By Colleen Kane
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Former Cincinnati Reds pitcher Tom Browning, now manager of the Florence Freedom, delivers the ceremonial first pitch. (Patrick Reddy photo) | ZOOM |

HAMILTON - The Florence Freedom's home opener against the Washington County Wild Things might have been overshadowed by a bigger game in downtown Cincinnati on Tuesday night.

This wasn't Great American Ball Park. These weren't the Reds and the Yankees. That's the point.

The Freedom organization, part of the 12-team independent Frontier League, began its inaugural season in front of 1,431 fans at the 2,000-seat Foundation Field.

The Freedom are stationed in Hamilton while a $5 million, 4,500-seat stadium in Florence is built.

The goal is to provide affordable, local and fun entertainment and a venue for players to develop their games for careers in higher pro leagues, according to part-owner Chuck Hildebrant.

Brittany Back (right), of Camden, cheers for the Florence Freedom, at the team's home opener at Foundation Field, Hamilton. (Patrick Reddy photo) | ZOOM |

"The average guy can't afford to go to a Reds game. Here, it's affordable, and it's entertaining," Hildebrant said. "This is dinner theatre - it just happens to have a baseball theme."

The dinner may have been cheap - $3.75 for a hot dog, chips and soda; $4.50 for beer instead of soda - but the theatre wasn't winning. The Freedom saw their season record drop to 1-7 with a 12-3 loss to the Wild Things.

Hometown pitcher Nate Zettler, (Badin High) allowed eight runs and seven hits and threw four wild pitches in 4 1/3 innings. The Freedom couldn't recover.

"This a good group of guys," Freedom manager Tom Browning said. "They play hard for me. They're young. They're learning. They're raw. They're hungry. They're here to learn more and get better, but we're going to have to expect more than this."

Florence will play Washington County again tonight and Thursday at Foundation Field.

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E-mail ckane@enquirer.com