Herschel Greer Stadium

Herschel Greer Stadium was a Minor League Baseball park in Nashville, Tennessee, on the grounds of Fort Negley, an American Civil War fortification, approximately two mi (3.2 km) south of the city's downtown district.

Amidst the Sounds' 37-season run, Greer simultaneously hosted two professional baseball clubs in 1993 and 1994, acting as a temporary home to a displaced Southern League franchise known during that period as the Nashville Xpress.

[11] Schmittou looked to local suppliers to donate construction materials, took out a $30,000 loan from a bank, sold season tickets in advance of having a team, and even mortgaged his own home to help pay for the facility.

[18] On the field, Sounds catcher Joe Griffin led the 16-hit Nashville offense with 4 hits and 5 runs batted in (RBI) while starting pitcher Bruce Berenyi got the win and closer Doug Corbett earned a save.

Other stadium upgrades included two new dugouts, three entrance and exit ramps, a new sound system, doubling the size of the reader panel on the scoreboard, and enlarging the ticket booth.

[29] The team moved from Evansville to Nashville for the 1985 season, upon which the Triplets' legacy was retired and the franchise adopted the Sounds' name and history, effectively elevating the organization from Double-A to Triple-A.

[27] Schmittou's desire to land a Triple-A team was part of a larger plan to put Nashville in a position to contend for a Major League Baseball franchise in the future.

At a time when other Triple-A cities were building new, relatively luxurious ballparks, Schmittou was unable to convince Mayor Phil Bredesen or the Metro Council to pay for such a new park.

[41] In April 1994, Michael Jordan's foray into professional baseball attracted 16,842 fans to Greer to see the Xpress face his team, the Birmingham Barons, for the first time that season.

[46] With Greer Stadium still falling below Triple-A standards, Schmittou proposed dropping the Sounds back to Double-A in 1996 via a trade with the Southern League's Memphis Chicks.

[47] The Chicago White Sox, the Sounds' major league affiliate, did not see Memphis' Tim McCarver Stadium as an improvement over Greer and convinced Schmittou to delay the swap by at least a year.

[54] As consumer preferences changed and in an effort to attract larger groups to the ballpark, in the late 1990s, Greer Stadium's fixed-seating capacity was reduced to 10,300 by eliminating the bleacher sections from the third base side and right field and constructing three party decks in their places.

[57] However, the Sounds and private developers Struever Brothers, Eccles, & Rouse were unable to finalize financing and design plans for the new stadium by the April 15, 2007, deadline set by the Metro Council.

[55] After the 2008 season, Al Gordon's Amerisports Companies LLC sold the Sounds to MFP Baseball, a New York-based group of investors consisting of Masahiro Honzawa, Steve Posner, and Frank Ward.

[59] The new ownership group invested over $2 million to make repairs and upgrades to the aging stadium's playing field, restrooms, concession stands, scoreboard, sound system, and seating.

[61] In 2011, MFP Baseball and the Mayor's Office began working toward a new stadium, with the city identifying three potential sites for construction, and recruiting stadium-builder Populous to study each.

Mayor Karl Dean preferred the Sulphur Dell site, in an attempt to bolster economic growth on downtown's sluggish north side, while incorporating the ballpark into the surrounding neighborhoods.

[67] Knowing that the 2014 season would be the team's 37th and final campaign at the old ballpark, the Sounds launched the "Last Cheer at Greer", a season-long celebration of the stadium that included nods to its history and promotional giveaways to commemorate the closing.

[73] The department asked Mayor Barry for $800,000 to fund the demolition of the concourse and seating bowl so as to expand the green space at the property, which could then be sold to private developers.

[83] Cloud Hill's developers canceled their plans in January 2018 after archaeologists determined that undisturbed areas on the edge of the Greer property, but not part of the stadium itself, were the unmarked burial sites of slaves forced to build Fort Negley.

[85] Following Barry's resignation in March 2018, acting Mayor David Briley proposed the demolition of Greer Stadium and the reincorporation of the land into Fort Negley Park.

[90] Nashville was further represented on the All-Star squad by Geoff Combe, Paul Householder, Dave Van Gorder, and manager George Scherger who coached the team.

Despite an early American League lead, the Nationals came back to score the winning run in the fifth inning when Tucson's Brian Hunter came home on a wild pitch.

[100] Those on hand for the game included Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, coach Yogi Berra, and players Reggie Jackson, Dave Winfield, Lou Piniella, Willie Randolph, and Bobby Murcer.

[102] The tying and winning runs came off the bat of catcher Frank Kneuer who doubled down the left field line bringing home Matt Gallegos and Derwin McNealy from second and first.

[102] Among the Yankees in attendance for the game were owner George Steinbrenner, manager Billy Martin, coach Yogi Berra, and players Goose Gossage, Ken Griffey Sr., Dave Winfield, Willie Randolph, Bobby Murcer, and former Sound Don Mattingly.

[99] The Chicago White Sox, Cincinnati Reds, Cleveland Indians, Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, Montreal Expos, St. Louis Cardinals, and Texas Rangers all visited Nashville as they prepared for the 1996 season.

Participants included Vince Gill, Carrie Underwood, Brad Paisley, Billy Ray Cyrus, Sara Evans, Montgomery Gentry, and Phil Vassar.

[145] The Oak Ridge Boys, including Sounds' minority shareholder Richard Sterban, were photographed standing in the seats along Greer's left field line for the cover of their 1989 album, American Dreams.

[154] The buyer, AJ Capital Partners, integrated the structure into the design of Nashville Warehouse Company, a mixed-use project at the corner of Chestnut Street and Fourth Avenue South, just blocks away from Greer.

A black and white photograph of a baseball stadium in the final stages of construction, lacking infield dirt and warning track gravel
Construction nears an end in April 1978
A black and white photograph of a baseball game in progress with fans looking on and few empty seats in sight
High attendance in the inaugural 1978 season led to expansion in the ensuing years.
A view of the concourse behind home plate. Overlooking the field are sky boxes and the press box on the third floor and the fourth floor stadium restaurant, all of which are fronted by glass windows.
A new press box, restaurant, and sky boxes were built in 1984.
A view of the giant blue guitar-shaped scoreboard beyond the left-center field wall. Advertisements for local businesses adorn the guitar and the green outfield wall below.
Greer's guitar scoreboard, in its original color scheme, was installed in 1993.
The back side of a freshly painted dark gray metal and concrete structure with red and white accents. Concession stands can be seen on the first level, seating on the second, and sky boxes on the third.
The first base concourse viewed from outside the park
The green baseball field illuminated for a night game
A 2008 game at Greer with the newly built clubhouse visible beyond center field
A view looking over the dirt and green grass of the infield as men rake the dirt and paint the lines before a game
The grounds crew preparing the infield before a game in Greer's final season
A man in a red baseball jersey with "Sounds" written on the front in white and blue and a blue cap with a white "N" on the center stands on a baseball field swinging a bat.
Sounds outfielder Duane Walker was selected as the MVP of the 1979 Southern League All-Star Game at Greer.
A man in a gray baseball uniform and black cap prepares to throw a baseball from his right hand as he stands on the pitcher's mound.
John Wasdin pitched a perfect game at Greer in 2003.
A black guitar-shaped scoreboard towers over the left-center field wall.
The scoreboard as it appeared in 2010
A view from the right field line of the seating bowl at Greer. Blue seats stretch from the right field wall, behind home plate, and beyond the third base dugout.
The diamond and seating bowl as seen from right field