Know Your Foe: The Ogden Raptors
Welcome to Know Your Foe, the season series of friendly fast facts to get to know the Ballers’ opponents at Raimondi Park.
First up: Our Opening Week rivals, the Ogden Raptors!
Hometown: Ogden, Utah
- Ogden claims to be the oldest European settlement in Utah.
- Nicknames: Junction City, Crossroads of the West, The Big O.
- But also call it Mountain Hollywood: Parts of The Sandlot (the iconic pool scene!), Con Air, Yellowstone, and Dumb and Dumber (“Big Gulps, huh?” and the atomic peppers) were filmed in the city and surrounding area.
Mascot: Oggie T. Raptor
- He is a nod to Ogden’s own Dinosaur Park, Utah’s Dinosaur National Monument, and the state’s celebrated Utahraptor, the supposed inspiration for the velociraptors in Jurassic Park.
- His jersey numbers have been simply ? and #
- His diet includes, “Hangin' curveballs from opposing pitchers, Raptor Burgers from the Hardball Café and children (He says they taste like chicken!),” which does not entirely convince those of us who saw the Jurassic Park kitchen scene when we were nine years old of Oggie’s prevailing cuteness…
Isaac Fisher @ The Standard-Examiner
Team History:
- The Raptors finished ninth in 2024, but they have a long history of success: they tied a Pioneer League record for wins in 2019, and they won it all in 2017 and 2023.
- They were affiliated with the Milwaukee Brewers from 1996 to 2002 and the LA Dodgers from 2003 to 2020.
- They play at Lindquist Field, renowned for its view of the Wasatch Mountains. The park is regularly voted one of the most beautiful in professional baseball. (But do they have a Bay Area sunset and a 20-foot-high B? Just saying.) They lead or nearly lead the league in attendance each year. (Watch out, we’re coming!)
- Prince Fielder, Kenley Jansen, and Corey Seager spent time with the team on their way up. Frank Robinson played for the Ogden Reds, a previous Ogden franchise.
Best Promos:
- The team does “ticket drops” around town where fans can find hidden physical tickets, good for most of the season’s games, under lampposts in parking lots or taped to fire hydrants or secreted away between rocks on popular walking paths (even, perfectly, under some bleachers at a little league baseball diamond).
- Their Fan Fest has a fans’ Home Run Derby—any homer wins free tickets!
What to Watch For:
- In a town like Oakland with its own mythic baseball winning streak, look no further for the same kind of magic than the Salt Lake City Trappers, precursors to the Raptors, who in 1987 won a record 29 games in a row, still a record for all levels of American professional baseball. Bill Murray was one of the managing partners and a frequent fan who once brought along Huey Lewis to sing a National Anthem. The streak is the subject of a new documentary called…The Streak.
