Great Lakes Loons (LAD) @ Dayton Dragons (CIN)
July 19, 2025
S: Christian Ruebeck
HR: Cameron Decker (GL), Connor Burns (DAY)
Attendance: 8,046
Time of Game: 2 hours, 37 minutes
Stadium Facts
Location: Dayton, OH
Opened: 2000
Capacity: 6,831
Level: High A
League: Midwest
Time of Game: 2 hours, 37 minutes
Stadium Facts
Location: Dayton, OH
Opened: 2000
Capacity: 6,831
Level: High A
League: Midwest
When the game in Dayton was rained out during my June Midwest trip, I figured I probably would not return to see a game there until a future year. I did go ahead and exchange my ticket for a game in mid-July to at least give myself the option of making another trip to Dayton this summer though. The week leading up to that Saturday night game, I went back and forth on whether or not to make the fairly lengthy drive with a less than ideal weather forecast once again. Ultimately, I decided to go for it, figuring even if the Saturday night game were to get rained out, I could stick around until Sunday and skip the stop in Pittsburgh I had planned to see a White Sox/Pirates game on my way home. As it turned out, it started to pour just a matter of minutes after I arrived in Dayton. Fortunately, this was several hours before scheduled first pitch and the rain did not last long. They did delay the game about a half hour to give themselves more time to get the field ready. It turned out to be a nearly perfect summer night for baseball.
The Dayton Dragons are perhaps best known for holding the North American professional sports record for most consecutive sellouts, a streak that began the day the franchise arrived in Dayton in 2000 and remains in tact today at over 1,600 consecutive games. The caveat is that this excludes the 2021 season which had limited attendance due to pandemic restrictions. This is a baseball loving city and it certainly helps being in close proximity to the parent club in Cincinnati as well. Day Air Ballpark is a gem of a stadium located in the downtown area of the Gem City. There are a plethora of bars and restaurants in the Water Street district where the ballpark is located, just a few blocks from where the Miami and Mad Rivers meet. Like many of these other downtown minor league parks, there is a residential high rise looming over the park across the street from center field. There is also an apartment building rising above the home plate area and an old brick warehouse building in left. These all create a cozy environment despite it being a pretty good sized High A facility. There are no regular seats in the outfield, but the concourse does encircle the entire park. There are a couple party areas in left and center, plus lawn seating in right and down both baselines. This allows them to accommodate far more fans most nights than the official seating capacity of about 6,800. There is a legit second deck with a bunch of sets of stairs leading up to it from the concourse. And then there is a suite level above that. There is construction underway on the upper level to add another party deck in the future, it would appear. One thing that the sellout streak affords the team is to not need to put together an extensive set of promotions. I think they are the only minor league team I've checked out the past two years that doesn't have a published set of promotions on their website for every game. Also, the in-stadium advertising is quite limited compared to most minor league (and MLB, for that matter) parks. I think this might have been the first summer weekend night minor league game I've attended the past two years that didn't have postgame fireworks. None of this is a complaint at all. It's just noticeably different than what I've experienced elsewhere and almost certainly because they don't need any of that to fill the park.
This was my third time seeing the Dodgers Midwest League affiliate Great Lakes play this summer and second for the Reds' Dayton. Both Dayton games have featured tall left handed pitcher with a funky delivery, Adam Serwinowski, starting on the mound for the Dragons. He happened to get traded last week to the Dodgers as part of a three team trade in which the Reds acquired pitcher Zack Littell from Tampa Bay. Serwinowski was added to the Great Lakes roster this past weekend and will presumably make his debut in the Dodgers organization in the next couple days, pitching for the team he faced on this particular night. He was very good in this game for the first four innings before running into trouble in the fifth. Great Lakes starter Payton Martin also pitched well, but must have been on a pitch count limit because he was pulled in the fourth inning having only allowed one run. That run was a solo home run by nine hole hitter, catcher Connor Burns, who lofted one into the Dragons Lair party area just above the wall in left. The Loons did not have a hit against Serwinowski until the fifth inning. Two batters after a double by Wilman Diaz, leadoff man Kendall George tied the game with a base hit to left. George would then steal second and third. He and Josue De Paula came around to score on a big two run single by Logan Wagner. That gave the Loons a 3-1 lead and knocked Serwinowski out of the game. In the next inning, Loons first baseman Cameron Decker hit a solo home run to almost the exact same spot in left as the Burns dinger. That was the fourth and final Great Lakes hit of the game. All four led to the runs in the fifth and sixth innings, so they made them count. It would also wind up being one more hit than the Dragons could muster in the game. The Dragons did load the bases with one out in the bottom of the seventh, but a strikeout and a flyout extinguished the threat. Dayton would not get another runner on base in the game, so they dropped this one by a final of 4-1. With the victory, Great Lakes improved to 3-0 on the season in games I've attended, which should make them my 2025 minor league tour champion since no other team will have the opportunity to reach three wins without a loss.
FYI, the linked photo album below contains photos from both my June stop in Dayton before the rainout as well as this return trip in July. I am now up-to-date with these minor league ballpark recaps. At the moment, my next scheduled visit is a day trip to the other side of Washington, DC in Bowie, Maryland for a Chesapeake Baysox game a couple weeks from now.
Next ballpark: Prince George's Stadium in Bowie, MD
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