Banana Ball in Minneapolis

All photos of Banana Ball @ Target Field available on Flickr.

My family and I finally got to experience the phenomenon that is Banana Ball for the first time yesterday.  I wouldn't necessarily say this was a "baseball bucket list" item for me, but we've definitely been trying to go for awhile, as it's been soaring in popularity every year and selling out venues across the country on an annual basis.  Because of how in demand tickets are and their barnstorming setup in which these teams play a unique mostly road schedule every season, the process for getting tickets is pretty arduous.  You have to sign up for a mailing list which then gets you the opportunity to sign up for a ticket lottery for select cities, but even winning the lottery does not guarantee that you will get tickets as we found out last year when they played in St. Paul.  Within literal seconds of clicking the ticket link, the entire 7,000+ seat stadium was sold out.  We were also unsuccessful in registering for tickets in 2024 in Des Moines.  This year, the Bananas were scheduled for 3 dates at Target Field, which is over 5x the size of the minor league venues in St. Paul and Des Moines, so we were a little more confident we'd be able to snag seats this year.  Long story short - we were part of a sellout crowd on Sunday.  Sadly, this was probably the most full I've ever seen Target Field including postseason games, but it's also a testament to a sport that has been selling out 100,000 seat football stadiums with ease.

We had some idea of how big the crowd would be before we even got there.  It took us about 2 1/2 hours to get from our house in Cold Spring to a parking garage - for context that is about double the normal drive time.  I-394 was backed up for miles into the stadium ramps, which switched to FULL just as we were entering, and we had to scurry into the closest open ramp we could find.  I love a lot about Target Field, but it is one of the worst stadiums in baseball to park at for a capacity crowd (thankfully that rarely happens for the Twins).  Despite the delays, we still managed to get inside about 15 minutes before first pitch, and we took our excellent seats in the 3rd row by the right field pole.  The Banana Ball Championship League is now up to 6 teams, and we were fortunate enough to be seeing the OG Bananas vs. the Loco Beach Coconuts.

I could probably spend hours and an entire post just explaining the origins of Banana Ball and its rules, but in the interest of brevity, I'll try to distill this to one paragraph.  Banana Ball is basically an offshoot of baseball meant to emphasize fun, fans, and constant action.  It started as a few wacky exhibition games played by the Savannah Bananas, who actually used to be a real summer collegiate team that replaced the former Sand Gnats in 2016 (whom we saw on the Tour).  When those exhibition games started to become more popular and better than real baseball, the Bananas ditched the Coastal Plains League entirely in 2023 and Banana Ball was officially formed.  In its infancy the schedule was sparse, with barnstorming games played against existing organized baseball teams, but as of this year it has grown into its own official league with six dedicated teams and a 7+ month schedule.  Savannah is still "home" to the Bananas and hosts games a few times a month for the home fans, but by and large it is still a barnstorming schedule, with a new slate of road cities and games introduced every year, some of them not even being played in baseball stadiums.  The difference in 2026 is that it is now an incorporated league, so there are team standings with an actual championship series played in October.  As I mentioned, the game is rooted in baseball and its basic structure would be recognizable to baseball fans, but it has many quirky rules that are meant to keep fans engaged.  I won't get into all of them, but some of them include no walks, the winner of each inning gets one point (so technically every inning can be a walk-off), a "Golden Batter" that can hit at any spot in the lineup, and foul balls caught by fans count as an out.  This last rule was particularly important this weekend at Target Field, as Minneapolis fans recorded a record 10 outs in Saturday night's contest.  For anybody who attends a Banana Ball game, you'll quickly realize that basically anything goes so long as nobody gets injured or embarrassed.  It's a spectacle that is basically a circus troupe performing baseball.  There is a stat called "trick plays" and it is not uncommon to see players regularly do back flips or catch balls between their legs or behind their backs.  It gets to the point where seeing just a regular no-frills baseball play occur on the field is shocking.

We saw the Loco Beach Coconuts defeat the Savannah Bananas by a final score of 3-2.  I think?  It might have been 4-3.  There are no box scores and I'm not going to pretend I knew half of what was going on, but that's not exactly the point.  I was surprised that the scoreboard even showed batting averages and RBI totals which seemed out of place for this sport.  I remember that the Coconuts walked it off in the 9th and I was bummed that it did not go to extra inning "showdowns" which is the wild Banana Ball version of extra innings that involves just a catcher, pitcher, and a batter, with no other fielders.  The two coolest parts of the game were when one of the Bananas batters hit while wearing stilts, and when Twins legend and 2006 AL MVP Justin Morneau came out to play first base for an inning.  It seemed to be a little staged with one easy grounder to short and one ball that was probably purposely thrown up the line for him to snag, but he clearly still had the ability to play and made a couple of nice plays.  2022 HOF Inductee Tony Oliva also came out and "coached third base" for one batter at the ripe old age of 88.  Watching Tony O brought back a lot of memories of Erik and I seeing him in a suite full of adoring women every time we were at the Metrodome.  The way the Bananas incorporate local celebrities and former players into their games is one of best parts of what they do and just further emphasizes their credo - give the fans what they want to see.

Our kids loved the non-stop music and thrills and had an absolute blast!  If a 5-year old and an 8-year old can stay engaged with anything for two hours let alone baseball, then we know that Banana Ball has achieved its goal.  We are all hoping that this is not the last time we'll get to experience one of these events, but if so, it was worth every penny.

STANDINGS AND UPCOMING SERIES AS OF 8/10/26:

Brewers 74-44, +5.5; 3 @ Padres, 4 @ Dodgers, 3 v. Mariners, 2 v. Braves, Little League Classic v. Braves

Twins 58-61, - 4.0, -1.5 WC; 3 v. Orioles, Field of Dreams Game v. Phillies, 2 v. Phillies, 3 v. Braves, 3 @ Padres

2026 GAMES ATTENDED:

Erik - 7

Peter - 25