A 110-foot Ferris wheel. Race cars painted in MLB team colors. Food trucks. Live music. Pitching tunnels and batting cages. A chance for photos with the Commissioner’s Trophy. And Clydesdales.
Of course, there’s merchandise available for any fans who forgot to grab their gear supporting the Atlanta Braves or Cincinnati Reds or simply commemorating a spectacle unlike any other.
“My sister’s already texted me asking for a t shirt,” said Marcia Lorenzo, 39, from Charleston, South Carolina.
After about four years in the planning, it’s finally time for the MLB Speedway Classic (7:15 p.m. ET on FOX and the FOX Sports app) to play ball Saturday night on the diamond constructed on the infield at Bristol Motor Speedway at the place called the “Last Great Colisseum!”
“When you walk up to Bristol Motor Speedway, much like many of our venues, you know you’re at a big iconic sports location,” said Jeremiah Yolkut, MLB’s senior vice president of global events. “You feel it. You walk into Wrigley Field, Fenway Park, you feel it. And that’s what Bristol Motor Speedway is for NASCAR.”
The MLB Speedway Classic was first announced nearly a year ago as part of Commissioner Rob Manfred’s push to take MLB to places where baseball isn’t played every day live. MLB played a game at the movie site in Iowa in both 2021 and 2022. Alabama, North Carolina and Pennsylvania, too.
Now it’s time for Tennessee, which has teams in the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLS but no MLB team even as a group chases an expansion franchise for Nashville. This game mixes the rich racing history of both Bristol, which hosts a pair of NASCAR races each year, and Tennessee.
“So we quickly worked to make it so that we could viably create this magic moment and give fans that don’t get regular season baseball all the time, an opportunity to see it right there in their backyard in Tennessee,” Yolkut said.
The Reds, chasing an NL wild-card berth, split the first two games in this series with Atlanta. The rubber match will be a part of history as the first Major League Baseball game played in the state of Tennessee.
They will play before the largest crowd ever to see an MLB regular-season game, too.
Reds outfielder Austin Hays said this will be a fun game and can’t wait to see how loud it gets.
“I used to go to the truck races and the [Daytona] 500, Rolex. I went to high school near Detona, “Hayes said after Reds’ 3–2 victory over Atlanta on Friday.” This is the only track I have ever done. This is a very large track. I think it’s going to be the same on the infield, but this time will be a baseball ground. ,
MLB did not try to sell every ticket inside the speedway that attracts 156,990 for the fight for Bristol College Football Games in 2016. The track with a racing capacity of 146,000 could host 90,000 or more, even blocks were blocked.
Officials announced that more than 85,000 tickets were sold on Monday – 84,587 set September 12, in the presence of the previous payment of 1954, when Cleveland Stadium hosted New York Yankis.
Casey, now three-time all-star scene on MLB network, sees it as two super powers that come together in an ideal partnership. NASCAR and baseball already cross the Atlanta and Cincinnati markets, and this exposes crossover fans in another game.
“This is such a unique situation,” Casey said on Friday after being aired from the area with the MLB network. “Kudos Two (Commissioner) Major League baseball’s Rob Manfred and NASCAR and Bristol Motor Speedway to keep the event together because it is going to be one way.”
Once fans have time to enter Bristol, the schedule has a pre-game concert with Jake Owen with stars Tim McGrag and Pitbul. A flyover by Navy Jets, and a pair of hall of fames in Chipr Jones, Atlanta, and the Johnny bench of Reds will handle the Ceremonial First Pitch.
Hunter Greer of Charleston, South Carolina bought a ticket with three friends a year ago. They arrived on Thursday, camped out and enjoyed the weekend. Greyer said that he really did not know what was expected by MLB by putting a baseball ground in a racetrack infield.
“We had an idea,” said Greyer. “But whatever is leading to (sports), it is actually making that idea even bigger as we can probably expect.”
Reporting by Associated Press.
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