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Most games (in any sport), people go to watch a team win. If they don’t, they leave unhappy. Win or lose, the Bananas delight their customers with their brand of showmanship and quick-paced games.

A former Cumberland All-American is trying to join them.

Tyner Hughes is on a developmental team called the Visitors. There are four fulltime teams — the Bananas, the Party Animals, the Firefighters and the Tailgaters.

The Visitors will only be together for six weeks and will play the Party Animals and the Bananas. They are wrapping up a three-game set tonight at Louisville’s Slugger Field against the Party Animals. In one of the games, Hughes played all nine positions in a game.

They will then play at Savannah’s Grayson Field for three games against the Bananas next week to end their brief season.

Unlike the Globetrotters, who once reeled off a streak of nearly 9,000 consecutive wins against opposition who served as foils to their bag of tricks, results of the Bananas’ games are not scripted, Hughes said.

“We don’t like comparisons to the Globetrotters,� Hughes said from Louisville before last week’s series. “The Globetrotters’ games are completely scripted. Our games, the only thing that scripted would be a walk-up song or a walk-up dance, a strikeout celebration or a home-run celebration. Other than that, nothing is scripted. We don’t know who would win any game. It’s just real baseball with added flair, trick plays, speeding the game up, making it fun.

“(The Bananas) are not even the best team in the Banana Ball league right now.�

Hughes said a Bananas player is one who can play the game at a high level, be entertaining and keep the fans foremost.

“It’s the fans first here,� he said. “If you’re 0-for-4, four strikeouts, it doesn’t matter. You got to put on a smile for the fans.�

Hughes got an inkling of what he was in for when at his first tryout, the first thing the players did was dance.

“We did probably 30 minutes straight and by the end of it, I was just drenched in sweat from dancing,� Hughes said. “In our everyday practice, we don’t just dance. We actually practice baseball and Banana Ball.�

As for playing all nine positions, it’s something he’s done before — just not in one game. Cumberland fans saw him catch, play third base and left field. He also saw some time at second base, right field and one game at first base.

“Without it being scripted, I’ve actually played all nine positions in my life,� said Hughes, who grew up in Gibson County in west Tennessee and played at Dyersburg State Community College before coming to Cumberland where he batted .373 with 31 home runs and 119 RBIs in the 2022 and ’23 seasons, earning NAIA All-American honors his senior year. “I can play everywhere and play it well.�

The games in Louisville were before the largest crowds he’d ever been in front of. Slugger Field seats just over 13,000 spectators. He said the largest gathering before that was last year playing in Idaho in the Pioneer League where around 4,500 saw his team one night, and it wasn’t a sellout.

In the Globetrotters’ heyday, players like Meadowlark Lemon and Curley Neal were household names. Though the ‘Trotters still draw will on their tours around the world, one would be hard-pressed to find someone who could name a current player.

Same with the Bananas, a look at their roster shows no names familiar to Major League Baseball fans. Yet, the team, which was only established in 2016, has taken the country by storm and Hughes said it’s only growing.

“It’s insane the growth they’ve had,� Hughes said, noting two new fulltime teams will join the league next year. “I think I’m getting my foot in the door at the right time because I don’t think it’s going to slow down.

“They’re becoming an official Banana Ball league. There’ll be playoffs and they’ll crown a champion at the end of it and everything… I think I’m setting myself well and I’m in a good spot.�