Baseball is a simple game. Pitch the ball, hit the ball, catch the ball, throw the ball. But if the ball drops, run the bases and hope you reach base safely and score some runs. Three strikes and you are out (unless the catcher drops the third strike), three outs to an inning, nine innings per game. If the home team is ahead in the middle of the ninth, they get to go home early. As does everyone, I guess. Game over. But if the home side does come up to bat in the ninth inning in Montgomery, Alabama, you better believe somewhere in Riverwalk Stadium there's a dude dressed up as a baker riding a barnyard animal. It's rally chicken time!
On May 14 of this year, we made our way toward the riverside in Montgomery, paid our $14 each for the best seats in the house and went to see the hometown Montgomery Biscuits (yes, that's the actual team name) take on the visiting Chattanooga Lookouts. The Biscuits were decked out in their "Gump" uniforms that night, celebrating Forrest Gump's fictional hometown in Greenbow, Alabama, and the Lookouts had on their brown colored "Nooga" unis (why abbreviate your city name that way?). And sure enough, there we were almost four hours into a nine inning, ten pitcher game with hundreds of fellow Biscuit fans getting fired up by the rally chicken in hopes of a late game comeback.
It didn't work.
Yes, they had a reasonable shot at a comeback in the ninth but it was a just not a good night for the Biscuits. Four errors in the field squandered an early 1-0 lead as they struggled to find the right solution on the mound. At one point, they even had their third baseman take a shot at firing balls and strikes toward home plate. Their performance in the field and in the batter's box was not enough, even with a grown man in a baker's costume riding a chicken throwing out biscuits in the stands trying to will the team to a come from behind victory. Game over!
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| One of Montgomery's former train sheds - now part of Riverwalk Stadium. |
Sports in large cities and small cities and large towns and small towns are important to community pride and togetherness. Even if the team stinks for years and years and years. Local sports offer a cause to rally around for individuals and families, and people from all walks of life in the community can come together and cheer for a common cause, just like they were this past May at Riverwalk Stadium. That sounds totally corny but I completely believe in it. So much so that the whole premise of my Master's thesis in college was centered around this very idea.
There are many great professional sports leagues and systems in the United States but none have the reach of baseball. And by "reach", I mean no sport has been around in so many communities all over this country for so long. No professional sport has been a part of more people's lives over the last let's say 150 years quite the same way baseball has. Not basketball, not soccer, not hockey, not football. Baseball is it. And baseball is especially important in small cities and large towns and small towns. Large cities have all sorts of access to live professional sports. Everywhere else? Not so much, which is why Minor League Baseball is so important to sports in this country. It touches more spots in the United States than any other sporting league below whatever the top league is.
But that dynamic may be changing. Two years ago there were 160 teams in the Minor League Baseball (MiLB) system. Most of those clubs were owned and operated by local interests, with Major League Baseball (MLB) teams providing the players. In December 2019, MLB decided they wanted to shake that up, meaning cut some costs and cut some teams out of the system. A lot of teams. Like 43. Earlier this year, they did just that.
Now, that doesn't mean that 43 minor league baseball teams ceased to exist, but it might mean something close to that soon. Without the Majors providing players, teams are forced to look for their own squads, something they didn't need the resources to do just two years ago. MLB is also removing one of the big perks of attending minor league ball, the idea that you can see a future superstar right there in your own town. With no players on Major League payrolls, that possibility, however remote, becomes almost not really possible at all. This is critical-level small city and town survival type stuff.
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| Friday night minor league ball in Memphis: Let's go Redbirds!!! |
I got a little hung up on this whole thing last year. And maybe I still am this year. Here's a group of 30 sports franchises that pull in (by one estimate I read) $10 billion per year looking to cut minor league sports out of 43 cities and towns to save less than $25 million annually. How does that make any sense? I'm all for free enterprise but less than $1 million savings per team against that kind of revenue total (assuming the numbers I read are reasonably accurate) seems like it might be worth it to keep baseball in some places of the country that are far, far from any other professional team. Take the little bit of a loss to keep teams in their communities.
So who cares, really? Well, besides me, I think a lot of people. I really do believe having a professional ball team in town is healthy for towns and cities. Some of these teams have been around a long, long time. The Chattanooga team was founded in 1885 and the Lookouts name dates to 1909. That makes them older than 22 of the 30 teams that currently play baseball at its highest level in this country (and Canada). Think that's worth something? I do. Especially since the Lookouts were on the original cut list from MLB (they survived, perhaps obviously).
Unfortunately for me last year, there were very few ways to act on my MiLB fixation since the 2020 MiLB season (but not the MLB season; too much money at stake to let a pandemic get in the way) was canceled in total. So last year, I could not go to a game to cheer on my local minor league team in Richmond, VA or Salisbury, MD. But I did buy some swag based on some trips we took in 2020, including caps from the Vermont Lake Monsters and Missoula Paddleheads and a shirt from the Boise Hawks (actually the Boise Papas Fritas but we'll get to that). I had to support these teams somehow if I couldn't do it at the box office.
But this year, Minor League ball is back. And by happy coincidence, all three cities where we stayed overnight on our tour of the American South not only have MiLB franchises, but all three had games in town at least one night we were also in town. Play ball!
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| The train rolls past Montgomery's Riverwalk Stadium a few times per night. |
We managed to take in two games in our time down south: one in Memphis watching the hometown Redbirds battle (and I use that term loosely here; we left with the Redbirds down 10-1 in the seventh) the visiting Durham Bulls and the May 14 contest between Montgomery and Chattanooga down in Alabama. Both were glorious experiences.
There are a few things that fascinate me about Minor League Baseball. Number one is the connections that the team makes with the local community. This is manifested in so many ways, and not just in the enthusiasm of the adults and kids in the stands. It's in everything from the local food sold at the ballpark to the (sometimes corny) local advertisements and sponsorships to the theme nights with custom one-night-only uniforms to the design of the stadiums. I drank local beer and ate chicken biscuits at the game in Montgomery while three or four trains rumbled by on the freight rail tracks that run right past the stadium. The train is such a huge part of the history of most towns in this country and Montgomery is no exception; a portion of Riverwalk Stadium is a train shed converted into offices and retail space. This connection through their baseball park is huge.
One of the other reasons I love watching Minor League ball is the players on the field in front of you are literally chasing their dreams. Players at this level (AAA in Memphis, one step below the big leagues and AA in Montgomery, one rung further down) are not in it for their weekly wages while they are at the plate or on the mound in places like Pensacola or Biloxi or Norfolk or Louisville. If you are making it in triple-A ball, you are likely pulling in a cool $700 a week (remember this is part time job) and it goes down from there. Double A players earn just $600 each week; that's $15 an hour assuming a 40 hour week. This is poverty line level stuff. The only reason these players are toughing it out in small cities and towns wherever they may be in America is that there is some hope of making it big. These guys are going for it.
Finally, there are the team names. I'm a huge believer in site-specific nicknames for sports teams and the minor leagues generally crush this concept big time. Biscuits in Montgomery, Storm Chasers in Omaha, Isotopes in Albuquerque, Blue Claws on the Jersey Shore, Kernels in Cedar Rapids, Lake Monsters in Vermont, Flying Squirrels in Richmond, Hops in Hillsboro, OR. The creativity is off the charts here and the teams will do everything and anything to sell merch, including numerous rebrands throughout the season (hence the Boise Papas Fritas, part of MiLB's annual celebration of latino influence on the sport). So Redbirds isn't so amazing, especially considering they are the AAA affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals. But the hats are awesome just the same.
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| Beer in Memphis (still under COVID protocols during that game!)... |
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| and biscuits in Montgomery. I mean, OF COURSE!!! |
Neither the Redbirds nor the Biscuits won the games we attended, which as a Washington Wizards and New York Jets fan seemed perfectly in keeping with my typical sports experience. It really didn't matter. I felt a connection to an important American tradition, one that I sincerely hope will continue for a long, long time. Although maybe not in the 43 spots where the Majors pulled a team from earlier this year.
Two years ago at this time, there were professional baseball teams in Lowell, Massachusetts and Port Charlotte, Florida. Neither of those teams exist anymore. The Spinners and Stone Crabs are both gone, victims of the cost savings measures imposed by Major League Baseball. The three teams in Vermont, Missoula and Boise that I elected to support last year by mail-ordering some swag were all stripped of their affiliations this year. In fact, every team in Montana (all three of them) lost their MLB sponsorship this year. Only time will tell what that lack of support will do to these teams in the communities of Great Falls, Missoula and Billings. And Burlington and Boise, for that matter. The effects are already obvious (to me) by checking out the Lake Monsters' website.
Sporting teams being removed from communities by wealthy men looking to save a couple of extra bucks is not a good situation. Fortunately for us this year, there were teams in both Memphis and Montgomery still around for us to spend a few hours watching young men chase their dreams hard. It's a totally different experience from attending a Major League game. The talent level differential is so obvious, but somehow it seems more meaningful standing during the seventh inning stretch in Montgomery, Alabama singing "Take Me Out To The Ball Game" with the line "root, root, root for the Biscuits". I can't wait for my next minor league game. Something tells me I won't have to wait long. Unless Major League Baseball decides they want to save a whole lot more money.
And if they do, I'll always remember the rally chicken!!!
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How We Did It
If you are staying in downtown Memphis or Montgomery (I know, it's a small downtown in Montgomery) and the Redbirds or Biscuits are in town, I'd highly recommend spending three hours or so on a summer night rooting for the home team. Both stadiums are right downtown and walkable from a number of hotels. Plus the tickets are super, super cheap. We paid $14 for the best seats in Montgomery. We splurged a bit more in Memphis (bigger city; better players in theory) and spent $28 each for our seats there.
Because there were limited seats available due to the COVID pandemic, we bought tickets ahead of time for the Redbirds game. I don't think we really needed to. In Montgomery, we just walked up to the box office and got some really great seats. The best part about taking in a game in a place as small as Montgomery, Alabama is that there's really no bad seat in the house.
There are 138 other teams in Minor League Baseball. If you can't make it to Memphis or Montgomery on your next trip, there are plenty of other places to take in a game. Just don't try to do it in Montana this year.
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