Banana Ball

Last updated

Banana Ball Championship League
Banana Ball logo.png
Sport Baseball
Founded2023
Commissioner Jesse Cole
No. of teams6
Most recent
champion		 Savannah Bananas
Broadcasters
Streaming partners
Official website bananaball.com

Banana Ball, or the Banana Ball Championship League (BBCL) from 2026 onward, [1] [2] is a barnstorming exhibition baseball league based in Savannah, Georgia. [3] The league has played most of their games at Grayson Stadium since its inaugural season. The league has six teams: the Savannah Bananas, the Party Animals, the Firefighters, the Texas Tailgaters, the Loco Beach Coconuts and the Indianapolis Clowns, the latter a revival of the legendary Negro League baseball team. [4]

Contents

History

Experiments with the Banana Ball format began in 2018 when the Savannah Bananas played an exhibition game against Lander University. The first official Banana Ball game was played at Grayson Stadium in 2020 when the Savannah team split into two parts for the game. From 2020–2022 the Savannah team played both Banana Ball and their regular Coastal Plain League (CPL) schedule. The Savannah Bananas began playing Banana Ball full time and the league was formed in 2023. [5] [6]

Teams

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Locations of Banana Ball teams.

Savannah Bananas

The Bananas were a part of the Coastal Plain League (CPL) West division, [7] where they won three Petitt Cup championships (2016, 2021, and 2022). The first ever Banana Ball team carrying the name of the Bananas began in 2020. However, after the growth of Banana Ball, the team moved entirely to exhibition games against their partner touring teams.

Party Animals

During the 2020 shortened Bananas CPL season, the organization debuted a second squad for Banana Ball games at home: the Party Animals, wearing black or pink uniforms. Previously, the Banana Ball games were played as intrasquad scrimmage games of the CPL Bananas pre-season. The creation of the new team gave the Bananas a true home or away opponent in its exhibition gamedays during most of the season. In 2024, the Party Animals were fleshed out as a more permanent team with its own slate of games outside of the Bananas tour. [8]

Firefighters

Debuting on October 5, 2023, as part of the 2024 season launch night, the Firefighters wear firefighter themed uniforms, including firefighter helmets. [9]

Visitors

Introduced in June 2024, the Visitors serve as opponents for the Party Animals or Bananas in games when the other team faces the Firefighters. [8] The Visitors wear generic gray uniforms with blue numbering (with no names on the back of jerseys) and constitute the minor league training wing of the Bananas organization.

Texas Tailgaters

The Texas Tailgaters were announced on October 3, 2024, during the 2025 season launch night, as the fourth team in the league and fifth overall. Despite the name, the team is also currently based in Savannah, Georgia, but it will headline games in Texas in September 2025. The Tailgaters are the first semi-regional team to launch since the original Bananas. In addition to their Texas headlining tour, the Tailgaters' first season was successfully held with games across the country against the other three league teams. [1] [10] [11]

Loco Beach Coconuts

On October 9th, 2025, as part of the 2026 season launch night, the BBCL announced the creation of the Loco Beach Coconuts, which will make their league debut in 2026 with their tropical and beach-themed uniforms. [12]

Indianapolis Clowns

Also on October 9th, 2025, the BBCL would formally induct as one of the new member teams the Indianapolis Clowns, a revival of the club of the same name from the Negro American League. They will wear a modernized form of the old uniform jerseys of the old club.

Banana Ball rules

The rules of Banana Ball have developed. [13] As of Oct 2025, the Banana Ball rules are as amended: [14]

  1. Games are won by points, instead of runs: the team that scores the most runs in an inning gets one point, except in the final inning when every run counts as one point. The final inning may be earlier than the ninth inning, due to the time limit noted below. When the home team has scored enough runs to "win" any inning other than the final inning, the inning immediately ends.
  2. There is a two-hour time limit; no new inning may start after 120 minutes have elapsed. Once an inning starts, it is played to completion.
  3. Batters cannot step out of the batter's box. Doing so results in an automatic strike.
  4. Batters cannot bunt. Doing so results in an automatic ejection.
  5. Batters can attempt to steal first base at any point during their at bat, including on passed balls or wild pitches.
  6. Walks are replaced by "ball-four sprints". After ball four, the batter is allowed to advance as far around the bases as he can while the ball is sequentially thrown to all of the fielders other than the pitcher, starting with the catcher. The ball remains dead, with the batter-runner not liable to be put out, until the four infielders and three outfielders have each touched the ball. This often results in the batter-runner advancing to second base on the sprint.
  7. No mound visits are allowed.
  8. Foul balls caught by fans on the fly are counted as outs. [15]
  9. Ties are broken by a "showdown tiebreaker", an abbreviated extra innings format. Each team's half-inning during the showdown ends with any out or with any run scored by the batter—if the batter puts the ball in play, he must attempt to score. A batter who draws a walk advances to second base, with the hitting team allowed to send a new batter to the plate. The same happens if the batter is hit by a pitch. At any point during the showdown, a home run hit over the outfield wall immediately ends the game in favor of the batting team. If the game is still tied after a showdown round, another showdown round is played, until there is a winner. Scenarios differ by showdown round: In showdown round 1, each team selects a pitcher and hitter to face off, with the defense fielding only their pitcher, catcher, and a single fielder. In showdown round 2, the fielder is eliminated. In showdown round 3 (and later), the fielder returns, but each half-inning starts with the bases loaded, and each run scored counts as a point.
  10. Each team is allowed to challenge certain calls by the umpires: whether a ball was fair or foul, whether or not a runner was tagged out (at home plate or on the basepaths), and whether a ball was caught or not. A team retains its right to challenge until they lose a challenge, after which they may not challenge any calls for the remainder of the game. The fans can also challenge one play per game, as determined by a fan who is chosen to initiate the challenge. Challenged plays are reviewed by the broadcast team, who relay their ruling to the umpire.
  11. "The Golden Batter Rule" – One time in a game, a team may send any hitter in the lineup to bat in any spot. The goal of this rule is so a team can have their best hitter hit when the game is on the line.
  12. "The Equalizer Point" – If the visiting team has more trick plays than the home team after eight innings, they get an extra point before the ninth inning.

Other non-standard baseball activities are sometimes used for entertainment purposes. For example, an August 2023 game featured an at bat where the pitcher and batter played rock paper scissors before each pitch: each time the pitcher won, the batter had to bat from the opposite side of home plate as he normally would, and each time the batter won, the pitcher needed to announce what type of pitch he was about to throw. Other entertainment includes elaborate walk-ups starting from the stands, in-game dances, and run celebrations.

Media coverage

The league has been featured by ESPN, The Wall Street Journal , CNN 10 , Sports Illustrated , [16] and 60 Minutes [17] highlighting its sports entertainment and viral videos.

Broadcast

Banana Ball entered into a partnership deal for its inaugural broadcast on CW Sports on July 27, 2025. [18] Games are also aired live on YouTube and have aired on ESPN in the summer of 2025. [19]

References

  1. 1 2 Brimmer, Adam Van. "Bananaland expansion: Savannah Bananas' next play is a Banana Ball league". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved October 24, 2024.
  2. ↑ Gonzalez, Alden (October 4, 2024). "Bananas to hit 3 football, 18 MLB stadiums in '25". ESPN.com. Retrieved October 24, 2024.
  3. ↑ Dominitz, Nathan. "Savannah Bananas fold collegiate team, focus on taking Banana Ball nationwide". Savannah Morning News. Archived from the original on August 21, 2023. Retrieved August 24, 2022.
  4. ↑ Palmer, Joseph (May 26, 2023). "'More than baseball': how the Savannah Bananas became the greatest show in sports". The Guardian. Archived from the original on September 13, 2023. Retrieved May 26, 2023.
  5. ↑ Paget, Brian (July 21, 2023). "'Banana Ball': Introducing the Savannah Bananas' baseball iteration that is taking the country by storm". Yahoo Sports. Retrieved July 26, 2025.
  6. ↑ Padgett, Larry (June 5, 2024). "Lander University Was Part of Banana Ball's Early History". Lander University. Retrieved July 26, 2025.
  7. ↑ "Savannah Bananas announce they will play Banana Ball year round". wtoc.com. August 24, 2022. Archived from the original on August 23, 2023. Retrieved August 24, 2022.
  8. 1 2 Williams, Dave (June 11, 2024). "Savannah Bananas rival the Party Animals unveil their mascot: Meet 'Pharty'". WJCL. Retrieved June 15, 2024.
  9. ↑ Benedetto, Matt (October 6, 2023). "Savannah Bananas bringing 2024 World Tour to Philadelphia". ABC 27 WHTM. Archived from the original on November 1, 2023. Retrieved November 1, 2023.
  10. ↑ The Savannah Bananas (October 1, 2024). The 2025 Banana Ball World Tour Draft - FULL 2025 SCHEDULE RELEASE . Retrieved October 4, 2024– via YouTube.
  11. ↑ Hauari, Gabe. "Savannah Bananas to visit 40 cities across 25 states in 2025: See full schedule". Democrat and Chronicle. Retrieved October 4, 2024.
  12. ↑ "Banana Ball Championship League 2026 Updates". Ministry of Sport. June 9, 2025.
  13. ↑ "Fans catching foul balls for outs? No walks allowed? Rules for this baseball team are bananas". KSAT-TV . April 12, 2021. Archived from the original on August 23, 2023. Retrieved August 20, 2022.
  14. ↑ "Banana Ball". The Savannah Bananas. Archived from the original on September 21, 2023. Retrieved August 15, 2023.
  15. ↑ Gartland, Dan (July 12, 2023). "A Baseball Game Ended on an Awesome Play by a Fan and Everybody Loved it". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved June 20, 2024.
  16. ↑ Heupel, Shannon (March 17, 2022). "Going Bananas! Two wild nights of 'the greatest show in baseball' coming to Montgomery". Montgomery Advertiser . Archived from the original on August 23, 2023. Retrieved March 20, 2022.
  17. ↑ Stahl, Leslie (April 13, 2025). "Savannah Bananas bring new life to baseball, dancing and playing by their own rules". CBSnews.com. Retrieved June 6, 2025.
  18. ↑ "The CW will broadcast Savannah Bananas baseball madness as network leans into live sports". Los Angeles Times. June 3, 2025. Retrieved June 3, 2025.
  19. ↑ "How to watch Banana Ball: Tailgaters vs. Bananas on ESPN". ESPN.com. July 24, 2025. Retrieved July 27, 2025.
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