Is it nigh upon the 4th of July? Which means everyone can view the Stanley Cup, coming soon to their nearest Scott Lee Cohen pawn shop. But more importantly Lake County has the baseball fever now. And not just baseball fever, double-A independent minor league baseball fever. There's no reason to schlep down to the city any more, Lake County now has a ball club to call its own -- the Lake County Fielders. Their home opener is scheduled July 2. Go to the Lake County Journal to see a graphic of the new Zion stadium ... Lake County team waits for field of dreams... which will be ready some time in 2011. Until then, Fielder games will be played at a temporary stadium. The temporary stadium is at an undisclosed location, hopefully not the Zion Nuclear Power Plant ...
Zion plant powers up for teardownBall teams are usually associated with their cities or metroplexes, for instance the Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks. But for some reason, the Lake County Fielders belong to the entire county. Probably to juice ticket sales: a Barrington minor league ball fan may think twice about filling up the Range Rover and trekking cross-county to see the Zion Fielders.
It is perhaps fitting that Lake County -- the official Illinois state generic county -- has a generically named baseball team. The Lake County Fielders -- what's up with that? Was the Lake County Players already trademarked? All kidding aside ...
The team held a name-the-team contest to decide the nickname. The five finalists were Cowpokes, Luckies, Fielders, Comets, and Skippers.There was a choice between naming the team after (1) dairy farmers, (2) cigarettes, (3) baseball players, (4) a second-tier reindeer, or (5) Alan Hale? No wonder they ended up selecting Fielders.
WikiPedia
Of course in baseball, as in real life, marketing is 99% of everything. As a service to the community, your LakeCountyEye conducted a new survey and compiled 10 better alternative names for the Lake County Fielders ...
| Ten Preferred Names for the Lake County Fielders |
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Alright everybody, let me hear ya now, a one, a two ...
2 comments:
C'mon, Barney! The whole thing was conceived based on Kevin Costner's movie 'Field Of Dreams' so why would you call them anything else BUT Fielders? Costner has also stepped up and become part owner now so that will help with development at and around the new ball park.
I wasn't aware that they were already playing with a 6-11 slow start. That's a lot of games already played without a home game. I read somewhere that the stadium they will be using, Carthage College, only has a seating capacity of under 500 but that inconvenience should end sometime in July when temporary bleachers are in place in Zion while other improvements are on-going.
My uncle played on a minor league team in Iowa when I was growing up and it was so exciting to watch. With the price of tickets and parking to see the Cubs or Sox play you have to mortgage the house if you plan on taking the entire family. While playing at Carthage I believe that kids admission will be free and it's not that far away from Zion either. Don't sell the idea short since we are fortunate that Lake County was chosen for an expansion team.
Let's go out to the 'old ball park' someday and have a beer (summit).
hi CatMan,
I hope I haven't sold the Fielders short, being a fan of the game since gradeschool. My last pro game was to Wrigley & I'm looking forward to seeing the Fielders, maybe in the new stadium. I suppose "Fielders" would be a better name than the Lake County "Costners"!
-BB-
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