In a city steeped in history, minor league baseball club builds a community legacy.
Twenty years ago, the idea of a minor league ballpark in downtown Greenville was inconceivable.
It was a pie-in-the-sky notion, something to be scoffed at. It would never be successful, many thought.
And there was the fact that the only viable site was in the West End, on an abandoned lumberyard that was literally on the wrong side of the tracks.
“Back then nobody invested in the West End, but we could see the opportunity,” said Greenville Drive owner and chairman Craig Brown.
Downtown, after all, was burgeoning. The Falls Park Liberty Bridge had just been completed. RiverWalk was under construction.
“We felt very strongly that a successful baseball park should be part of a downtown city, (and) there wasn’t a better downtown in the country than downtown Greenville,” Brown said.
Greenville shifts to the Drive
Greenville shifts to the DriveFrom the Black Spinners, an all-Black team in the early 1900s, to the textile leagues and Shoeless Joe Jackson, Greenville’s history is steeped in baseball.
The city had its own minor league team, the Braves, which played in the aging Greenville Municipal Stadium off Mauldin Road. After failing to come to terms with officials on a replacement stadium, the Braves announced they were leaving for Mississippi.
“We couldn’t afford what they were asking for,” said Greenville Mayor Knox White.
With the Braves gone, the search was on for a new team. Organizations around the country expressed an interest in moving to Greenville. Some even offered to contribute to the construction of a new ballpark.
The city had one caveat, however.
“We insisted the stadium had to be a mixed-use stadium. It had to include residential, office and retail in the actual project. That was a novel idea at the time,” White said.
It was a concept that deterred prospective teams. All but one.
The Capital City Bombers, a Single-A affiliate of the New York Mets, were on board with a mixed-use ballpark and offered to pay for the whole project.
White and other city leaders were bowled over.
“We felt very strongly that a successful baseball park should be part of a downtown city, (and) there wasn’t a better downtown in the country than downtown Greenville.” — Craig Brown, Greenville Drive owner and chairman
In February 2005, the team relocated from Columbia and played one season as the Greenville Bombers before being renamed the Drive and affiliating with the Boston Red Sox. Ground was broken on West End stadium in June that same year.
Replicating Fenway
Initial construction of what would be called Fluor Field cost an estimated $20 million.
“We really wanted to make a statement and come up with an exact replica of Fenway Park, so we were very painstaking in our design,” Brown said.
That included a Greenville version of the Green Monster, a 30-foot-high wall in left field equipped with a manual scoreboard, and Pesky’s Pole, the foul pole in right field. Even the playing surface was the same.
“The only difference is all of our restrooms are functional, and our seats are more comfortable,” Brown joked.
In a stroke of luck, the Charleston entrepreneur behind A&E’s “Flip this House” had purchased Shoeless Joe Jackson’s home and relocated it next to the stadium two days before the Drive’s inaugural game on April 6, 2006.
Substantial improvements have been made to the facility in the years since.
In 2016, a $15 million renovation added premium seating atop the Green Monster, a new 4,000-square-foot event space called the Champion’s Club and a Front Porch season ticket holders’ lounge.
“We’ve really worked hard to put the community first. Everything that we do is focused on that.” — Craig Brown, Greenville Drive owner and chairman
In 2022, the Drive opened District 356, modeled after the Jersey Street entertainment district in Boston. The “356” is a reference to Jackson’s lifetime batting average.
“Just like anything, it’s a notion of continuous improvement. You’re either getting better and keeping it fresh and keeping it relevant, or you’re going backwards,” Brown said.
Front porch culture
In 2010, a local newspaper editorial paid tribute to Fluor Field by calling it Greenville’s “front porch.” Like the front porches of the South, the stadium had somehow become a gathering spot, a community center, a nexus.
The phrase stuck.
“That’s exactly the kind of positioning we wanted our team to have,” Brown said. “The front porch has become part of our culture.”
Today, half of the Drive’s 60-plus home games each season revolve around community engagement. Examples include Health Careers Night and Advanced Manufacturing & Engineering Night, which celebrate industries vital to the Upstate, and TeachGCS Night, which honors educators in Greenville County Schools.
Perhaps the most successful of these endeavors is Reading All-Stars, a program in partnership with Michelin that promotes reading among young people. The program, which launched in 2008, has since spread to six counties and impacted over 1.3 million students.
“We’re using the platform that we have to really do good for the community,” Brown said. “We’ve worked hard to put the community first. Everything we do is focused on that.”
Photo by Gwinn Davis MediaFluor Field, by the numbers
- 5,700 seats
- 324,000 average season attendance
- 5,831,510 game day attendance to date
More about Fluor Field
The park is a true replica of Boston’s fabled Fenway Park with its own Green Monster, manual scoreboard, Pesky’s Pole and adjoining Jersey Street entertainment district.
