![]() Paul Saints have set the gold standard for nutty ideas-a trained pig that delivers balls to the umpire, a nun who gives massages in the stands, mimes who reenact big plays. The team is tame compared with other minor-league squads. For instance, the Clippers offer dozens of giveaways, special events and discounts each year and pack every game with between-inning entertainment-chicken dances, putting contests, T-shirts shot into the crowd. Instead, the experience (food, fun, fresh air) is the main selling point. Rosters fluctuate too much for most fans to get excited over players. Minor league baseball is not your typical professional sport. One regular carries bottles of mustard and ketchup in holsters attached to his belt. The event lacks a transsexual vampire, but it does have other unique characters. Like the movie, Dime-a-Dog is cheesy, theatrical, participatory, slightly frightening and, depending on the gender, homoerotic (that is, if you consider a hot dog a phallic symbol). “It has a cult following, like the old ‘Rocky Horror Picture Show.’ ”Ī fitting comparison. “It's really kind of amazing," says Ken Schnacke, president and general manager of the club. The team has trademarked the phrase Dime-a-Dog, and the souvenir shop sells T-shirts with the event's official logo-a cartoon hot dog in a bun flipping a dime. "It just grows better and bigger every year," says Joe Santry, the Clippers' media relations director and historian. ![]() Six were slated for this year as well, with two remaining on the calendar-July 24 and Aug. Last year, Cooper Stadium hosted six frankfurter fests, the most ever in one season. Or waddle.ĭime-a-Dog has become the Clippers' signature event. Columbus has moved down in the annual Men’s Health rankings of the fattest cities in America in recent years, but if the magazine ever sent a correspondent to cover Dime-a-Dog, the city surely would vault to the top. If laid end to end, those dogs would wrap around the 55-mile outerbelt three times. About 350,000 people have bought 1.5 million hot dogs during more than 50 Dime-a-Dog Nights. ![]() It's even stranger that the answer is no. It's strange that anyone would ever consider that question. And tonight's big issue: Will 20,000 hot dogs-more than one ton of boiled tube steak-be enough to satisfy the hungry horde? Over that time, he's developed a talent for hot-dog handicapping. He's worked nearly 20 Dime-a-Dogs since his company, Sodexho, took over Cooper Stadium's concessions operation about five years ago. "Basically, to get a good gauge of the crowd so you don't waste a lot of hot dogs,” he says. Mid-stride, he revises his answer to the query about his biggest challenge. He semi-sprints, his keys jangling against his khakis. Just one thing hints at the situation's urgency-his walk. Homon is oddly calm for someone about to square off against a mob hellbent for hot dogs. “Being tall enough,” he says, struggling to hang a sign above a food stand.Ī muffled voice says something on Homon's walkie-talkie, and another last-minute detail, a busted soda machine, grabs his attention. Todd Homon, who's in charge of concessions, is asked to name the biggest challenge of a Dime-a-Dog Night, when hot dogs are discounted a whopping 96 percent from their normal $2.50 price and the rules of food consumption tend to break down. Runners relay the franks from the cooking area to the food stands, where workers stuff them in buns and wait for the masses to buy the hot dogs five at a time, the limit per customer. About 20,000 hot dogs stay warm in two massive heated containers in a makeshift kitchen on the concourse's north end. The game marks the young season’s second Dime-a-Dog-the messy, gut-busting, one-of-a-kind Cooper Stadium tradition. Stadium officials anticipate a good-size crowd, around 8,000, even though it’s a meaningless game in May between a couple of International League also-rans, the hometown Columbus Clippers and the Richmond Braves.īut baseball is secondary on this Monday evening. Outside, parking attendants collect $3 fees from a steady stream of cars that’s backing up traffic on nearby I-70. Eager fans crowd the concourse, which is filled with the warm smell of boiled hot dogs. The first pitch is a half-hour away, but Cooper Stadium already is buzzing. Editor’s note: With the Columbus Clippers hosting the first Dime-a-Dog Night of the year this evening, Columbus Monthly is republishing this July 2006 feature-written by then associate editor (now editor) Dave Ghose-that dug into Columbus baseball's most peculiar phenomenon.
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