If you love baseball, there’s probably no better sound than the crack of a baseball bat making that first contact with the ball after the first pitch, or the sound of the guy yelling, “peanuts!”
For the next few months, you can hear those sounds right here in the Tampa Bay area because Spring Training has officially begun. Fans of the Blue Jays, the Phillies, the Yankees, and a host of other teams that train in the area, get a chance to see some baseball up close before the regular season.
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Baseball teams and their fans have been coming to the Tampa Bay region to train for more than 100 years for spring training. For the last 16 years, the Baltimore Orioles have been coming to the Ed Smith Stadium in Sarasota.
We visited the stadium one day before the start of the spring season last weekend.
On this warm spring morning, a cluster of fans lined up behind the stadium to watch Orioles players go through batting drills on the practice field’s perfectly rolled green turf.
Jennifer Grondahl, the Orioles Senior VP of communications, served as our tour guide around the stadium. Grondahl said Spring Training is a reset for the team, which plays in the American Leagues’ Eastern Division. We start off on the practice field.
“We’ve been fortunate that we’ve made the playoffs multiple years in a row, which is a significant achievement. But, you know, you want to win a World Series. That’s your mindset going into every single year.”
This is Grondahl’s eighth season with the Orioles. But she didn’t grow up in a baseball household.
“I grew up watching football. My father was a huge football fan. There were no boys in the house, so he taught me how to throw a spiral when I was a kid, and I played a little bit of sports in college and in high school,” she said. “I really didn't get into baseball until later in life. One of the things I love about baseball is that I love the strategy of the game, and since I'm in it, I understand it a little bit better, but I also think it's very relaxing.”
She said she didn’t really get into baseball until later on in life. One thing she loves about the game is the strategy of it.
“And the statistics of this game, it's a perfect blend of tradition, but also all of those analytics and sabermetrics…the precision that can give teams advantages. And I think we've seen that when you saw Moneyball, that's real, and now it's Moneyball 5.0 because of the advancements that they've made in the sport. But just watching, you know, when they replace a pitcher or just any kind of play, you realize how much goes into all those decisions.”
Grondahl takes us into the stands of the Ed Smith Stadium, behind the iconic, green vintage baseball seats.
Out on the pitcher’s mound, one of the Orioles newest players, Japanese pitcher Tomoyuki Sugano, is warming up for batting practice. This was his first time throwing live at the stadium.
The stadium embodies baseball’s mix of tradition and newness that Grondahl was talking about. It was renovated recently in the 2010s for about $30 million. But the seats stand out.
“Camden Yards is by far one of the most iconic, not just baseball, but sporting venues in the world, and these seats that we're looking at right now here at Ed Smith Stadium are from Camden Yards,” Grondahl said. “When this stadium renovation was happening, they made the decision to bring some of the old seats here, and it's pretty cool. And I think when fans come in, they recognize it because of some of the design on the side of the seats. And it's beautiful.”
Orioles fans, and baseball fans alike, travel from afar to see their favorite teams play in Florida. Grondahl said this sport has some of the most loyal fans.
“They're loyal to their teams, and one of the reasons I think that we draw so well is because the Orioles are such a historic franchise and have such a rich history,” she said. “So, you're going to see fans that have been following the team since they were at Memorial Stadium years ago.”
Among the fans watching the workout were three siblings: Bob Roberts, Jean Roberts Schweitzer and Betsy Roberts. Bob and Jean flew down from Baltimore to visit Betsy, who lives in Sarasota, to catch the opening weekend of Spring Training.
“I go to a lot of games in Baltimore during regular season. I've driven by Ed Smith Stadium before a few times, but never been inside the facility. Beautiful place," said Bob Roberts.
He came down from Baltimore to see the first spring training game of the season with his two sisters, one who just got a job at the stadium.
He said he loves the feel of Ed Smith Stadium.
“[It’s] a little more low key, little more relaxed. And of course, the weather you can’t beat. Beats the 20 degrees in Baltimore right now.”
Rick Vaughn said fans, and even baseball players, move to Florida to enjoy baseball in comfortable weather, in addition to all that Tampa offers.
“They'll train here, and then you'll see them retire, and they'll end up living where they were training. They see the promise and all of the great assets of the city that they're training in. To a much greater extent, you've got fans that come down here from the North. They're here for a couple of weeks, and they get into a regular pattern of doing that, and it becomes their second home.”
Vaughn led public relations for two major league teams for decades: the Tampa Bay Rays and the Baltimore Orioles. He’s also the author of two books about the history of baseball in Tampa Bay.
“For Tampa, it's the 100th spring that Tampa has hosted a major league team here,” he said. “There's been some gaps along the way. It started with the Cubs in 1913. There were some gaps in between the Cubs and the Red Sox. There were the war years during [19]43, ‘44, and ‘45 where the government would not allow any of the teams to travel. And then when the Reds left in the 80s, until the Yankees came in the 90s, there was a gap. So, although it spans from 1913 to 2025, it's 100 springs.”
Vaughn said the cigar industry is what brought baseball to Tampa. When Cubans came to Ybor City, they brought baseball with them. He said all the cigar factories had teams and the sport really just became a part of everyone’s lifestyle in the city.
“There was also a feeling that baseball was actually played by soldiers during the Civil War, and when they returned home to Florida, it was that combination of them bringing the game with them, plus you had all of the Latins working in the cigar industry who loved the game, and it became a big deal.”
Tampa even had its own minor league club, The Tampa Smokers, who unlike the major league teams, played in the area all year.
Vaughn knows a lot of the baseball history from the area. And he’s full of stories, including ones about local player Al Lopez, Babe Ruth, and Jackie Robinson.
Listen to the full episode now on the media player above.
