Baseball has many quirky traditions, even when the sport isn’t even in season. Right now, Major League Baseball teams have all migrated south – well, the ones that aren’t located there in the first place that is – for spring training.
Spring training is a tradition that is over 100 years old with the theory that training and preparing for the new baseball season, which is traditionally starts in early April, in warmer climes was beneficial to the players.
With the number of teams travelling to states such as Florida and Arizona beginning to grow at the start of the 20th century, they began to play exhibition games against each other and these quickly morphed into mini pre-season tournaments.
One such tournament is known as the Grapefruit League and takes place in Florida. The Grapefruit first came about in 1914 as teams like the Philadelphia Phillies, Chicago Cubs and Cleveland Indians began to regularly travel to the state for spring training. Now the League features 15 teams, including two who already based in the Sunshine State.
For this teams who don’t base themselves in Florida during the early spring months, Arizona is the favored state for spring training. The Cactus League was born in the 1940s as the state became a popular destination for Major League teams and now around 15 of them base their pre-season preparations there.
Spring training often coincides with spring break for school kids, which allows them to get a close-up glimpse of their heroes without having to worry about seeking out much sought-after tickets for big games.
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