City: Birmingham, AL

Category: Spectator Sports

Address: 100 Ben Chapman Dr.

Description: With the Barons, sports fans in Birmingham have no trouble filling the void between the end of basketball season in the spring and the beginning of football season in fall. And with promotions like “Belly Buster Monday” and “Thirsty Thursday,” Barons games are both a fun and inexpensive way for the whole family to spend an evening in Birmingham while taking in some serious baseball action. The Barons have called Hoover’s Regions Park (formerly the Hoover Met) home since 1988 when they moved away from historic Rickwood Field. Dating back to the 1880s, the Barons are one of the most storied franchises in all of minor league baseball and have been a launching pad for some of the game’s greatest players including Reggie Jackson, Frank Thomas, and Willie Mays, who played for the Birmingham Black Barons during segregation. And in 1994 packed stadiums saw basketball legend Michael Jordan don the Barons’ black-and-white uniforms during his sabbatical from the NBA and his short foray into professional baseball. The team is an affiliate of the Chicago White Sox since 1986 and Barons fans have seen a number of their former players go on to star for the parent club on Chicago’s South Side. Prior to its affiliation with the White Sox, the Barons were affiliated with the Oakland As, at the time owned by Birmingham native Charles O. Finley. Birmingham had been without a professional baseball club for one season before Finley, who grew up a short distance from Rickwood Field as a boy, brought it back in 1967, winning the Southern League title with many of the same stars that would go on to win multiple World Series in Oakland. In addition to the White Sox, the Barons have been affiliated with a number of big-league teams such as the Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, and Detroit Tigers. The current Barons still play in the Southern League of double-A minor league baseball where they consistently finish at or near the top. The Barons made the playoffs a record six consecutive seasons from 2000 to 2005, winning the Southern League title in 2002 with a lineup that featured many of the players that would lead the White Sox to the World Series title three seasons later in 2005, and in 2009 the Barons set a club record for regular season winning percentage, winning 66.2 percent of its games. Individual ticket prices range from $7 to $12 while season tickets range from $90 to $420. Various discount packages are also available.