MOOSE, WYOMING—The news shot around Grand Teton National Park’s Jenny Lake on Sunday like the crack of a well-hit baseball echoing off the walls of Cascade Canyon.
The Trump administration and Major League Baseball are scouting the park for a site to play a game?
That was the report in The Washington Post that shook campers and other visitors from their serene surroundings where they had come to escape the mayhem of daily news. The Post story and others that followed chased down a request by Major League Baseball and statements from the White House that the league’s request was not a priority.
“Keep America’s pastime in our baseball parks, not in our national parks,” said David Kelly, an Angels fan from L.A. who was visiting Grand Teton on Sunday. “What are they going to do, cut down a bunch of trees?”
“They would have to build a field?” asked Kristen Kelly. “Not in Yellowstone, not in Yosemite. No!”
“This is our sanctuary,” said Scott Bauer, a visitor from Seattle and a Mariners and Red Sox fan who was at Jenny Lake on Sunday. His bicycling companion Carol Bauer added a few words about President Donald Trump and his building projects: “I don’t need him doing any construction in parks.”
Christiana Rinderle, the former mayor of Durango, Colorado, was visiting Grand Teton on Sunday and called foul. “National Parks are meant for people to enjoy the wildlife and natural beauty,” she said.
“The stadium should be facing the Tetons.”
Steven Williams
The Post reported that National Park Service Deputy Director Frank Lands visited three Grand Teton sites including one that was “already disturbed land.” White House statements to news outlets said Lands was not on a baseball scouting mission.
“This is not a Presidential directive, nor is it being directed by the White House,” Reuters reported the statement reading. “It’s also not being driven by the Department of Interior. Therefore, this is not a White House or Administration priority.”
“I first thought this has to be a joke or an AI spoof,” Joan Anzelmo, former superintendent of Colorado National Monument, said in a statement. “MLB you should know that Grand Teton National Park, home to free ranging wildlife, including grizzly bears, bison, wolves, moose, cougars and elk, is not an appropriate or safe venue for your baseball fantasy,” the valley resident and park advocate said.
Seriously, folks…
Fans describe a towering home run as a ball that would have been hit out of any park but Yellowstone. Well, now maybe …
WyoFile’s examination of Grand Teton on Sunday revealed thousands of acres of sagebrush plain across the 310,000 acre reserve. A baseball field can cover up to about four acres. A stadium can cover 25. A complex, including parking, can cover hundreds of acres.
In Grand Teton, about 10 acres of the sagebrush fields are “already disturbed” — recently bulldozed to expand the Taggart Lake Trailhead parking area.
Steven Williams, a former Jackson Hole resident who now lives outside Steamboat, Colorado, offered advice on how to design a stadium. Williams, (6’2”, 160 pounds, bats right, throws right) tried to walk on as a Chicago White Sox pitcher in 1973.
“The stadium should be facing the Tetons,” he said as he pointed Sunday toward the mountains from Moose. “The fan experience should be the vision of the Tetons.”
Jorge Colon, who played catcher in the Jackson Town League decades ago, disagreed. Fans want home runs, he said, and Williams’ layout would disadvantage the batter.
“You’re against the wind,” Colon said.
Playing baseball at 6,783 feet above sea level near Jenny Lake would, nevertheless, give a batter a boost. At the high-elevation site, a baseball would travel, according to experts’ calculations, 40 feet farther than one hit at sea level.
The Park Service already has an appropriate site for a baseball game at a historic site it oversees in California. A game was recently played at the Manzanar National Historic Site where thousands of Japanese Americans were interned during WWII.
In 2024, the Little Tokyo Giants played the Lodi JACL Templars, the first time the field had been used since the Manzanar camp was closed in 1945.
Grand Teton itself had a ball diamond at Moose years ago in the middle of a park housing complex. But the Park Service converted the open space to additional quarters for park staff in response to Jackson Hole’s worker housing crunch.
Neither the Department of Interior nor Major League Baseball returned emails seeking comment Sunday.
