Never seen a baseball game in Danville, VA? You otter

This is an excerpt from the latest edition of the Ben's Biz Beat Newsletter, bringing Minor League Baseball business and culture news to your inbox each and every Thursday. Check out the full newsletter HERE.

The following ballpark road trip recap is presented by Wyndham, proud sponsor of *Minor League Ballpark Guides*. Start planning your 2025 road trips today!

In late July, I visited five teams in North Carolina and one in Virginia. That Old Dominion anomaly was the Danville Otterbots, who play in a southern Virginia city located along the Dan River.

The Otterbots are members of the Appalachian League, a 10-team loop founded in 1911. From 1963-2020 it was classified as a Rookie-level circuit, comprised largely of players making their professional debuts. I spent many years covering the Appy League in this context, most notably in 2016 when I visited all 10 teams in a 10-day span. Minor League Baseball at its most intimate.

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In 2021, as part of a larger reorganization of the Minors, the Appy League was dropped from the affiliated ranks and instead became a summer-collegiate MLB Partner League. Since all 10 teams had previously carried the names of their parent clubs, this necessitated a league-wide rebranding. Danville’s club, for example, switched from Braves to Otterbots.

Otterbots, a heretofore unknown portmanteau, pays tribute to local Dan River wildlife as well as the region’s “future of STEM education and new industry.” They play at American Legion Post 325 Field, located within the 170-acre sprawl of Dan Daniel Memorial Park. The July 29 ballgame was my first visit to Danville since 2016 and my first-ever professional visit to a non-affiliated ballpark. It was great to be back in the Appy League!

American Legion Post 325 Field is a small park with a simple layout. The entrance area, behind home plate, leads onto a concourse that wraps around the back of the seating area.

Bleachers extend down the first- and third-base sides, on either side of a covered grandstand.

The team’s daily operations are overseen by general manager Austin Scher, king of the Otterbots, who joined the organization prior to their inaugural 2021 campaign. He operates in a creative and irreverent fashion and isn’t afraid to take risks, good (and necessary) traits for a team seeking to make a name for itself within a small market.

In the below photo, Austin is on the left.

On the right is Luca Cicilese, a military vet, civil engineer, Otterbots fan and descendant of Moonlight Graham. Luca, on a volunteer basis, oversaw the creation of the sensory room near the right-field Kid’s Zone, which accommodates young fans with sensory aversions. It is now known as Luca’s Place.

A mural along the right-field concourse wall illustrates Danville’s baseball history, which began in 1905 with a team that, more often than not, was known as the Leafs (as in tobacco).

American Legion Post 325 Field opened in 1993 and has hosted an Appy League team ever since. In 1998, the ballpark also hosted the counter-intuitively named Danville 97s, named after the Danville-area Old 97 train wreck. The 97s were a Class-A Advanced Carolina League that relocated from Durham after the Durham Bulls switched to the Triple-A International League. They played just one season in Danville before moving to Myrtle Beach and rebranding as the Pelicans (Single-A affiliate of the Chicago Cubs).

The Old 97, a mail train whose derailment resulted in 11 deaths, was immortalized in a country ballad. It has also been immortalized at the ballpark, whose left-field bar is named The Wreck. The train’s cargo included a case of canaries, whose heedless chirping pierced the eerie stillness of the crash site.

American Legion Post 325 Field isn’t just home to the Otterbots. This season marked the debut of another summer-collegiate entity, the rather outrageously-named Dairy Daddies (who, not surprisingly, quickly became an internet sensation).

On the evening in which I was in attendance -- July 29, for those keeping score at home -- the Otterbots hosted the aforementioned Burlington Sock Puppets.

The Otterbots, managed by Major League veteran Mickey Tettleton, went 31-17 during the regular season and then won the league championship. Their top performer was 2024 Appalachian League Player of the Year Michael Callan Moss, a Brooklyn native who has since signed with the Royals as an undrafted free agent.

During the game, I got to know some of the ballpark regulars. Scotter the Otterbot is named after NASCAR great Wendell Scott, a Danville native and the first Black racer to win at the sport’s highest level. Scotter’s wardrobe resembles Scott’s '60s-era racing gear, and the number 34 on his jersey is in honor of Scott’s car number. (The number 34 has been otherwise retired at the ballpark.)

Luther Adkins arrives at the ballpark before the gates open and stays until the final pitch, the ultimate diehard. He’s missed just 12 games over the 31 years that Danville has hosted an Appy League team.

Jo Adams has a gigantic collection of Otterbots paraphernalia, including every item of merchandise the team has ever sold. She supports the team in many other ways, such as making homemade ice cream for the players. (After the game she drove by me in her truck, ice cream loaded in the back. I was not surprised to see that her truck had an Otterbots vanity plate.)

I also spent time on the air with broadcaster Sam Goldberg.

And, of course, I met with a Designated Eater, one Matt “Possum” Campbell.

I’ve known Matt forever -- he was a regular commenter on my “Ben’s Biz Blog” back when blogs ruled the land -- and it’s been great to cross paths with him through the years (including in his two previous stints as Designated Eater). This time around he enjoyed two quite similar items served up by chef Austin Scher.

The Scotter Dog is a Jesse Jones-brand footlong hot dog topped with pulled pork and barbecue sauce.

It was accompanied by BOTs Fries, in which, with great ingenuity, the same toppings are applied to fries instead of a hot dog. Scotter was a fan.

Wash it all down with an Otterbots beer, made by local 2 Witches Brewery. Take your pick!

Thanks to Matt and Scotter and Austin and Luther and Jo and Mickey and Michael and everyone else who made my return to Danville a memorable one. Good night from American Legion Post 325 Field, the jewel of Dan Daniel Memorial Park.

Thanks for reading, and as always feel free to get in touch at any time. Listen to last week’s “Show Before the Show” podcast. It features my interview with Toledo Mud Hens broadcaster Matt Melzak, in which he shares his memories of Jim Weber. Weber called nearly 7,000 games for the Mud Hens, from 1975 through his sudden passing on Aug. 2.