Courtesy of the Niagara Gazette
By Doug Smith
It’s gotta’ be better in the New York Collegiate Baseball League’s West than East, where one of the leading teams left the league with four games to play.
Minor- and collegiate-league baseball is always subject to the vagaries of attendance and enthusiasm. The minor-league encyclopedia is littered with notations “Hornell folded July 11, team moved to Patton.” But the Eastern Division Utica Brewers were second in the standings and first in attendance when, just over a week ago, they declared last call.
Base Paths pulled up to LeMoyne College last Sunday for the Brewers’ battle with the Syracuse Salt Cats. The place was padlocked. One lonely soccer dad awaited kickoff in that game in which left-handedness doesn’t matter.
At the Power game in Geneva that afternoon, the Bolts were all a-twitter with the social-network news that Utica had made the big u-turn. Piecing it together, Base Paths figured that Utica suffered some injuries, some players suffered from homesickness and suddenly the ranks were thin enough that the team asked permission to sign a few “locals.”
Under terms of the NYCBL’s agreement with co-sponsor Major League Baseball, the subs wouldn’t have enough games in to qualify for the playoffs and at that, the Brewers flew the coop.
Easterners were furious. The Geneva Red Wings lost out on their closing night promotion. Top Salt Cat Martinez said that a principal playoff rival picked up three victories without lifting a bat.
“These things happen,” said Tom Bonekemper, long-time official of the Atlantic Collegiate League in the Philadelphia-New York metro area. “Kids go home.” Wayne County almost lost its NYCBL team some 10 years ago after a tragic on-field accident but pulled itself together and played out the string with a 15-man roster. Guys who’d never thrown a ball in anger in their lives stepped up to pitch and the Raptors, as they were known, made it to the finish line.
This year Power infielder Malachi Melton and catcher Frank Polino suffered season-ending injuries and begged to “hang around.” Neither needed to twist Power President Cal Kern’s arm.
The Eastern Division, adopted en masse from the National Baseball Federation two years ago, is furious. Base Paths wouldn’t be surprised to see it defect for 2013. Out here in the West, fans and managers alike hail the young men who stick it out. That’s far more important than any result.
Signal Base Paths via pollyndoug@hotmail.com
Leave a Reply