Al Lang Field, St. Petersburg, Fla.

Al Lang Field

Home-plate entrance to Al Lang Field, Aug-2003.

The main seating area.

Quick Facts:

Location: Between 1 Street and Bayshore Drive at 2 Avenue South, St. Petersburg, Fla. (map it using Google Maps)
Opened: 1947 (stadium rebuilt 1977)
Additional names: Florida Power Park (1998-2002), Progress Energy Park (2003-08)
Home team: St. Petersburg Saints, Florida International League (1947-54), Florida State League (1955-65); St. Petersburg Cardinals (1966-97), Devil Rays (1998-2000), Florida State League; St. Petersburg Pelicans, Senior Professional Baseball Association (winter 1989-90); spring training, St. Louis Cardinals (1947-97), New York Yankees (1947-50, 1952-61), New York Giants (1951), New York Mets (1962-87), Baltimore Orioles (1991-95), Tampa Bay Devil Rays (1998-2007), Rays (2008); FC Tampa Bay / Tampa Bay Rowdies, North American Soccer League (2011-16), USL Championship (2017-present)
Capacity: 6,438

The dedication plaque to Al Lang.

As you can see on the dedication plaque to the right, Al Lang was a mover and shaker in Florida baseball from the 1910s forward. Teams had occasionally trained in Florida prior to Lang’s involvement, but in 1914 Lang, a businessman who served as mayor of St. Petersburg from 1916 to 1920, convinced the St. Louis Browns to train in his home town. Waterfront Park was opened in 1921 and a full stadium built in 1922 at this site, and it hosted several teams, including the Boston Braves, New York Yankees, and Philadelphia Phillies, over the next twenty years. In 1947, a new stadium dedicated to Lang was built to accommodate the St. Louis Cardinals, who had been training in St. Petersburg since 1938 at the site. Many clubs also used Crescent Lake Field for games and other training activities at the same time they utilized this site for their exhibition games.

For most of its spring training life, the site was used for two major league clubs in the same season, a cost-sharing maneuver again being employed at venues such as Jupiter and West Palm Beach as well as many of the Cactus League complexes in Arizona.

The current stadium was built in 1977, and it acquired a corporate sponsor, Florida Power, in 1998. The stadium later became Progress Energy Park, reflecting the corporate parent of Florida Power, but the sponsorship agreement ended when the Rays moved their spring training to Port Charlotte.

Right next to Al Lang Field was the headquarters building of the National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues, the owners of the trademark Minor League Baseball. The National Association, in existence from 1902 to 2020, coordinated dealings among affiliated professional teams and leagues, and administered the Professional Baseball Agreement between itself and Major League Baseball. MiLB later moved to offices on 66 Street, several miles from Al Lang Field, before being dissolved when MLB assumed control of the affiliated minors for 2021.

There was a proposal on the board to build a new major league facility on the site of Al Lang Field and move the Tampa Bay Rays there. This move, which would only be several blocks, would have required myriad local approvals, and the idea was shelved in 2009. In the meantime, the stadium has been converted for soccer and has served as the home of the second-tier Tampa Bay Rowdies since 2011. No baseball has been played here since 2014, a condition of the Rowdies’ lease with the city.

Return to the Stadiums page
Return to Charlie’s home page
Send us feedback