Scott Butherus' "View from the Cheap Seats,"

Mar. 6: If you’ve ever sat in the bleachers and chatted with the folks around you, you know that everyone has a baseball story. A first game, a favorite moment, a personal achievement — probably a story that has been told countless times over countless hotdogs. Since my back is still killing me from my major league workout yesterday, and the air is a little too chilly to make my planned return to Lakeland, I figured I would place myself on the 24-hour DL and instead share my own favorite baseball story.
My story is not so much a time or a specific game, but a place called Baseball City.

In 1973, Ringling Bros. Circus opened a theme park near Haines City

called Circus World. This theme park was built around a circus theme,

and featured three-ring shows as well as rides and exhibitions. Despite

the initial backing of the successful Ringling empire, the park failed

to achieve success in the shadows of Disney World to the East and Busch

Gardens to the west. In 1986, the park was bought out by the publishing

firm Harcourt, Brace & Jovanovich and renovated to look like the

turn-of-the-century boardwalks of Atlantic City and Coney Island,

complete with roller coasters, thrill rides and a wooden boardwalk

sprawled across the 366-acre park. The theme park re-opened in the

spring of 1987 under its new name, Boardwalk & Baseball.

At the heart of the new theme park was an 8,000-seat baseball stadium

for the Kansas City Royals, who had been lured away from their previous

home in Fort Myers to take part in the experiment. Park visitors could

take in the Cooperstown-like exhibitions, a performance of the Royal

Lippizaner Stallion Show, or ride the roller coaster that soared just

past the right field fences, before taking in an exhibition game. For

the team and players, the complex featured five practice fields, player

dorms and corporate offices. While attendance was great during the

spring games, the theme park had trouble attracting visitors during the

rest of the year and by 1990, Harcourt, Brace & Jovanovich was

forced to sell its theme park to Anheiser Busch, Busch Gardens’s parent

company, which quickly closed the doors to the baseball theme park. The

Kansas City Royals would remain in Baseball City for spring training

until 2002, but without the draw of the theme park, fan attendance

plummeted until the team was lured away to Surprise, Arizona.

I got to experience Boardwalk & Baseball during spring break of

1988 while on a family vacation. (That’s me in the photo at age 8 with

my brother Andrew, 4, at Boardwalk & Baseball.)

Even though I was very young I remember being enamored of the place.

And why wouldn’t I? It was baseball, it was rollercoasters, it was a

Kansas City Royals Mecca. I vaguely remember seeing a game, but I was

so hopped up on sugar and rollercoaster adrenaline that the game is

nothing more than an afterthought. Years later as a college student

when I returned to the stadium, feelings of nostalgia overwhelmed me —

even though the rollercoasters and ferris wheels had been gone for a

decade.

Do you have a favorite baseball story that you would like to share?

You can post it below in the comments link or email them to

scott@aviewfromthecheapseats.com