“We didn’t put a ton of thought into their brand,” Cole said. “We just needed a worthy opponent and loved the name.”

Cole didn’t neglect the Party Animals for long. Today, the baseball team has a passionate fan base drawn to them as the counter-culture alternative (think punk rock meets frat house) to the wholesome silliness that defines the Bananas. Two more recently created Banana Ball franchises, the Firefighters (established 2024) and Texas Tailgaters (2025), are building their own followings.

The recent playoffs were a dress rehearsal for that future. The Bananas lost in the opening round to the Firefighters, sending the Firefighters to the championship game versus the Party Animals. While Savannah Bananas gear remained the most popular garb among fans at the sold-out title game, merch in Party Animal pink and Firefighter red dotted the grandstands like brown spots on a banana peel.

The “Party Papa,” Loganville retiree Bob Goodyear, wears his love for the Party Animals on his sleeve — and chest and trouser legs and even on his head. He’s amassed a full Party Animals outfit a piece at a time over the last five years and retired all evidence of a previous Bananas fandom.

“When they started touring, everyone was a fan of the Bananas. It was like the Party Animals didn’t exist,” Goodyear said. “I didn’t feel like that was right.”

Bob Goodyear, nicknamed the "Party Papa" for his fandom of the Party Animals, attended the 2025 Banana Ball playoffs with his wife, Nancy. The couple are from Loganville and became fans of the Party Animals in 2020. (Adam Van Brimmer/AJC)

Become ‘the talk of the town’

The Party Animals' fur-wearing hypeman, Drake C. Toll, performs alongside the team during a Savannah Bananas baseball game Saturday, March 29, 2025, at Truist Park. (Daniel Varnado for the AJC)

Over the last two seasons, with the formation of the Firefighters and the Tailgaters, the Party Animals have broken free of the Bananas to headline their own tour. They played 21 sellout games in nine college and minor league ballparks in 2025 and became the “talk of the town,” Toll said.

The Party Animals have connected with fans to eclipse the “bad boy” moniker and instead be associated with the “greatest party in sports,” a brand that can appeal to both 7-year-olds and 77-year-olds, Toll said.

The Firefighters and Tailgaters are following the Party Animals’ lead, carving out their own unique personas. The Calendar Crew, the Firefighters’ hunky male cheerleading squad, is the antithesis of the Bananas’ Man-Nanas dad bod cheer squad. Fire Line Live is the Firefighters’ drum line band, and their bat boy is a spotted white Dalmatian dog named Chief.

The Firefighters run on the field before taking on the Savannah Bananas at Angel Stadium on Friday, May 30, 2025, in Anaheim, California. (Luke Johnson/Los Angeles Times/TNS)

The Texas Tailgaters’ hook is the “greatest pregame in sports,” with cookouts, yard games and line dancing outside the stadium. Their band plays country rock and includes a fiddler, because as country music legends Alabama once sang, if you’re going to play in Texas, you gotta have a fiddle in the band. Their uniforms are denim, and their caps are shaped like Stetsons.

The Tailgaters’ manager, Joe Mikulik, left his longtime job as a minor league coach to lead the new team. He grew a bushy handlebar mustache and is known to take off his shirt and shoulder press beer kegs between innings. One of his assistants grills hot dogs in the first base coaching box when the Tailgaters are batting.

Will Lindsey and Carla Silva, a couple from El Paso, Texas, traveled to Savannah to root on the Texas Tailgaters in the Banana Ball playoffs on Oct. 3, 2025 at Savannah's Grayson Stadium. (Adam Van Brimmer/AJC)

The Tailgaters already have a following in their namesake state. El Paso residents Will Lindsey and Carla Silva traveled to Savannah for the recent playoffs after catching a Tailgaters game this summer in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Lindsey, a former college ballplayer, instantly adopted them, even doing something he’s never done before — buy a team jersey.

“I played ball and know what wearing a jersey means, but this is different,” he said. “Fans are part of the fun.”

Beyond the Banana brand

Banana Ball’s founder, Cole, beams when he hears stories like Lindsey’s. Banana Ball’s parent company is named Fans First Entertainment, and his insistence on taking lessons from how and why fans embraced the Bananas and later the Party Animals has driven Banana Ball’s success.

Savannah Bananas owner Jesse Cole, center, looks for contestants during a performance before the start of a home game at Historic Grayson Stadium. (Stephen B. Morton for the AJC)

“People are excited about the game of Banana Ball and not just one brand,” Cole said.

The Coconuts will be beach-themed, complete with a grass skirt-wearing male cheerleading squad known as the Hula-gans.