When and why was the Cactus League founded?
The Cactus League association is a representative of the facility operators and booster groups that work with the teams to help put on spring training. So, the association was formed in 1954 to work together cooperatively, to share different ideas and promote the Cactus League as a whole, to not only local communities, but various parts of the country. There are currently 12 teams in the league—the Seattle Mariners and the San Diego Padres are in Peoria; the Texas Rangers and Kansas City Royals are in Surprise; Phoenix has the Milwaukee Brewers and Oakland A’s; Mesa has the Chicago Cubs; Tempe has the Los Angeles Angels; Scottsdale has the San Francisco Giants; and Tucson has the Colorado Rockies, the Chicago White Sox and the Arizona Diamondbacks.

What are the advantages teams have for relocating their spring training to Arizona?
Historically, the Cactus League teams find it better in Arizona compared to the 18 teams in Florida (home of the Grape Fruit League). Number one, they’re closer together physically, so travel distance for the teams to play an away game is a half-hour or so, not counting Tucson. It’s my understanding that in Florida, you have to travel two or three hours every day to get to another facility. So, close proximity means they get more practice time at their stadium and then they get to go play the game. If you’re a fan and you travel down from Chicago to see the Cubs, and if the Cubs are playing in Peoria one day, you can easily stay in Mesa and still make that transition and go to that game. Number two, Arizona has less rainouts overall than Florida, so that makes for more training time.
How has the league benefitted
surrounding communities?
The No. 1 benefit for the local municipalities, as well as the community, is that we have state-of-the-art facilities. Through the combination of the city and rental car taxing through the county or the Sports and Tourism Authortiy, we’re able to build these first-class facilities that the teams use mainly during spring training and through their minor league presence. But the communities get to utilize it on a year-round basis. Our little leagues and high school baseball teams get to play on some of the best facilities in the state.

How much revenue does the league generate for Arizona?
The study that we did three years ago found that the fans that come from out-of-state (60 percent) generate $220 million annually just for that month of spring training. That’s just the out-of-state fans; it’s not counting the amount teams spend, which can easily total $1 to $2 million each, while they’re here.

What changes can baseball fans expect for this year’s spring training?
Overall, spring training is a great experience because the fans get up close and personal with the players more than they can at a regular season game. The biggest change is different teams have different players, so if they didn’t get to see a star player one year, they can see him the next. It seems like all the teams and players, even though they are going through a strong competition, they are all basically tied so they are in a better mood at that time.

What steps are taken by the league and local government to prepare for spring training?
There’s quite a bit of work that goes on for spring training. Booster groups lend volunteers to do all the ticket taking, selling of programs, parking and things like that. Those volunteers are a tremendous support and there’s a lot of work involved to get them organized. The teams themselves bring not only 60 major league players but 180 minor league players, so most of our facilities have six or seven baseball fields that have to be prepared to a major league level. That’s quite a transition from the summer Bermuda grass to the winter rye grass.

What are your future goals for the League?
Our main focus is to take care of the 12 teams that are in the league right now. We want to make sure as their contracts come up for renewal (most of them are 20- or 30-year contracts), that we have funding and a plan in place to keep those teams happy. Whether that means facility improvements or changes, there needs to be money in place to take care of the existing teams. After that, if we have some funds and there are some cities available to recruit teams, that’s an added bonus as well.

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