When I was in Durham this summer, I got the opportunity to go to my first ever minor league baseball game, and was genuinely surprised by how fun it was. If you consider yourself to be a fan of baseball, I would encourage you to try to attend one! They pair very well with college visits or short trips to other towns or cities, but we also have our own Triple-A team right here in Atlanta: the Gwinnett Stripers.
The way I see it, minor league games don’t have any of the problems associated with attending a major league game. If you’re as concerned with traffic as anyone who lives in Atlanta should be, fear not! Smaller ballparks, less attendees and more rural locations for games make getting in and out quick and easy. Perhaps the most obvious perk of a minor league game is how much cheaper they are. While the average price of a major league ticket is 53 dollars, Triple-A tickets sell for a mere nine and a half! Additionally, food and beverage stands and parking in and around minor league ballparks don’t have nearly as much audacity that major league stands do to charge as much as they do.
It might be a concern to some hardcore baseball fans that the quality of play isn’t as high, but I can assure you, as someone who’s watched baseball my whole life, that there really isn’t a significant difference. Pitchers get called up to the majors from their Triple-A teams all the time, and the batters and outfielders aren’t that bad (infielders are a different story, but they aren’t bad enough that it’s a big problem).
Additionally, new minor league technology allows batters to challenge strike calls. If this tech follows the same trend as the pitch clock, which was instituted in the majors this year, then it should reach the majors sometime in the near future; so if you want to get ahead, consider checking it out in the minors before it reaches the big leagues.
Minor league games are also much more family friendly alternatives to major league games. At the Durham Bulls game I went to, it was Harry Potter night, which included quidditch games and broom races in between innings, as well as exclusive Harry Potter themed Bulls merchandise. Minor league games are much less overwhelming compared to how loud and crowded a major league game can be, and since there are less people, it is also so much easier to take pictures with the mascots.