since that community is full of Cardinal fans who were disappointed to see their parent club move their affiliate to Peoria. Brown says, though, that simply makes their job more interesting.

“Obviously we were very sad to see the Cardinals go,” Brown said. “They were a great organization, and there are many fans here that are Cardinals fans, but I think it’ll just be educating the community and letting them know the great things that the Astros are doing and probably trying a little bit harder to get the new players out in the community and get that personal touch with the fans. Every organization has a great group of guys and a great group of athletes, so it’s just going to be on us to get them out there.”

Local fans will recognize at least three players who made their way through the Quad Cities on their way to the Major League club in 2012 — Brett Wallace, Chuckie Fick, and most recently, Tyler Greene.

With the potential of a first overall draft pick on his way to town, and oodles of other promising young players, talent will definitely not be a problem.

Ultimately, it came down to three teams vying for the Bandits’ attention — the A’s, the Angels, and the Astros. When all was said and done, it came down to identifying the Major League team that offered the thing the River Bandits wanted most: partnership.

“We were looking for a Major League affiliate that understood what we were doing,” Brown said. “We wanted to have player appearances, we wanted them to be an intricate part of the community, [we wanted] someone that is easy to communicate with, that will hear out our ideas on different promotional ideas or appearances, someone who buys into the same vision.”

For the next two years at least, that team is the Houston Astros. And Nelson is confident that those two years will be exciting — both in the Quad Cities, and eventually all the way to Houston.

Welcome to the Quad Cities, Astros fans!

Tara is a St. Louis Cardinals reporter for Aaron Miles’ Fastball and a contributor to Around the Horn. Follow her on Twitter @tarawellman. 

There are three things that I can’t stop talking about regarding the Houston Astros. I thought I’d give my friends a break and talk about them here instead.

#1 – The New “Previous At-Bat Graphic” on El Grande:

This is a cell phone camera photo, and the brightness of the board makes photos tough. But you can get the idea. Photo credit: Greis Perez

I’d show you a photo, but the ones I have are from a cell phone camera and are “meh.” Well, maybe I’ll show you anyway.

Below the lineup of the appropriate team when a player comes up for his second or subsequent at bats in a game, a graphic of the field is shown along with what happened their last at bat. Is the line green? Then they got on base. Is it red? Then it was an out. A dotted line signifies a grounder while an arched line signifies a fly ball. If it’s a player’s 5th at bat of the game, you’ll see the 4 lines of the 4 previous at bats. I. LOVE. IT.

#2 – Brian Bogusevic Hands the Astros Their First Walk-Off Win of the Season!

Last night against the Milwaukee Brewers, Brian Bogusevic hit a grounder up the middle into the outfield to send Steve Pearce home. Astros win it 4-3 over the Brewers. I hate the Brewers. Well, really I hate Brewers fans. There were some incidents last season during a home series where some fans were insanely rude. So I like to see the Brewers lose.

But I really like to see the Astros finally win. This was a win these boys needed, desperately!

#3 – More Astros are on Twitter than You Think

I was updating the page on this site that has all the team’s twitter handles. Bear in mind it’s still not 100% accurate and a few guys that are in AAA are still on the MLB roster on that page, but hey – I’ve got baseball to watch. Anyway, you’ll notice that almost 20 of the 25 man active roster is now on twitter. Apparently the new guy, Tyler Greene, is not. We need to work on him. Also not on twitter – Xavier Cedeno, Rhiner Cruz, Armando Galarraga, Fernando Rodriguez, Carlos Corporan, Chris Snyder and Scott Moore.  So, if you know any of these guys, can you have a chat with them?

I really like posting a starting lineup on twitter using only twitter handles. It looks cool ;D

Terri Schlather (AGirlintheSouth) is the tortured Senior Houston Astros Writer for Aerys Sports. You can email her at agirlinthesouth@gmail.com, or follow her ridiculous ramblings on sports, vodka and the weeone on twitter @agirlinthesouth.