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DubSea Fish Sticks deliver more than a baseball game

A golf cart turned bullpen boat putters toward the infield to drop off the night’s starting pitcher at his place of work. Just minutes earlier, on this flawless July night, the game’s designated special guest, “Broccoli Guy,” had hurled a wild Alaskan pollock for the night’s “first fish.” 

Fans crowd the “Ice Chest” beer garden along the left-field line, sipping suds from local breweries, while players stretch within earshot on the sun-soaked outfield grass. Others congregate at the food truck, where selections range from pulled pork nachos to fiesta shrimp tacos and, yes, fish sticks. 

A young boy, wide-eyed and glove in hand, watches while clinging to the rails behind home plate, while another fan takes her seat with a homemade hat replicating a plastic bowl of the team’s namesake treat.

Fish Sticks players race out from their dugout as “Slick Watts,” a song by Seattle hip-hop group Blue Scholars, blares over the speakers. It is Seattle sports appreciation night, after all. 

“Play ball!” yells a little girl, who is accompanied by her dad on the field and Fin Crispy Jr. — the team’s fish stick-shaped mascot (with a backward hat, of course). 

The sign hanging outside The Fryer — the recognized name of Mel Olson Stadium in White Center — says it all as the DubSea Fish Sticks, a local college summer team, play the Northwest Honkers on a recent Saturday night:

“This is not your average baseball game.”

The scene is a familiar one in White Center, where Fish Sticks baseball has become a fixture for 30 nights each summer. Fish Sticks fans have filled the 1,100-capacity stands of this amateur baseball cathedral for a night of entertainment, food and, of course, baseball. 

“We want people to come here for dinner and a show,” Fish Sticks president Justin Moser said. “[Our focus is] how can we entertain people and feed them with great quality food, entertain them, and there happens to be a baseball game going on.”

The crowd, on this day, is there to watch their Fish Sticks battle the Honkers. The teams are part of the Pacific International League — a premier summer college league of players from the Seattle area and across the country. The league, now at seven teams, was founded in 1992 and features mostly college athletes who are polishing their games.

Between innings the mic bursts on and the games begin. There’s a Hidden Ball Trick game, where three volunteers shuffle around with oversized hats and one hidden ball. There’s Seattle Sports Broadcasters Trivia, as fans accurately guessed a Steve Raible call of Marshawn Lynch’s Beast Quake run. And there’s an Inflatable Floatie Ring Toss Game, incorporating the aforementioned golf cart turned bullpen boat as the target. The Fish Sticks’ bullpen boat has many uses, including a fan ring toss game with inflatable floaties.

Brandon Sparks, the team’s “director of fun,” writes the script for each contest. He also wears a glittery, blue and gold sport coat, as any director of fun should. 

Sparks’ favorite promo is called “Be a Kid Again Night.”

“We kind of swap it out so that the adults get to do the kids’ games and sometimes the kids get to do the adult games,” he said. “And the adults run the bases. People really like that one.”

Promo night or not, anyone can be a kid again here. 

Moser was 11 years old when he played Pony League ball on the same field his Fish Sticks now call home. The field was “rock-hard dirt” and nowhere near as welcoming as the turf and grass combination it is today. 

Twelve years later, Moser was playing on the same field with a new team and a vision. 

“I’ve always kind of been entrepreneurial ever since I was a kid, whether there’s lemonade stands, you know, flipping baseball cards at the Midway Swap Meet or Pokemon cards when they came out,” he said. “And baseball has always been my first love and passion and goal, and [my] aspiration was always to play professionally, but that just wasn’t in the cards for me.”

Wesley Marino, 8, dressed as a fish taco races other fans between innings as the DubSea Fish Sticks take on the Seattle Blackfins Saturday, July 15, 2023, at the Mel Olson Stadium in Seattle. The Fish… (Luke Johnson / The Seattle Times)

Moser knew the field he grew up playing on would be perfect for launching a team. The original White Center Stadium was made of wood and seated 2,000 fans. Much like it is today, the field was a destination for the community on weekend nights. Fans would fill the bleachers and line the roped-off outfield grass. 

But in May 1977, the stadium caught fire and burned to the ground. 

“They almost didn’t replace the stadium,” Moser said. 

That was until Mel Olson stepped in to push for a rebuild. Olson, a community activist and head of the White Center Chamber of Commerce, had brought Little League Baseball to the area, starting the Southwest Little League. After relentless campaigning, he was able to pull together the funds to build Mel Olson Stadium — a park that now hosts Seattle Prep, Pony League, Puget Sound Senior Baseball League and eventually Moser’s Fish Sticks games.