City of Birmingham
Major League Baseball today announced the launch of the ticketing process for the two primary MLB and MiLB games scheduled for Rickwood Field in Birmingham, in June.
Tickets for MLB at Rickwood Field, A Tribute to the Negro Leagues, which will feature the first-ever official MLB game at the historic ballpark between the San Francisco Giants and St. Louis Cardinals on Thursday, June 20th, will be exclusive to residents within the state of Alabama. Alabama residents, which will be determined by local zip codes, can now begin registering for the chance to purchase tickets at https://www.mlb.com/events/rickwood/tickets. The registration process for this special ticket lottery closes on Tuesday, April 30th.
Major League Baseball and the City of Birmingham will be making more than 26% of the approximate 8,100 seated tickets at Rickwood Field available to community- or youth-based organizations in Birmingham at no cost.
The special Minor League Baseball contest, the first such event at Rickwood Field since the last “Rickwood Classic” in 2019, will feature the Montgomery Biscuits and the Birmingham Barons on Tuesday, June 18th. The teams will honor the legacy of the Negro Leagues by playing as the Montgomery Grey Sox and Birmingham Black Barons, respectively. Pre-sale tickets for season ticket holders of both the Barons and Biscuits began Wednesday, April 17th while general public tickets will be available for purchase on Tuesday, April 23rd. Tickets can be purchased at https://www.milb.com/events/rickwood/tickets. The match-up holds historic significance as semi-professional teams from Birmingham and Montgomery were the first to play at Rickwood Field when it opened in 1910.
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Additional ballpark and community engagement event details surrounding these games and Juneteenth will be announced at a later date. The entirety of the events will be centered around celebrating the legacy of Negro Leagues players, including its greatest living player – Hall of Famer Willie Mays – as well as the larger Birmingham community.
Rickwood Field, the oldest professional ballpark in the United States and former home of the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro Leagues, hosted some of baseball’s greatest players on its hallowed grounds. These players included Mays, Hank Aaron, Ernie Banks, Cool Papa Bell, Yogi Berra, Roy Campanella, Oscar Charleston, Roberto Clemente, Joe DiMaggio, Larry Doby, Rube Foster, Lou Gehrig, Josh Gibson, Monte Irvin, Reggie Jackson, Buck Leonard, Biz Mackey, Mickey Mantle, Connie Morgan, Stan Musial, Satchel Paige, Frank Robinson, Jackie Robinson, Babe Ruth, Duke Snider, Toni Stone, Cristobal Torriente, Honus Wagner, Willie Wells, and so much more. Rickwood Field is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro Leagues called Rickwood Field home from 1924 through 1960. As a teenager, Mays began his professional career with the Black Barons in 1948. He played with them before beginning his legendary MLB career as a member of the New York Giants in 1951. Rickwood Field was the site of the final Negro League World Series game in October 1948, which saw Mays’ Black Barons falling to the Homestead Grays in five games.
MLB is collaborating with the Friends of Rickwood and City of Birmingham to renovate Rickwood Field for 2024, transforming the National Historic Site in order to host a Major League game. Existing and future information on these events can be found at MLB.com/rickwood.
