Orlando Bulldogs
The Orlando Bulldogs of Orlando, Florida carried the third name of the city's original professional franchise, a club whose 1920s run is inseparable from Joe Tinker, the Hall of Fame Cubs shortstop of "Tinker to Evers to Chance" fame. The franchise began in 1919 as the Orlando Caps, charter members of central Florida's new league, and played that first season into a championship series against Sanford that collapsed into protest, with Sanford claiming Orlando's pitcher was throwing the banned "shine ball." Games were thrown out, the series was ruled a 3-3 tie, and both cities were declared co-champions of the league's first season. Tinker retired to Orlando in 1920, took over as manager in 1921, and won the league title in his first season at the helm.
By 1922 the club was the Bulldogs, and Tinker, by then president of the Orlando Athletic Association, was building the team a home. The ballpark rose outside the western city limits in early 1923, and local reporters started calling the 16-acre site "Tinker's Field" before it even opened. On April 19, 1923, Orlando declared a city holiday for the dedication: every business closed at noon, the mayor gave the address, and 1,700 fans watched the Bulldogs beat the Lakeland Highlanders 3-1. The Bulldogs won the league championship that same season, and the new ballpark impressed the Cincinnati Reds enough that they made it their spring training home starting in 1924.
The franchise played its final stretch as the Orlando Colts, winning one more championship in 1927 over the Miami Hustlers before the league went dark after 1928. Tinker Field went on to host Orlando baseball for the next nine decades. Our design honors the Bulldogs name from the ballpark's dedication year.
The Bulldogs' league began play in 1919 as a Class D circuit of six teams clustered across central Florida, tracing what would later become the I-4 corridor decades before the interstate existed. The circuit ran through 1928, went dark during the Depression, returned in 1936, paused again for World War II, and resumed in 1946. Unlike most minor leagues of the era, it never truly died; the same circuit still operates across Florida today.
