The sun’s setting on a hot Western Pennsylvania day, and fans are lining up for the baseball game. Tents from local sponsors line the wide concourse. Kids hop excitedly or beg for ice cream while the announcer calls out tonight’s lineup. A few fans straggle near a large mister. The press box is packed with journalists and scouts.
No, this isn’t PNC Park, but EQT Park in Washington, Pa., where a couple thousands fans have filled a parking lot tucked behind a mall to catch the Wild Things, who play in the Frontier League, a “partner league” of MLB without direct club affiliations. Many of the players are recent college graduates; a few have more experience. Tonight, they’re playing the New Jersey Jackals (based in Paterson), and, despite a top-of-the-order walk, the Wild Things quickly set to work on the hapless Jackals, getting out to a two-run lead in the first inning.
Minor-league ball is a bedrock institution in small- to mid-sized American cities, but the lower tiers of the sport have also been jarred by league-wide reforms, private equity, and attendance woes exacerbated by COVID. Teams have tried temporary and permanent rebrands, family-friendly promotions, and countless theme nights to get fans through the gates, to varying results, but those haven’t eased pressure from MLB — which forced a MiLB-wide contraction and realignment that saw 42 teams lose farm-team status and others fold or relocate in 2021 — and other forms of entertainment. Meanwhile, one company, Diamond Holdings, has quickly bought up a quarter of all minor-league teams and forced further relocations.
Tonight, in Washington, those worries feel far away. The locally owned team is clad in eye-catching purple as part of Neuro[divergent] Night Out with the local chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association, and staff is on hand as planned for Milk & Cookies Time. Fans clap and cheer, and several keep score, including Gena Sheller of Washington, who’s sitting with her family. Sheller says the minor-league game is more intimate than the product in Pittsburgh.
“I feel like there’s more fan interaction,” she tells Pittsburgh City Paper. “You just feel more part of the game.”
Down in the lower bowl, Kayla Thompson, catches City Paper’s attention with her Wild Things tattoo. She’s lost track of how long she’s had season tickets and even keeps a blog on independent baseball. Her feelings are similar to Sheller’s.
“The players actually interact with all of their fans. There’s not a bad seat in the house. I just love it way more,” Thompson says. The best part? “Getting to experience the playoff atmospheres that we’ve had for so many years, everybody cheering, and our team actually trying to fight for something.”
Thompson notes the Wild Things’ “soul-crushing championship losses,” including to the Schaumburg Boomers in 2021 and the Québec Capitales last year. But the team has racked up a dozen playoff appearances and nine division titles since 2002 (that’s five and four, respectively, since the Pirates’ last playoff appearance in 2015). Despite giving up a run in the top of the third, the team comes roaring back in the bottom half of the inning with a walk and four singles.
“I think they’re going to be battling for the last playoff spot. [It’s] kind of up in the air. We have a whole basically new team on the infield,” Thompson tells CP. “I’m always hopeful. So we’ll see.”
The team settles in and quiets the Jackals for the remaining innings. Fans applaud; the temperature falls. Between innings, kids crash together on the field in inflatable costumes, and the Washington Wild Thing himself takes turns mugging with fans and leading Wild Things staff, who seem to be everywhere tending to fans, in cheers as the runs pile up. Foul balls clatter in the bleachers, and fans give chase. Bugs swirl in the lights as the sky gets dark.
Rosin dust in the air, the crack of the bat, the smack of the ball in a fielder’s glove — this is baseball, baby. Even if beers at EQT Park are $10, the moneyball aspect of the game feels far away.
Another five runs after the stretch seals the deal, and fans begin to trickle away (it’s a school night, after all). A 1-11 rout of New Jersey keeps the Wild Things hot on the Lake Erie Crushers’ heels in the Central Division. In Pittsburgh, the mood has curdled, with fans protesting and leading chants against Pirates ownership, but tonight in Washington, October — or rather, September — baseball, free of worries about trade deadlines and gambling scandals and tributes gone awry, still feels possible.
This article appears in Jul 30 – Aug 5, 2025.
