Midwest League McPhail Nominee

Every year...oh, I'm just going to swipe Benjamin Hill's explanation of the Larry McPhail Trophy: The Larry MacPhail Promotional Trophy is awarded annually to the Minor League team that did the most outstanding promotional work during the recently concluded season.

That is from the start of a post about the Peoria Chiefs, the Midwest League team up for the award this year. The post is notable for two things. 1.) Nathan Baliva responds to the questions. I'll get to that after this excerpt:

What were some of your biggest promotional successes from last season?

NB: We played a regular season game at Wrigley Field in Chicago in front of a MWL record crowd of 32,103 fans while also garnering national attention. Our free hot dogs and peanuts nights on Wednesday increased our average attendance on Wednesday nights more than 1300 from last season. We also brought in local and national celebrities such as Hall of Famer Bruce Sutter, Illinois basketball coach Bruce Weber, Bradley soccer coach Jim DeRose, Jason Earles from Hannah Montana, Illinois State basketball coach Tim Jankovich and former Illinois basketball player and ordained minister Roger Powell. We also drew over 6,000 fans on average for our 12 fireworks shows, which each featured a Pitch-In for Charity. Our Jimmy Buffett Night was a sell-out yet again this season with a post-game concert by Coco Loco and the Chiefs players/coaches all wore Hawaiian jerseys that were auctioned for charity after the game.

2.) There doesn't appear to be any mention of this guy as their manager in 2008. It must go without saying.