Tour 2023: Arizona Fall League Home Run Derby

All photos of AFL HR Derby at Sloan Park available on Flickr.

Our final game of our jam-packed Tour 2023 was the AFL Home Run Derby at Sloan Park in Mesa.  Sloan Park is the relatively new Spring Training home of the Chicago Cubs, located just west of their former home at Hohokam which is now inhabited by the Oakland A's (which I visited in 2019).  This park has also hosted the Mesa Solar Sox of the AFL since the park's inception in 2014, and on this particular weekend hosted the biggest events of the Fall League calendar - the homerun derby and the Fall Stars Game.  We were planning on attending both of these events when we originally planned this trip, but unfortunately the schedule changed after we booked our flights and the Fall Stars Game moved to Sunday, the day we both flew home.  Personally I enjoy derbies much more than the actual all-star games, so this was the event I was more excited about anyways.  The derby was jacked up to a whopping $20 for this special event and we headed straight towards the outfield berm in left field when we got inside.  Sloan Park is the largest park in the circuit at a 15,000 capacity, but I never would have guessed that since the overwhelming majority of people in attendance were in the outfield as we were.

We didn't get to see as much of Sloan Park as we would have liked since we made a bee-line directly to the outfield, but from the looks of it, it is following the trend of a lot of the Grapefruit League parks that look to mimic the shape and feel of their major league tenants - a "Wrigley Field West" of sorts.  It had similar dimensions with the same deep outfield corners as Wrigley, it had some "rooftop seating" in the outfield to mimic the rooftops on Waveland and Sheffield Streets in Chicago, the same green seats and green painted structure, and even a replica of the Wrigley Field marquee.  Had this park not been in the desert, I would have fully expected to see ivy on the walls as well.  I think given the fact that it was trying to recreate a smaller Wrigley Field, it made the park kind of ordinary and simplistic in its layout.  That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it made it less memorable than some of the other newer parks and made it not as nice as I was expecting.  This was the one park of the week where I think being there for an AFL game as opposed to a Spring Training game negatively skewed my opinion.  It was still a great place to watch the derby, and I felt just like I was in the bleachers at Wrigley on that giant berm that was packed with fans on this night.  Much like at the bleachers at Wrigley, there were a couple of idiots that had to be escorted out.  A couple of dudes wearing GoPros were jumping in front of children left and right to snag homeruns and had literal backpacks full of balls before security finally stepped in to remind them they were grown adults and asked them to leave.

The AFL Home Run Derby had a similar format to the format that has been adopted by MLB and many other leagues in recent years, namely that rounds are timed rather than based on a number of "outs."  I love this format, as it creates less down time and more home runs, which has certainly been a goal of baseball lately.  One slight nuance to the AFL rules that I also loved is that two finalists advance to a championship matchup based on a cumulative total of two rounds.  This means that you get to see every hitter at least twice, it avoids dragging out the event and tiring out hitters, and it also avoids the common occurrence of somebody putting up a monster first round total but still not advancing.  Kala'i Rosario of the Desert Dogs/Twins ended up winning on a very impressive effort.  He finished with 25 total homeruns as well as the longest homer of the night, estimated at 465 feet.  He really impressed us in Glendale on Thursday and we were excited to see him listed as a participant at the derby, and he did not disappoint.  Damiano "Chicken Parm" Pamelgiani was leading after the first two rounds with 17 homers, and 2nd place was a 4-way tie between Ivan Melendez, Kyle Manzardo, Jase Bowen, and the aforementioned Rosario.  This led to a one-minute swing-off for the 2nd and final spot in the championship round, which was won in a walk-off fashion by Rosario over Bowen with 10 seconds left on the clock.  Pamelgiani chose to hit 2nd in the final round, and that proved to be a mistake as he lost 6-5.  In addition to winning the Derby, the Hawaii native Rosario also finished the season tied for the league lead in homers with 7.  Wes Clarke of the Saguaros/Brewers also participated and mashed a paltry 6 total dingers in his two rounds, although he did manage to crush a hot dog during one of his timeouts.

Following our visit to Sloan Park, I have now officially completed the Cactus League/AFL Tour, which is the only league outside of MLB for which I have been to every ballpark.  With that being said, I would rank the parks in this order:

1. Camelback Ranch
2. Salt River Fields at Talking Stick
3. Surprise Stadium
4. Hohokam Stadium
5. American Family Fields of Phoenix
6. Sloan Park
7. Tempe Diablo Stadium
8. Goodyear Ballpark
9. Scottsdale Stadium
10. Peoria Sports Complex

I would highly recommend the Arizona Fall League to any rabid baseball fan and especially to anybody who enjoys going to the Cactus League.  If you love Spring Training, but you also want cool evening temperatures, smaller crowds, and something a little bit more affordable, then this is the league for you.  The two of us spent a grand total of $112 on 4 AFL games and probably $20 apiece per game in concessions, and we've definitely had trips where we spend that much on one person for just one game.  It was a long wait into the year for our Tour 2023 trip, but well worth it.  It was awesome that we got to extend the season by a few days, and it makes Tour 2024 already that much closer.

park rankings and statistics:

aesthetics - 8
views from park - 4
view to field - 7 (largest park in the league)
surrounding area - 3 (nothing in immediate vicinity but 5 minutes from downtown Mesa and Tempe)
food variety - 5
nachos - 5
beer - 4 (points deducted for no Old Style)
vendor price - 8
ticket price - 8
atmosphere - 9
walk to park - 3
parking price/proximity - 10 (adjacent lot for free)
concourses - 7
team shop - 3 (points deducted for very little generic AFL gear at the jewel event)

kids area - n/a

best food - Chicago Dog
most unique stadium feature - replica Wrigley Field marquee
best jumbotron feature - player stats

best between-inning feature - live music by the Chocolate Fountain Experience

field dimensions - 360/410/360

HOMERUN DERBY PARTICIPANTS: 

Kevin Alcantara, CHC/Mesa
Jase Bowen, PIT/Salt River
Wes Clarke, MIL/Surprise
Kyle Manzardo, CLE/Peoria

Ivan Melendez, ARI/Salt River

Damiano Palmegiani, TOR/Surprise

Gabriel Rincones Jr., PHI/Scottsdale

Kala'i Rosario, MIN/Glendale

winner - Kala'i Rosario
score – 6-5 final round, 25 total
stadium - Sloan Park