The Cincinnati Reds replaced the White Sox as Al López Field's primary tenant in 1960 and would return every spring for almost 30 years.

Al López Field was constructed as the first phase part of a planned community sports complex, with Tampa Stadium built adjacent to the ballpark in 1967.

Beginning with the Chicago Cubs in 1913, a series of major league teams trained at Plant Field, a multipurpose facility near downtown Tampa.

City leaders decided that a new baseball-only facility would insure that Tampa could continue to host spring training and professional baseball into the future.

The grandstand was primarily constructed from concrete and featured a high, curved aluminum overhang with no obstructing columns, a design similar to that of Miami Stadium.

[4] After the White Sox went north for the beginning of the regular season, their new Florida State League Class-A team, the Tampa Tarpons, took the field.

The Reds would become the major league club most associated with the ballpark, as they used the stadium and the adjacent training facilities (nicknamed "Redsland") as their spring home for almost 30 years.

Johnny Bench, and Dave Concepción, played some of their first professional baseball in Tampa with the Tarpons and later returned for spring training with the big league club.

During a visit to Tampa in November 1963, President John F. Kennedy delivered his last major speech to an overflow crowd of 10,000 people at the ballpark only days before being assassinated in Dallas, Texas.

[11] With the uncertainty about the future of the site, the Tampa Sports Authority would only offer the Reds a series of short-term leases for the continued use of the ballpark and the adjacent training facilities.

[14][15] With no tenants and with a sense that the city would have to move quickly to build a major league stadium, the Tampa Sports Authority decided to demolish AL Lopez Field in early 1989.

While Tampa waited to build a new ballpark until it was guaranteed a major league team, St. Petersburg went ahead with construction on the domed stadium that is now known as Tropicana Field.