The Savannah Bananas, the quirky independent baseball team that has become a worldwide phenomenon, will bring its distinctive style of “Banana Ball” to 18 Major League Baseball venues and three football stadiums in 2025, according to an announcement made Thursday. According to owner Jesse Cole, each of these locations is expected to sell out. “We played in front of a million people this year,” Cole told ESPN. “We’ll play in front of 2 million people next year. Maybe it seems cocky, but our waitlist is currently at 3 million.”
The Bananas will be joined by the Party Animals, the Firefighters, and a new team, the Texas Tailgaters, for a 39-game tour from March to September. The trip will stop at Memorial Stadium (Clemson), Nissan Stadium (Tennessee Titans), and Bank of America Stadium (Carolina Panthers). The Bananas will also play two games in each of the following stadiums: New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox, Philadelphia Phillies, Baltimore Orioles, Houston Astros, Seattle Mariners, San Diego Padres, Pittsburgh Pirates, Chicago White Sox, Colorado Rockies, Washington Nationals, Cincinnati Reds, Kansas City Royals, St. Louis Cardinals, Los Angeles Angels, Atlanta Braves, Tampa Bay Rays, Miami Marlins.
The visits were announced Thursday night during the organization’s annual “world tour city draft” on YouTube, and supporters may then join a ticket lottery on the team’s website. The entire 2025 trip, which includes stops at several minor league venues, will last 111 games, from February to October. Banana Ball visited six MLB stadiums this year, including Miami, Philadelphia, Boston, Houston, Cleveland, and Washington, and drew large crowds at each, with tens of thousands of fans arriving hours before the game to participate in pregame activities. Those games featured prominent former big leaguers like Ryan Howard, Roger Clemens, Jamie Moyer, Shane Victorino, Corey Kluber, Jonny Gomes, and Josh Reddick.
“Now as we go out to these major league stadiums, we’re getting reached out to by a lot more former stars — All-Stars, World Series champions, MVPs — that want to be a part of it,” Cole told the sports network. “It’s just wild.” Banana Ball’s experimental phase began somewhat more than five years ago, inspired by a desire to speed up baseball games and keep fans engaged throughout. The Savannah Bananas and its affiliated teams now compete all year. The notion consists of 11 rules.
Stepping out of the batter’s box results in a strike, and attempting a bunt gets you ejected. Mound visits are not permitted. Each inning exists as a separate entity, and games are limited to two hours. Fans are able to contest rulings and record outs by grabbing foul balls. Instead of taking a walk, batters run around the bases on a fourth ball and continue to advance until the defensive team throws the ball to all fielders. In the event of a passed ball or a wild pitch, batters may “steal first,” regardless of count.
In place of extra innings, a one-on-one matchup is played, with the field empty save for one fielder, the pitcher, and his catcher, and the batter attempting an inside-the-park home run when the ball is put in play. An 11th rule, the “golden batter,” was recently implemented, giving each club one chance to deploy any hitter from any position in the lineup.
Cole’s Banana Ball idea book is now part of an exhibit in the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York, which opened in September 2023. Thursday’s announcements included the development of the Banana Ball Championship League, which will debut in 2026 and feature six clubs, with Cole’s ultimate objective of “taking Banana Ball all over the world.”
“At first people were like, ‘Well you’re just the Harlem Globetrotters of baseball,'” Cole recalls. “I consider it as a complement because the Globetrotters really impacted the game of basketball, and they’ve been around for 100 years. “But we see ourselves as if we’re developing a sport. We’re creating something truly unique and enjoyable for future generations. That is when my dream becomes much bigger.”
Cole and his wife, Emily, bought the old Class A affiliate of the New York Mets in Georgia in the fall of 2015 to establish a new collegiate summer league team. Their debt quickly reached $1 million. They sold their North Carolina home, depleted their savings accounts, relocated to Savannah, Georgia, and engaged themselves in the difficult work of marketing offbeat baseball to ardent traditionalists.
Momentum began to shift when their team’s mascot, the Bananas, was introduced. The Bananas’ circus-like entertaining eventually made them a popular draw. The squad made games affordable and portrayed them as major events, with players donning kilts, doing choreographed dances, and participating in bizarre fan gatherings. The Bananas quickly began to sell out Grayson Stadium, a century-old ballpark that formerly hosted Babe Ruth, and Banana Ball became their year-round style of play. Their brand has since expanded immensely.
“It’s something I could’ve never imagined,” said Cole, a former collegiate pitcher. “Walt Disney has always been my biggest mentor.” He said, ‘It’s kind of fun to do the impossible. I simply feel like, in many respects, we’re doing something impossible.”
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