Advertisement

Millions for the Mudcats? Rooftop sky lounge pitched for Wake’s Five County Stadium.

It will cost millions of dollars to make mandatory improvements to Wake County’s Five County Stadium to keep its minor league baseball team in town.

The stadium, located in Zebulon, and near the border of Wake, Franklin, Nash, Wilson and Johnston counties, has been home to the Mudcats for decades.

Major League Baseball requires minor league stadiums to meet professional standards by 2025 and make “significant renovations.”

For Five County Stadium that means renovating the home clubhouse to be used for visiting teams, renovating batting and pitching tunnels, building a new clubhouse with facilities for women and replacing the irrigation and drainage system for the field.

“If you go to any minor league stadium, what you’re not seeing behind the scenes is a lot of what the players are dealing with,” said Tyler Barnes, vice president of communications for the Milwaukee Brewers, which owns the Mudcats.

”Some of them are in very, very small locker rooms, the lighting on the field can be very poor, the field conditions can be very poor,” he said.

The pitch to the Wake County Board of Commissioners is for the stadium renovations to include non-mandated improvements to enhance the “fan experience,” according to a presentation made Monday to Wake County leaders.

Those improvements could include a rooftop sky lounge for a bar and kitchen and event seating, a playground and a two-story clubhouse that puts pitching and batting tunnels on the first floor near fans.

The improvements would cost more than $15 million.

The stadium is roughly 85% owned by the county and 15% by Zebulon.

A 2013 file photo showing 6-year-old Emma Strickland enjoying front row seating to pre-game warmups during an exhibition game between the Carolina Mudcats and the Cleveland Indians.
A 2013 file photo showing 6-year-old Emma Strickland enjoying front row seating to pre-game warmups during an exhibition game between the Carolina Mudcats and the Cleveland Indians.

A regional draw

Mudcats and town of Zebulon representatives say the baseball team has seen an uptick in ticket sales in the last year and generates $5.1 million for eastern Wake County.

“We’re getting more folks from outside the county now than we ever have,” said Zebulon Mayor Glenn York. “Because their counties are growing. Johnson County, Nash County, they’re growing, and they’re right up on our doorsteps. So this is a great opportunity to have a fan experience for the future and for the future Wake County.”

Wake County Commissioner Matt Calabria wanted to know the team’s commitment to staying in the area if the county moves forward with these improvements. The current agreement with the MLB goes through 2030.

“We are very bullish on the development we’re seeing in these eastern Wake County and in the town,” Barnes said. “We like what’s happening there. I do think it’s very important that we look at the fan experience. I think that’s that this master plan has to be considered in its entirety.”

Commissioner Susan Evans said she could commit to the mandatory improvements, but wants to hold off on the extras.

“Not saying that the other fan experience improvements aren’t important, but I just think we have to maybe take some baby steps and come back with some of this other information that gives us the comfort feeling about how we’re going to improve our market share out there and turn it into a really desirable place that people want to go and get excited about,” she said. “That’s what we all want.”

The presentation included examples from other North Carolina minor league stadiums including the Red Oak Rooftop and party decks at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park, concessions and lounge areas from Charlotte’s Truist Field, and playground from the Intimidators Stadium in Kannapolis. .

“We’ve talked about these various fan experiences that might draw people in,” said Wake County Commissioner Vickie Adamson. “But we haven’t done any citizen engagement to see if that would really help. If people say, ‘Oh, if there’s a playground, I would come.’ So before we do any fan experience upgrades, I would like to see some citizen engagement, to see what people would say would draw them out.”

Commissioners didn’t take a vote during the work session and the item will come back at a later date.