Salem Red Sox general manager Allen Lawrence has worked with officials from the city of Salem for the last nine months to plan for what is expected to be two hectic days this upcoming weekend. Not only is the annual Salem Fair taking place, but a brand of baseball that has become a viral sensation is attracting thousands more to Salem Memorial Ballpark.
Banana Ball coming to Salem in 2025
Four extra parking lots and shuttle services to and from Salem Memorial Ballpark are part of the accommodations being made as Banana Ball, the brand of baseball made famous over the last several years by the Savannah Bananas, is set to make its debut in the Roanoke Valley.
The Firefighters and Texas Tailgaters, two of the four Banana Ball teams, will meet Friday and Saturday at Salem Memorial Ballpark as part of the organization’s yearlong tour across the country.
The pregame plaza opens at 3:30 p.m. and there will be activities until the gates open at 5:30 p.m. The show starts at 6:30 p.m. and the game will begin at 7 p.m.
“I think the difference with this Banana Ball is this is an event. This is something that most of these people will never have the opportunity to see again,” Lawrence said in a phone interview last week. “This is a huge, huge opportunity for the city of Salem, and we’ve been fortunate to have some very good meetings with city officials, and they recognize this and they want to make this a big event.”
Lawrence anticipates between 3,000 to 4,000 fans will be at each pregame party and 6,500 fans will be inside Salem Memorial Ballpark for each game. Those numbers are on top of the thousands who attend the Salem Fair each day.
Fans cheer before the Firefighters and Texas Tailgaters meet in a Banana Ball game on June 20 at The Diamond in Richmond. The same two teams are facing off for two games this upcoming weekend at Salem Memorial Ballpark.
RICHMONd TIMES-DISPATCH, FILE JUNE
He said he has met multiple times with Salem City Manager Christopher Dorsey, Assistant City Manager Rob Light, Wendy Delano and Carey Harveycutter with the Salem Fair, and the Salem police and fire departments to coordinate logistics of parking and traffic flow for the two busy days.
“Logistically with the parking and the fair, it makes things challenging,” Lawrence said, “but it’s something from the very beginning when I made city officials aware that this was even a possibility, their response to it is like, ‘We will figure it out,’ because they realized at the time how big of an opportunity this is.”
In addition to parking at the Salem Civic Center, there are four off-site parking lots that will offer shuttle service free of charge. Those lots are at Phoenix Investors on Roanoke Boulevard, Valley Commons and Layman Distributing on Apperson Drive, and Metis Holdings on Electric Road.
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The shuttles will run until 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday.
“The parking and getting shuttles to and from the parking was certainly the biggest challenge, and we knew going in that was going to be the case,” Lawrence said. “We’ve identified four spots kind of around town that have large parking lots. We’re fortunate we have good relationships with these businesses, and they’ve allowed us to use their parking lots both on Friday and Saturday. Our fans, along with people going to the fair, can park in any of those four lots and then shuttles will be running to and from the stadium.”
Lawrence and members of his staff went to Richmond three weekends ago to see Banana Ball in person and get an idea of what to expect when the show traveled to Salem.
The Firefighters and Texas Tailgaters were the teams who played at The Diamond, and Lawrence received insight from the Richmond Flying Squirrels staff on how the Banana Ball crew worked with the team to make sure everything ran smoothly.
Fans cheer at The Diamond before a Banana Ball game between the Texas Tailgaters and the Firefighters on June 20. The two teams will take the field at Salem Memorial Ballpark this upcoming weekend.
RICHMON TIMES-DISPATCH, FILE JUNE
“The common thing that we kept hearing was the Bananas come in, this is what they do, they make it very easy, they’re great to work with,” Lawrence said. “Observing the players, it’s fun because they always have to have the switch turned on because everybody’s always watching them and I can’t imagine how difficult that must be.
“They do a tremendous job with it, they’re very entertaining, they engage with the crowd, the kids very well, and they sell a ton of merchandise. We’re going to have merchandise tents sent up all over this ballpark and it’s pretty incredible to watch all these people buying merchandise.”
The trip to Richmond was the first of three in Virginia this summer. The Firefighters will take on the Party Animals in Norfolk on July 24-26.
The Savannah Bananas have sold out shows this year in Miami; Tampa Bay; Atlanta; Clemson, South Carolina; Nashville; Kansas City; Charlotte; Cincinnati; and Washington, D.C.
They played in front of soldout crowds at Fenway Park in Boston this past weekend.
“If you look at the list of cities that the Bananas have been to, it’s all very big cities, and then you see Salem, Virginia, on there,” Lawrence said. “For anybody not from this market, they’re probably wondering where in the world Salem, Virginia, is, how in the world we got them, why in the world the Bananas are coming to Salem.
“I don’t know that I know the answer to any of those, but what I do know is that we’re on a list with some pretty major markets out there and it’s just an incredible opportunity not only for us here at the stadium but just really for the city of Salem.”
Damien Sordelett