The Short History of Professional Baseball in Pompano Beach

During the first half of the twentieth century, baseball was the sport of choice for Pompano residents. In fact, it’s likely that as soon as a couple dozen settlers had established themselves in the area, bats, balls and gloves came out and some form of the national pastime was played.

As Pompano developed, the game became more organized and local athletes formed a town team to compete in an everchanging South Florida amateur leagues that at various times included squads from the Keys to Stuart and points north. The local team played on a hardscrabble field just north of today’s old downtown. There were no grandstands; spectators sat on the ground or in cars.

As the second half of the century arrived, local civic leaders saw growth all around them and began to think about competing in the quest for a professional baseball team to locate their spring training to Pompano. One big roadblock, however, was that Pompano did not have facilities to host spring training.

The solution came in December 1956, when the Pompano Beach City Commission allocated $25,000 to build a baseball stadium. Incredibly, in less than four months the ball field was completed and on March 23, 1957 about 3,000 people attended the dedication ceremonies for Municipal Stadium. The featured event of the day was an exhibition game between the minor league Buffalo Bison and the major league Kansas City Athletics. Pompano Beach mayor Edwin Haynie threw out the first pitch.

The Buffalo Bison used the new stadium as their spring training base, but local boosters wanted to secure a major league team for the park. An opportunity presented itself when, following the 1960 season, team owner Calvin Griffith moved the Washington Senators baseball team to Minnesota. A new team was formed for Washington D.C., also called the Senators.

From 1961 to 1971 this version of the Senators held spring training at Pompano Beach's Municipal Stadium. There were few stars on the team -- probably the most notable player was Frank Thomas, who won the league home run crown in 1968 and 1970 (44 HRs in each year). In fact, the players were overshadowed by their managers and coaches, some of whom were former major league greats Ted Williams, Gil Hodges and Nellie Fox.

The Senators had only one season over .500, and had trouble drawing fans. Following the 1971 season, the team moved to the Dallas-Fort Worth area and became the Texas Rangers, but continued to conduct spring training in Pompano Beach through 1986.

In those days before cable television and multi-million-dollar contracts, major league baseball was a decidedly more casual affair. Sports writer Mike Shropshire did not put on rose-colored glasses when he recounted his memories of spring training here:

The Texas Rangers had moved to Arlington in 1972, and conducted spring training at Pompano Beach, Fla. The team headquarters was the Surf Rider, a dive that resembled a minimum-security halfway house. It was right on the beach, though, and therefore heavenly.

The spring training of my experience was not a family scene. The schedule for the Major League Baseball beat writer went as follows: Get up, gargle with English Leather, and stroll the beach. Then I'd return to my room at the Surf Rider with its mildewed walls and do an hour's worth of research for the work day ahead. That amounted to studying the racing form to handicap the first five races at Gulfstream. After returning from the track, I'd report to Pompano Stadium, making sure to arrive late enough that the game would be over, and get a copy of the box score.

Next, I would locate Whitey Herzog, the manager, who by 5 p.m. would be located at the Surf Rider bar, actively anesthetizing his brain from the troubling occupational circumstances that confronted him.

Whitey had a good reason to be troubled. In his single season of managing the club, the Rangers won only 57 games against 105 losses, the worst record in the major leagues that year.

In addition to major league baseball during the spring, locals who wanted to see professional baseball could cheer for a series of minor league team that played at Municipal Stadium: the Pompano Beach Mets, 1969-1973, the Pompano Beach Cubs, 1976-1978 and the Pompano Beach Miracle, 1990-1991. Pompano Beach was a just a way stop for the Miracle, between its stints in Miami and Ft. Myers. The team was brought here by Mike Veeck who promoted the team through wacky promotions and gimmicks such as Jerico, a golden retriever who served as bat boy and goodwill ambassador for the club.

All three of Pompano Beach’s minor league teams played in the Florida State League, one of the nation’s longest-surviving minor leagues. It was formed in 1919 and, except for short periods during the Great Depression and World War II, has played every season through this year.

In addition to the Florida State League teams, Pompano Beach was home to another professional baseball team -- the Gold Coast Suns. The Suns existed only a single season (1989) as part of the Senior Professional Baseball Association, a winter league for players at least 35 years old. The SPBA included a number of former major league players including future Hall of Fame pitchers Rollie Fingers and Ferguson Jenkins.

The Gold Coast Suns split their home games between Pompano Beach and Miami and were managed by another future Hall of Famer, Earl Weaver. The SPBA reorganized for a second season, but folded in December 1990, having played less than half its scheduled games.

And that was the end of professional baseball in Pompano Beach. The stadium was showing its age and the Major League teams were looking for more expansive spring training sites that local governments would finance, something that Pompano Beach was not able (or willing) to do. When a major league team was awarded to South Florida and the Florida Marlins began National League play in 1993, it was clear to almost everyone that Pompano Beach’s era of professional baseball was over.

Municipal Stadium still stood, but the impact of hurricanes as well as a lack of maintenance and upgrades spelled its doom. Parts began to be demolished in the late 1990s, and the stadium’s end came in 2008, when the final structures were removed, and the grounds reconfigured for recreational baseball teams.