Two years ago, on a summer night in Arizona, two diehard Wyoming baseball fans named Kristi and Paul Hack found themselves sitting through a baseball game that was unlike anything they’d ever experienced before.
The players were decked out in practically neon-colored uniforms, some of them accessorized with what looked like Mardi Gras beads from afar.
Periodically, the players would stop everything and break out into song and dance.
Banana Ball was pioneered by the Savannah Bananas, often called the "Harlem Globetrotters of Baseball."
Meanwhile, hitters were walking up to the plate for turns at bat with made-for-TikTok song and dance routines.
Think singing in the rain type of stuff as the player dance-meanders to the plate, lip-syncing to a woman’s voice while decked out in a banana-yellow baseball uniform that’s been accessorized with white gloves and more Mardi Gras beads than ever.
All of the players have a schtick, something they promote throughout the game. It can be backflips, it can be song, or sometimes it’s something else entirely.
“They have a gal who dresses up as Princess Belle, like from Beauty and the Beast, and she calls herself Princess Potassia, because there’s potassium in bananas,” Kristi told Cowboy State Daily. “They have singers and dancers, fun mascots — just all kinds of things.”
They even have a player who stands 10-foot tall because he is playing the game on stilts.
Before the Banana Ball game was even half over, Paul and Kristi, who own the Casper Spuds Collegiate Team, knew they wanted to bring this new, rule-busting brand of baseball home with them, to Wyoming, the Cowboy State, with an exhibition ball game, whether it’s the Savannah Bananas themselves, or one of the other five teams like the Texas Tailgaters, the Party Animals or the Loco Beach Coconuts.
They have since mounted an all-out campaign, complete with traveling T-shirts and social-media ad campaigns that have been inspired by their own chats with some of the Banana Ball players.
Brad Skinner as DJ Phony Stark, left, poses with the Dad Bod Cheer Squads Man Nanas Ant and Mr K during pre game festivities in Savannah, Georgia. (Courtesy DJ Phony Stark) 
Green River's Brad Skinner plays DJ Phony Stark for the Savannah Bananas. (Courtesy DJ Phony Stark) 
DJ Phony Stark is actually a Green River High School teacher. (Courtesy DJ Phony Stark)
The Dullness Connection
Banana Ball’s foundation is baseball, but it’s a model that chucks any rule that slows the game down. It’s billed as fan-first entertainment, and that is exactly what the Hacks believe baseball needs a little more of today.
While today, Kristi is a diehard baseball fan— as well as a fanatical Banana Ball fan — she’ll be the first to admit she, too, once found baseball a bit, well, dull.
She’s not the only one by far. A 2023 Marist Poll found that 53% of Americans describe baseball as boring, and that’s something Kristi really gets.
“I grew up with a dad who watched golf, watched baseball, and I just couldn’t stand it,” she said.
But then she and her choir group were asked to sing the National Anthem at a Colorado Rockies baseball game in 1996. That’s when everything changed.
There were thousands in the crowd surrounding her as she sang the National Anthem. Somewhere between that buzzy crowd and the subsequent crack of the baseball bat striking a ball, things suddenly clicked for Kristi when it came to baseball.
“I just thought, ‘How did I ever think this was boring?’” she said. “‘This is the most amazing thing on earth. This is America’s pastime.’ I was hooked from that moment forward.”
Kristi was picking her favorite teams and her favorite players practically overnight after that.
“It just grew from there,” she said. “And then, Paul and I, our love for the same teams just continued to develop, until here we are with our own team.”
Paul’s love of the game, meanwhile, grew up a little more traditionally.
He learned the game in childhood sandlots, playing neighborhood ball with his friends, before progressing to Little League games in Casper.
Ultimately, his journey has included watching his and Kristi’s son play college baseball, and now he and his wife have made it a point to visit every Major League Baseball Stadium. They have just nine to go.
How Banana Ball Came To Be
Banana Ball was invented by a man named Jesse Cole, a yellow-suited showman, who was initially just trying to get fans to return to historic Grayson Stadium in Savannah, Georgia.
The minor league baseball team had left the city of Savannah after calling it home for 90 years, and getting any sort of excitement from fans for a college summer team seemed next to impossible.
The first few months in, Cole’s team had only managed to sell a handful of tickets. Things were looking so dire that he and his wife sold their home to keep their team and their dream alive.
Hope though, isn’t a plan. So, Cole also started rethinking the whole game of baseball, in earnest.
“No one leaves a great movie in the middle of a movie,” Cole said in a video at his team’s website, explaining a new concept he called Banana Ball. “No one leaves a great concert in the middle of a concert. Yet, for some reason, people leave baseball games in the middle every time.”
Blame it on social media and the shortened attention span that comes from doom-scrolling endless fast-paced TikToks, each of which promises some sort of excitement.
At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter who or what is to blame, Cole decided. The game just lasted too long. The action was too slow. The rules just had to change.
Alex Zeigler of the Savannah Bananas comes to the plate with an oversized bat during a game against the Party Animals at Richmond County Bank Ball Park in New York City. (Getty Images) 
Banana Ball was born out of the idea of making baseball more fast-paced, entertaining, and fun. (Getty Images)
The New Rules
Cole settled on nine rules that dramatically speed things up and create new action and excitement for a reimagined version of baseball.
First, and foremost, every inning counts for something. The team that gets the most home-runs in a given inning wins a point toward the total score.
Importantly though, just as soon as one team has racked up enough runs to beat the other team’s tally in that inning, that inning is over. That team takes their point, and a new inning begins.
That prevents long drawn-out innings where it takes forever to get three outs.
Cole also implemented a two-hour time limit on the overall game, which means the game ends right then, right there, with the winner being whoever has racked up the most points.
In the rare event of a tie, there’s a pitcher versus hitter showdown.
“The pitcher has to stop the hitter, or the hitter has to score,” Cole explained. “So, you have a pitcher who can strike guys out. Boom, you’re ready to go. Or if a hitter tries to hit a ball way out in the outfield, the pitcher is going to run after it. It’s going to be a one-on-one play at the plate, that’s going to create some excitement at the end of the day.”
Walks are no more, because those are boring. Instead, on the fourth ball, the hitter takes off for first base while the catcher must throw the ball to every single player position before it becomes live.
“What are the fans going to watch?” Cole asked. “I don’t know, but it’s going to be exciting.”
Bunting isn’t allowed. Nor are mound visits and stepping out of the batter’s box.
Foul balls, meanwhile, are where it gets really fun for fans. Every foul ball caught by a fan becomes an out. And every fan who catches a ball gets it autographed and gets to take it home.
Cole named his game Banana Ball, because “Yes, it’s bananas,” he said.
“But it’s nonstop excitement,” he added. " It’s faster than any baseball game anyone’s ever seen. And I’ll tell you for all the fans out there, don’t blink. You might miss something.”
Wyoming’s Own Banana Ball DJ
The new approach to baseball is magical, Green River’s Brad Skinner, stage name DJ Phony Stark, told Cowboy State Daily.
Skinner is one of the Banana Ball DJs, who travels around the country to games and helps ensure that the energy level at games reach stratospheric levels.
The approach has been selling out at stadiums across the country, including a game at Coors Field in Denver last year. More recently, the Savannah Bananas made history at the Caesar’s Superdome in New Orelans, selling out the venue, and bringing more than 140,000 fans into one place.
Skinner’s exciting side gig happened somewhat by accident.
The theater director at Green River High School took a group of students to a Banana Ball game in Utah in 2024. It was just a fun way to start off the school year, not a job interview.
But he happened to wear a certain yellow jersey with the name DJ Phony Stark on the back, which was spotted by a couple other Savannah Banana DJs.
Conversations were struck up, and contact information exchanged. When Banana Ball started growing like crazy, Skinner got a surprise text one day asking if he wanted to come DJ a game or two.
Now Skinner is all set to DJ a Banana Ball game at Texas A&M’s College Station in May, where 102,000 tickets have been sold.
“The whole thing is magical,” he said. “Jesse Cole is the founder and owner and he just understands what it’s like to be a fan and always wants to create moments that people remember. They’re going to really connect with the players and have those opportunities to talk to them, to get photos, to get autographs, to exchange charm bracelets.”
Skinner is all for bringing Banana Ball to Casper, even though he’s on the other end of the state.
“They’re going to have games in Salt Lake City this summer as well as in Denver,” he said. “And a lot of Wyoming people will head down to go to those games. But I think there are a lot of people who would love to experience it in Wyoming, and Casper is a wonderful location for that to happen.”
Meanwhile, DJ Phony Stark does plan to perform at one of the Casper Spud games this summer, a first taste of some Banana Ball excitement.
Feel Of Casper Is Ideal
The Hacks believe they have a few things going for them in their quest to draw Banana Ball to Casper for an exhibition game.
For one, Cole has already committed to hosting games in all 50 states, and Wyoming was one of just five states that didn’t host a game this year. Next year, the couple believes it should be the Cowboy State’s turn.
Meanwhile, Mike Lansing Field, which is Casper’s minor-league style ballpark, is among the largest baseball facilities in the state, with an advertised capacity of about 2,500, but that can be pushed closer to 3,800.
“They’re playing in Billings this year, for instance, and that stadium seats 3,000 people,” Paul said. “And we can get our capacity to more than that. So, we think Mike Lansing is a great place for them to come and play a Banana Ball game and just bring something really cool to the state.”
The other thing Casper has going for it is its central location, which is about four hours from most places in the state, as well as plenty of hotel capacity and places for people to stay.
“The bananas are selling out major stadiums, but the other teams are playing some of the smaller stadiums and facilities,” Paul added. “So, we started this campaign in hopes to get banana ball in Wyoming.”
Fire Up The T-Shirt Brigade
The couple have found out of the box ways to promote their idea. They’ve printed up T-shirts that say, “Bring Banana Ball to Wyoming,” which they’ve been taking with them to Banana Ball games around the country — including in Georgia, New York and Arizona.
They also introduce themselves to players and tell them about the Cowboy State. They’ve even asked players, point-blank, if they’d like to come to Wyoming to play a game.
“We just try and spread the word,” Kristi said. “So many of them are so excited to get to come here because they’ve never been here before, but they’ve heard it’s so beautiful.”
Kristi also ran into Jesse Cole himself last year in New York City.
“And so I introduced myself to him, and he’s heard of Mike Lansing Field and he knew where Casper was,” she said. "They already had their schedule for 2026 set, but he said, ‘You know, maybe we could look at 2027.’”
That’s put a little wind under the Hacks’ sails for this effort, which they believe would be good for Wyoming tourism, because Banana Ball games tend to draw fans from all over the country.
“They’ll get to experience Wyoming and be able to plan to come back in the future,” Kristi said. “Which then just boosts the economy in the future for us … Wyoming is just so beautiful, so big and beautiful, and we just want to share that with other people. This is a great place to start.”
Is This Baseball’s Future?
As owners of a minor league team, baseball hasn’t been just a sport to the Hacks. It’s been their way of life.
But now that they own their own team, there’s a certain reality they’ve had to face, not unlike the same reality that prompted Cole to rewrite the rules of baseball.
So, even before they had attended their first Banana Ball game, they were already realizing the need to pick up the pace and jazz up the experience.
“We choose participants from the crowd, whether they’re kids or teenagers or adults, and we play games with them on the field,” Kristi said. “And we love making everyone feel special at the ballpark, so we offer some roses to special ladies in the crowd, whether they’re host family sisters or real-life sisters or girlfriends or mothers or just a random person sitting.”
Still, while the Hacks are keen to bring Banana Ball to the Cowboy State, it’s not necessarily the way they want to see the overall sport go.
“Everything evolves, right,” Paul said. “Everything can be improved upon. And, as far as this Banana Ball thing goes, I don’t think it’s replacing baseball. It’s making the game fun, and it’s its own game. It’s not going to replace baseball, but it is something that’s bringing a lot of people back to the ballpark and involving a lot of people.”
New baseball fans are what the sport most needs to survive, Paul believes, and so bringing a Banana Ball game to Wyoming is one way the Hacks feel they can be part of strengthening their favorite sport.
“The Banana Ball league is not commercial, so it allows you that intimate, up close participation,” Kristi said.
“That’s what we love about what we do with Spuds, too,” Paul added. “It’s very fan friendly and very accessible to everyone.”
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
