Photo: Instagram/thesavbananas
Written by Maddie Schlehuber
We’ve all seen them—the good-looking, yellow-dressing, home-run-hitting team from Georgia: the Savannah Bananas. If you weren’t a baseball fan before, you might change your mind. This sensational team has carved out a niche in the sport, embracing the fans as a part of the game experience while putting on quite a performance. Every gameday, people pack the small stadium early, enjoying beer and hotdogs and repping the unmistakable banana-yellow merch to watch the show. Best known for everything but playing baseball, you might be curious as to where the Savannah Bananas came from; who even are they? We have the answers and a little more to their story here.
In Savannah, Georgia, locals are lucky enough that their home team plays all year round. There is no agonizing off-season. There is no regular spring training. The Bananas are always ready to play; their fans go wild for them every game. For folks who aren’t lucky enough to be in person at the ballpark, the social media team works overtime to produce viral content on all their platforms, increasing their attention and attendance. Some popular videos are TikTok trends, choreographed dances, or trick pitches that send batters into overdrive. Instead of a pom team, they have the Banana Nanas, who are, as you might guess, all grandma-age but just as young at heart, putting on their dances on the field. Even the umpire shakes it a little for the camera. It is truly bananas.
We can’t ignore that their players also know their angle because being a part of the Bananas is more than being a good baseball player… they have to have the right moves, too. Often seen sporting mullets and yellow cowboy hats, the players assume a performative role just as much as they play a position, timing their game down to the minute so it adheres to the “under two hour” rule of Banana Ball. It is all about making a faster-paced game that fans pay attention to, something Major League Baseball might want to take notes on (see new rules on the pitch clock here).
At their home field, historic Grayson Stadium, the bleachers have seen an evolution of the sport of baseball. Built in 1926, the stadium was home to various minor league teams, as well as host to exhibition games for major league players, too. Legends like Babe Ruth graced the field. And Hank “Hammerin’” Aaron hit one over the fences on his visit, and Yankee legend Mickey Mantle played an exhibition game there in the 1950s. Savannah was home to many minor league teams through the twentieth century, including the Senators, the White Sox, the Braves, and most recently, the Savannah Sand Gnats. These days, the old stadium sees more action than ever with the Savannah Bananas, even if the sport doesn’t look quite as it did back in the day.
The Savannah Bananas are relatively new, founded in 2016. They operated more closely to a club team for their first seven seasons, playing in the Coastal Plain League (CPL) and winning a few championships. They had fans from day one, but after finding success with their adaptation of the baseball they call “Banana Ball,” they ultimately went all-in and decided to become a year-round entertainment team in 2022, leaving the CPL and traditional baseball behind.
Banana Ball is a fast-paced, fan-central experience that resembles baseball. Sure, there are hits and pitches, outs and strikes, but intermixed is a hilarious and captivating performance of dances, skits, routines and costume changes. The players are all talented, many of whom came from college teams or junior leagues, but they only play one opponent who is just as committed to the “performance:” the Party Animals. Some have compared these games to the Harlem Globetrotters’ model. This is a Savannah-created roster that the Bananas play all of their exhibition games against, and they are just as crazy.
So how did they get here? It seems like a dream—year-round games. Happy players. International success. What is the secret? It might just be all in their strategy. They put their fans first but also take care of their players by making sure they have what they need to be healthy and ready to play. According to their “2025 Vision” plan, they define a pretty straightforward marketing strategy: Get Attention. It has worked. So, we all support Banana Ball, and this summer, you might be lucky enough to have them play at a field near you. You bet we want tickets.
