Book it! Savannah Bananas baseball back with sold-out preseason, league games and new book

So many people want to see the spectacle that is Savannah Bananas baseball, the team added an exhibition game May 24 at Grayson Stadium.

Not that it put much of a dent in the demand to watch the collegiate summer league ballclub perform.

"The wait list is past 40,000 for tickets," Bananas co-owner Jesse Cole said Friday. "When we put tickets on sale for June and July (league games), it didn't even get close. ... It was gone in the first hour."

The Bananas introduced their fans-first focus of baseball-based entertainment in their inaugural season of 2016 — an overload of music, singing, dancing and comedy bits involving players, coaches and a growing cast of characters interacting with spectators before, during and after games.

The Bananas could play ball, too, winning the Coastal Plain League title.

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The ballclub returns as defending champion in 2022 after claiming its second crown last season. The Bananas are at home against the Florence (S.C.) Flamingos at 7 p.m. May 26, and all 24 home games are sold out through the regular-season finale July 30 against the Wilmington (N.C.) Sharks.

But first, the college players will play a preseason contest against the Bananas' Premier Team, a collection of professional and former college players on May 24 to highlight Banana Fest at 5:30 p.m. at Grayson Stadium.

The format will be Banana Ball, an unorthodox version of the game with rules to speed-up play and create more action and drama. Basic rules include a two-hour time limit, no mound visits, no stepping out of the batter's box, and foul balls caught by fans are outs.

Banana Ball is so popular, the team specifies on its website which contests are Banana Ball and which are the CPL's traditional nine-inning games. The May 24 game sold out about 4,100 tickets in a couple of hours, Cole said, and because this is the Bananas, that's not all there is to it.

"We also purchased over 2,000 banana costumes to break the world record for most people in a banana costume at an event, which is going to be awesome," said Cole, who wears a banana-yellow tuxedo and accessories to all team-related appearences, including when speaking to businesses and corporations.

Because Cole and company don't have enough going on, he launched his second book on Tuesday. The author of "Find Your Yellow Tux: How to Be Successful by Standing Out" in January 2018 has a new book: "Fans First: Change the Game, Break the Rules & Create an Unforgettable Experience."

His wife, team co-owner Emily Cole, also is an author, of a children's book "Go Bananas!" in 2021.

Cole said Friday he was "blown away" by hundreds of pre-orders for the book.

"The response has been overwhelming and exciting in sharing stories that most people never knew about our players, our staff, of things that were happening, about what we were trying to do to create Fans First moments," he said. "I'm very excited for the launch."

Heavily invested in their social media presence — including 2.5 million followers on TikTok — the Bananas are getting the word out through a long-standing medium.

"Having a book is another way to reach more fans and share the story and also, hopefully, inspire others to look at their life and how they can create fans and try to create moments and be a part of things that are unforgettable," Cole said. "That's what we're trying to do."

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More Banana Ball in late summer

Banana Ball will return after the CPL season with Friday and Saturday home dates Aug. 19-20, Aug. 26-27 and Sept. 2-3. Tickets went on sale May 17 and are sold out.

Cole also mentioned the possibility of "a very big surprise" road game in the fall but revealed no more, as it's a surprise.

The Bananas Premier Team is ahead of schedule on Cole's plan for the franchise by 2025. A spinoff from the college squad, the travel team has an in-house foil in another professional outfit, the Party Animals. The rosters are formed before the series opener from the same talent pool, and the teams play straight up.

After testing early incarnations of Banana Ball since 2018, the ballclub played a limited spring series in 2021 under pandemic protocols with two home games and a "One City World Tour" to Mobile, Alabama. The players felt like rock stars in selling out two nights with seating limited to 3,500 for social distancing at Hank Aaron Stadium.

A more ambitious 2022 spring series of games in Savannah plus six other cities, played 13 games since March, sold out every night and has garnered national media attention.

"Our 2025 vision was that we'll go to eight cities by 2025," Cole said. "We'll be at 20 to 25 cities next year. The speed and the momentum is more than we could have ever imagined in how much it's resonated and the impact it's made."

Going all out in Kansas City

Bus trips this spring to Columbus, Georgia as well as Daytona Beach and West Palm Beach, Florida; and Montgomery and Birmingham, Alabama, were followed by the team's lone plane trip 1,000 miles away to Kansas City, Missouri.

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The Bananas' opponent on May 6-7 was not familiar foe the Party Animals. The Kansas City Monarchs are an independent minor league team that won the 2021 title in the American Association of Professional Baseball. The 2022 roster includes veterans Matt Adams and Pete Kozma, who were in the big leagues in 2021.

"It was the most nervous I've been going into a game," Cole said. "It was a statement game. A lot of people say what the Bananas do is a joke, it's a scripted circus. I'm one of the first people to say it's a circus and a baseball game breaks out, but the fact that it is good baseball, high-level baseball, I think, that brings it all together. That's the glue of the circus and entertainment."

The Bananas had a depleted roster, as players had left to start playing for full-season pro teams, so they became a hybrid with the Party Animals. Jonny Gomes, 41, a big leaguer from 2003-15, joined at the invitation of Bananas manager Eric Byrnes, 46, in the MLB from 2000-10. Gomes and Byrnes — calling on himself to pinch hit — contributed to the cause.

The team still had Bill Lee, 75, the former All-Star and World Series starter for the Boston Red Sox who hasn't stopped pitching since his last big-league game in 1982. One of the MLB's all-time characters, the left-hander pitched a clean inning in one game and came out of the stands after chugging a beer to retire a Monarchs batter.

"He literally chugged an entire beer," Cole recalled. "He chugs it, throws it behind him, and then gets an out to get out of an inning. It was legendary. Only Bill Lee can be the one to do that."

They brought the whole circus to town. About 100 people in the travel party, from players, coaches and front-office staff to dancing umpires, male cheerleaders, a pep band, Disney-like Princess Potassia, a magician, a trick pitcher and a trick batter.

On the field, the Monarchs scored six runs in the first inning and won Game 1, but the Bananas responded to split the series in Game 2. Each game attracted a sellout of 6,000, with Cole observing "it was really crazy to see" people selling some $20 tickets on the secondary market for $100 or more.

"Kansas City was a huge coming-out party for the Bananas. It proved so many things to us," Cole said.

"We really went all out to make sure they would see a great show. That's the goal in the future. We want to bring the full show and give people something they've never seen before on a baseball field."

Nathan Dominitz is the Sports Content Editor of the Savannah Morning News and savannahnow.com. Email him at ndominitz@savannahnow.com. Twitter: @NathanDominitz

This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Savannah Bananas baseball team back 2022 coastal plain league season