Tomorrow’s Big League Heroes Play Here
Published Apr 16, 2005
Rocky Bluewinkle, the Wilmington Blue Rocks mascot, entertains young fans during a game at Frawley Stadium.
For a dozen years, the Wilmington Blue Rocks baseball club represented the gold standard for franchises in the Carolina League. Now they have a parent club worthy of such a valuable asset.
In 2005, after 12 years as an affiliate of the Kansas City Royals, the Blue Rocks became the advanced Class A team of the Boston Red Sox – Major League Baseball’s 2004 World Series champions.
“Both (the Red Sox and Royals) organizations were looking for a change,” says Kevin Linton, sales and group sales executive for the Blue Rocks. “Our fan base is excited about the affiliation.”
The Red Sox should be even happier. Since the resurrection of the Blue Rocks in 1993, Wilmington has been at the top of the minor league food chain.
Unlike the parent club, which went 86 years between championships, the Blue Rocks have been hoarding trophies since they returned to the community after a 50-year absence. Wilmington, the northernmost team in the Carolina League, has won four league championships, advanced to the league playoffs in all but two seasons and posted the best winning percentage in all of minor league baseball during 1993-2004.
The Blue Rocks have been equally successful at the turnstiles. The team has drawn more than 300,000 fans annually for the 55 home games at 6,532-seat Daniel S. Frawley Stadium, leading the Carolina League in attendance for the past seven seasons and providing an economic stimulus for neighboring restaurants and pubs at Riverfront Wilmington.
Such numbers earned Blue Rocks General Manager Chris Kemple the Minor League Baseball Executive of the Year award from Baseball America magazine in 2004.
“We pride ourselves on being an affordable, fun, family event,” Linton says. “We want to be entertaining with everything going on here. That entertainment package includes 60 to 70 promotional nights each year, with fireworks displays and bobblehead-doll giveaways among the most popular.
The team’s most dedicated fans form the Blue Rocks Booster Club. These local Rocks rooters don’t just support the players at Frawley Stadium, but before and after the game, too. The boosters provide getaway breakfasts before road trips and places to spend the night following games. The adopt-a-player program places one or two ballplayers (or a ballplayer and his family) with host families during the season.
“We refer to them as our sons of summer,” says Karen Colletta, 2005 president of the booster club. She and her husband, Charlie, have been hosting ballplayers since 1995.
Professional baseball returned to Delaware two years earlier when a group of investors that included current club President Matt Minker purchased Virginia’s Peninsula Pilots and relocated them to Wilmington. The team’s new home, built by Minker Construction Co., initially was known as Legends Field. Later it was renamed Judy Johnson Field at Daniel S. Frawley Stadium.
Story by Dan Markham
Photo by Stephen Cherry
Current Weather Conditions In Newark, DE (19702)
Cloudy, and 39 ° F. For more details?
Click here...
