Baseball Stadiums: 2016 MiLB Mascot Mania Recap

Baseball's Hot Stove season is in full swing, as teams wheel and deal pro players and prospects alike.  Earlier this week I recapped the baseball stadiums I visited during the 2016 season (read it here), and felt it was appropriate to wrap up the mascots I had my picture taken with during the year.

I attended 14 games during the season at 11 stadiums.  Four stadiums were first-time visits, so I was keen on getting my photo taken with mascots at those ballparks.  One big difference this past season was traveling with my now fiancée, who was included in all my mascot photos this season.

The first stop on our trip through the Carolinas was actually in Tennessee, as we attended a Tennessee Smokies game (read it here) and got our photo taken with Homer the Hound.

Katie and I with Homer the Hound.

The second stop on our trip to the Carolinas was Asheville, N.C., where we saw the Asheville Tourists and along with enjoying the Thirsty Thursday promotion (read about our visit here) we got our photo taken with Mr. Moon.

Katie and I with Mr. Moon almost immediately after walking in the gate.

The next stop on our trip was Greenville, S.C., but the Greenville Drive game got rained out that night.  So our next game was on the Grand Strand, as we got to see the Myrtle Beach Pelicans.  I hoped to get photo with Splash, but unfortunately that was not the case (read about rest of our visit here).  Instead late in the game we got our picture with Rally Shark.

Katie and I with Rally Shark.

After Myrtle Beach, our next stop was Charleston to see the RiverDogs and Charlie T. RiverDog (read about our visit here).

A Charlie T. RiverDog sandwich with Katie and I.

The final stop on our #SCMiLBTour was the state capital: Columbia.  We got to attend a game at the newest ballpark in Minor League Baseball and see the recently relocated Columbia Fireflies in action (read about our visit here).  All the superlatives meant we also got to take our picture with the newest mascot in the South Atlantic League: Mason!

Katie and I with Mason as the sun sets.

Although last season I had a picture of just myself with the Nashville Sounds mascot Booster, Katie and I got a picture with the hot chicken together when we attended the Sounds' first playoff game at First Tennessee Park this September.

Enjoying the first @nashvillesounds playoff game at @firsttnpark on a beautiful night in @visitmusiccity. #PCL #baseball #minors #milb #playlouder

A photo posted by Steven Ericson (@geo_steven) on Sep 9, 2016 at 6:55pm PDT

So this season I added photos with five more MiLB mascots while Katie got her first six photos with team mascots.  The best part about our journeys is that these photos with mascots give us a great memento of our trip to each ballpark.