Minor League Baseball canceled for 2020. What it means for Columbia Fireflies
What’s been expected is now a reality: There will be no minor league baseball in Columbia and the rest of South Carolina this season.
MiLB officially canceled the season for its teams on Tuesday. That means the Columbia Fireflies, Myrtle Beach Pelicans, Greenville Drive, Charleston RiverDogs, Augusta GreenJackets and more than 150 other teams nationally won’t be playing baseball in 2020.
“The Columbia Fireflies are devastated by today’s announcement,” Fireflies president John Katz said in a statement Tuesday. “This is not just about the Fireflies not playing baseball. It is about our team of 30 dedicated staff members that rely on the Fireflies to support themselves and their families. It’s about our hundreds of part-time and seasonal team members that come together to make Segra Park the best fan experience in the South Atlantic League.”
Minor League Baseball and the rest of sports across the country have been on hold since the coronavirus pandemic began in March. Major League Baseball has announced it will be coming back for a 60-game season starting at the end of July without fans in the stands.
Other sports such as NASCAR, golf and European soccer have returned with no fans or a limited number of spectators. The NBA and NHL are expected to return next month and play without fans.
That was never an option for Minor League Baseball teams, which need spectators in the stadium in order to thrive. Last year, the Fireflies drew 245,522 fans and the Pelicans had 226,247. The Fireflies have ranked in the Top 25 in minor league merchandise sales every year since the team moved to Columbia from Savannah, Georgia in 2016.
According to statitsa.com, only 30% of MLB teams’ revenue come from ticket sales with a large portion coming from the league’s TV revenue. Minor League Baseball is the opposite — there’s no league TV deal and a club’s revenue is determined by ticket sales, concessions and souvenir sales.
“Without fans, minor league baseball doesn’t work,” Katz said in April. “It is all about the experience.”
The Fireflies’ Opening Day was supposed to be in April 9. The team would’ve been 75 games into the season by now, had things gone to plan. Now the team must move forward with the hope a season can happen in 2021.
“We had remained cautiously optimistic that there would be a modified season in 2020, but we now know that will not be the case,” Katz said.
Individual tickets purchased for any game during the 2020 season can be kept and exchanged for any game during the 2021 season once that schedule is available, according to the Fireflies. Season ticket members, group leaders and corporate partners will be contacted in the coming days with options for each individual circumstance.
There will be baseball played locally in 2020. The Lexington County Blowfish summer baseball team opens its 43-game season Wednesday with limited fan capacity for home games.
Fifteen minor league baseball teams, including the Columbia Fireflies, have filed a lawsuit alleging breach of contract by insurance providers during the coronavirus pandemic. Those teams say they were “denied claims for business-interruption insurance,” The Associated Press reported.
With no baseball, minor league teams such as the Fireflies have been using their facilities to host other events to have some stream of revenue. The Fireflies are hosting 12 games in the S.C. American League summer league as well as showcase events for travel baseball at Segra Park.
The Fireflies also are hosting dinners in its Club Lounge on Fridays and Saturday. A Fourth of July event, which included fireworks and the movie “The Sandlot,” was planned but was postponed because of the increase in coronavirus numbers around the state.
Minor League Baseball is expected to look different next season with possible reduction of as many as 42 teams, according to reports. The Fireflies aren’t in danger of being contracted but there might be there are talks of splitting the northern teams in the South Atlantic League to form a Mid-Atlantic League, according to Prospects365.
Minor League Baseball President & CEO Pat O’Connor told reporters Tuesday that half of the teams might not survive and they are in “dire straits.”
“It will be a challenge to determine how we manage our organization during a span of 19 months between Fireflies games, but we have the right team together to make the best of a difficult situation,” Katz said. “...Thankfully, we are blessed with a team of creative, innovative problem solvers. This is a new kind of problem, but I have every confidence we’ll get through these challenging times together.”
This story was originally published June 30, 2020 at 5:00 PM.
