24 Mar From the Sports Pages..Minor League Concession Item of the Year

For years, we’ve given the title of “Concession Item Of The Year” to the Gateway Grizzlies, whose executives seems to have a knack for coming up with the best idea year after year.

In 2006, it was a bacon cheeseburger with donuts as buns.

Then came the deep fried sliders.

Last year, it was the buffalo wing pretzel.

But the West Michigan Whitecaps have our eye this year with this — believed to be the single most caloric item ever offered at a ballpark.

Here are the important details on this absolute gutbuster. It’s called the Fifth Third Burger, named after the bank [FITB 2.15 -0.23 (-9.66%) ] that sponsors the team’s ballpark.

It’s 5/3 lbs (1.66) of beef with lettuce, tomato, salsa, sour cream, chili and Fritos on an eight-inch sesame seed bun.

The team says it feeds one to four people and sells for $20, and if a person finishes the Fifth Third Burger in one sitting, the team will offer up a Fifth Third Burger T-shirt.

Mickey Graham, the team’s director of marketing and media relations, told us that they came up with this burger because it’s something fun that people can understand.

Graham added that he thinks it’s possible that that the burger will be popular enough that people might show up to the ballpark, buy a ticket to get in, buy a burger and go home.

“We’ve had people come just for dinner,” Graham said. “It actually happens pretty frequently. We take our food pretty seriously.”

A shout out to Ben Hill’s great minor league business blog, who had this meaty story first.

And a shout out to my husband for finding this gem.