Country music superstar Tim McGraw set to kickstart Reds-Braves 2025 Speedway Classic

I like it. I love it. I want some more of it.

Drew Koch

Tim McGraw / Elsa/GettyImages

The Cincinnati Reds and Atlanta Braves are the headliners for the upcoming 2025 Speedway Classic which is set to take place at Bristol Motor Speedway on August 2, but one of country music's biggest stars will get the festivities started. Tim McGraw will perform a pregame concert ahead of the Reds game with the Braves.

A three-time Grammy Award-winning country music artist, McGraw is the son of former major league pitcher Edwin "Tug" McGraw. Tim McGraw has been around baseball his entire life and even played college ball at Northeast Louisiana University. McGraw, however, did not follow in his father's footsteps and became a professional musician instead of an athlete.

The Speedway Classic was dreamed up last season, and is the first time that a baseball game will be played at the world famous race track. It's also the first time that a regular season game is played in the state of Tennessee. The Volunteer State is the country music capital, and the city of Nashville has been making a push in recent years to bring a major league expansion team to Tennessee.

Tim McGraw set to kickstart Reds-Braves 2025 Speedway Classic

The Speedway Classic will be the second time in four seasons that the Reds will play a game at an irregular venue. Cincinnati played the Chicago Cubs back in August of 2022 when the two teams met for the Field of Dreams Game. The Iowa venue was undergoing renovations for the past two seasons, so MLB shifted the focus to Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama in 2024. The Speedway Classic appears to be MLB's latest concoction that's sure to drive (perhaps) record crowds to southeast Tennessee.

The Reds and Braves will begin the three-game series at Great American Ball Park on Thursday, July 31. After two games in Cincinnati, the two teams will head down to Tennessee on Saturday for the game at Bristol. Thinking ahead, MLB reserved Sunday as an off-day for both teams as a makeup date in the event of bad weather.

McGraw will get the event kickstarted with first pitch scheduled for 7:15 p.m ET. Once McGraw is off the stage, the spotlight will shift to Elly De La Cruz, Ronald Acuña Jr., and some of the biggest stars in baseball for the first ever Speedway Classic.

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Drew Koch

Drew Koch has been an MLB Staff Writer since January 2024 and part of the FanSided Network since June 2018. Drew's contributions have been published on Blog Red Machine, Friars on Base, BoSox Injection, Lombardi Avenue, Wildcat Blue Nation, Motor City Bengals, and many other sites within the FanSided Network. When he's not cheering wildly for the Cincinnati Reds or the Kentucky Wildcats, Drew enjoys fishing, golfing, playing cribbage and other card games, listening to country and classical music, and spending time with his family and friends.