The new baseball stadium in Madison? (Huntsville, Excel: living, restaurants, shops)

[TC2coolmom]

This is a HUGE waste of TAX dollars! The Huntsville team did not work and the teams got bought and moved. It's not worth the mess, people don't care about baseball here. They love high school football and band and that's it. It's just not worth our tax dollars.

[Teko03]

Originally Posted by TC2coolmom

This is a HUGE waste of TAX dollars! The Huntsville team did not work and the teams got bought and moved. It's not worth the mess, people don't care about baseball here. They love high school football and band and that's it. It's just not worth our tax dollars.

The Stars remained in Huntsville for 29 years...hard to say that it didn't work out and that people didn't care about baseball.

[MadisonMike]

Dilly Dilly!

Originally Posted by Teko03

The Stars remained in Huntsville for 29 years...hard to say that it didn't work out and that people didn't care about baseball.

[dijkstra]

Originally Posted by Teko03

The Stars remained in Huntsville for 29 years...hard to say that it didn't work out and that people didn't care about baseball.

They had one of the lowest attendance numbers in the league for years. They had to give tickets away for free and still couldn't draw a crowd. They did ok back in the day when people had a lot less options for entertainment and baseball was far more popular around here. They did leave didn't they?

On a side note, they are only drawing an average attendance of around 2500 in Biloxi in a brand new stadium. They aren't doing very much better now than they were when they were here.

Originally Posted by MadisonMike

Dilly Dilly!

Wth does Dilly Dilly mean?

Edit: It hit me that "Dilly Dilly" is from that obnoxious bud light commercial.

[RocketDawg]

When the Stars first came to town (around 1985) the team had players such as Jose Canseco and Mark McGuire ... we almost had a major league team for a while. Attendance was outstanding, and on special nights (I remember one night when the Beach Boys were there) might get >14,000. As I recall, the team did well as long as they were affiliated with Oakland but fell off drastically after the Brewers took over. That might be coincidental, or it could be the A's sent better players and had more interest in the team. We had season tickets for several years and really enjoyed them.

There should be enough young families with kids that will support a new team. We might even go to some games even though we're older now. Birmingham and Chattanooga still support their teams, but I don't know how well it'll go over here. We'll see if they decide to go that route.

[cjseliga]

For minor league baseball you will always have your "hardcore" fans, the trick is to get people to come out year after year regardless who is on the team and how well they are doing. A good majority of people at these games, major and minor leagues, rather look at their phones 90% of the time or conversate with their friends while having a beer, like they are at the bar, not caring one bit about the game.

It sounds sort of counter-intuitive, but minor league baseball is not really in the baseball business, they are in the family entertainment business (it's the same for minor league hockey as well). You need to have some sort of contest between every inning on the field to keep the kids and sometimes the adults entertained. You need to promote the heck out of the team year round, even in the winter, trying to get people to buy season tickets (full or partial) as a Christmas gift, try and get tons of groups there for every game. Construct a temporary ice skating rink on the field in the winter.

Convert the ballpark into a 9 hole golf course in the Fall, where people tee off in the open concourse and aim for the field, kind of like Topgolf, but in a minor league ballpark (that's been done many a times in the minors). Have an October Beerfest in the Fall at the ballpark. Rent the ballpark out to church groups to hold services on Sunday mornings if it is warm enough.

For Double A, I would think drawing at least 3,500 to 4,000 would/should be a goal regardless of how well the team does, of course everybody loves a winner and that helps your attendance no doubt. Keep the ticket prices relatively cheap for the market you are in. It always nice to be affiliated to your closest MLB team, sometimes that is hard/impossible to do though.

And in the end if your city/metroplex does build a new state of the art ballpark with the latest and greatest bells and whistles, know that in 20 years your team could be moving/relocating to a new city if you don't upgrade/renovate your stadium, such is life in the minor leagues!

[cjseliga]

New BayBears Owners Believe in Madison Market

“I think this is probably the best minor-league baseball market in the United States that does not currently have a team,” Nelson said.

The fact that Huntsville just recently lost a team 3 years ago, because after failing to get a new ballpark built, hasn’t deterred him from considering North Alabama after heavily vetting the market.

“We love the demographics here. We love the economy here. We love the enthusiasm of the folks we have met with here. There’s a very attractive site in Madison that we like quite a bit,” Nelson said.

To this point, the club has received permission to explore the market, but permission to relocate has not been granted and would have to come as part of a later process.

[MadisonMike]

Madison expects agreement with minor league team owners in January | AL.com

[MadisonMike]

A little birdy told me that today (13 FEB2018) Mayor Finley will announce the agreement is finalized. Will likely be covered by news outlets (live) later in the day.

Originally Posted by MadisonMike

Madison expects agreement with minor league team owners in January | AL.com

[Tennhioland]

Originally Posted by MadisonMike

A little birdy told me that today (13 FEB2018) Mayor Finley will announce the agreement is finalized. Will likely be covered by news outlets (live) later in the day.

Woohoo! It has seemed like a definite for a little while now, but will be nice to make it official and start building that thing. Should obviously help speed up the interchange and additional retail when it becomes official.