Myrtle Beach Pelicans

If you are a baseball fan, you don’t want to pass up a chance to catch a game if you are in town when the Pelicans play.  This family-oriented ballpark has a lot of history and is kid-friendly.  Several times during the season, games end with kids being allowed on the field to run the bases and fireworks. Check out the link in the LEARN MORE tab below and grab your seat at the ballpark!

Click here to go directly to the Pelicans website:  Myrtle Beach Pelicans | MiLB.com

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Myrtle Beach Pelicans are a Minor League Baseball team in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and the Single-A affiliate of the Chicago Cubs of the National League in Major League Baseball.^[2] The Pelicans compete in the Carolina League. Home games are played at Pelicans Ballpark, which opened in 1999 and seats up to 6,599 people.^[3]

The Pelicans have been members of the Carolina League since 1999 and most recently won the league’s championship in 2016.^[4] In the 2021 reorganization of Minor League Baseball, the Pelicans continued as the Cubs’ Low-A affiliate in the Low-A East.^[5] This league was renamed the Carolina League and reclassified as Single-A in 2022.

From their inaugural season through 2010, they were affiliated with the Atlanta Braves, also of the National League, before spending four seasons as a Texas Rangers (American League) affiliate from 2011 to 2014. The team’s current affiliation with the Chicago Cubs began in 2015.^[6]

History

Previously, this franchise was known as the Durham Bulls, the Minor League Baseball team featured in the 1988 film Bull Durham starring Kevin Costner, Susan Sarandon, and Tim Robbins. The Carolina League team was relocated following the 1997 season as a result of the expansion of the top-level Triple-A International League into Durham, North Carolina, where the new franchise assumed the “Bulls” name. The Carolina League franchise then spent the 1998 season in Danville, Virginia, as the Danville 97s while awaiting a further move to Myrtle Beach in coastal South Carolina while Coastal Federal Field was under construction. Their first home game as the Myrtle Beach Pelicans was played on April 12, 1999, against the Potomac Cannons with 5,521 people in attendance.^[3] In the first at bat, Pelicans pitcher Luis Rivera struck out Cannons hitter Esix Snead looking.^[3] The first two hits at the stadium were home runs for each team, first by Potomac’s Andy Bevins, and later that same game by Myrtle Beach’s Ryan Lehr.^[3]

Their ballpark has since been renamed Pelicans Ballpark, which is a family-friendly stadium with a speed pitch, obstacle course, and moon bounce on the concourse. In 2004, the sports publication Baseball America rated it as the second-best Class-A level ballpark in the United States, and the best in the Carolina League in 2009.^[3] For four consecutive seasons (2011–2014), Stadium Journey ranked the Pelicans as the top stadium experience in the Carolina League and one of the publication’s “Top 50 Stadium Experiences” in all of sports,^[3][7] while the website TripAdvisor named the team as the third-best attraction in Myrtle Beach.

Splash, one of the team mascots