Base Paths roadtripped Tuesday to the playground of the newest kid on the New York Collegiate League block, Houghton College’s Kerr-Pegula Field in Allegany County, home of the Genesee Rapids and site of the league’s all-star game in July. The stars better pack their hiking boots along with their spikes.
“Oh, yeah, it’s over there and then you walk down the hill,” advised one girl from her skateboard. They’d built it, but how do we come? The climb down, with the umpires in the lead, was so long and treacherous that Base Paths wondered whether he’d need a Sherpa and a St. Bernard to get back to his car, which barely survived the trip. The deer it encountered on Route 236 did not.
One Power official wondered at Base Paths’ frustrations. Usually, he navigates like Henry Hudson. “You got lost coming to Houghton?” Mr. Power asked. Base Paths put it this way: “If this were a golf hole, I drove the green, then needed nine putts to get down.”
Later, many of the genial Rapids fans advised him, “you should have come in by Chamberlain Street,” but no highway sign whatsoever pointed the way for visitors and no parking lot was visible from Kerr-Pegula’s little cluster of bleachers.
Then a fan came in bearing a scrumptious-looking beef-on-weck. “Wow, where did you get that?” Base Paths drooled. “Over there, by the soccer field,” the diner gestured. “It’s quite a ways. You’ll work up an appetite getting there.” Another seatmate actually offered to bring one back; Base Paths settled for the home-made chips, a unique treat, recommended.
So while getting there remains a mystery to be solved, the field itself is a beauty, brand-new turf, so that playing the game was never in doubt although it had rained into the early afternoon. It’s actually on the crest of a disused ski slope and youngsters who’d lost interest in the game amused themselves by rolling down the hill.
Bleachers seat about 150. The 2012 All-Star Game at Sal Maglie drew close to a thousand, so the visitors better tote alone some chairs and find that elusive Chamberlain Road entrance. The sightlines are beautiful, simply nothing beyond the outfield walls but trees, reminding Base Paths of the home of the former Catskill Cougars in Mountaindale, minus the yarmulkes.
Like the Power, the Rapids are a faith-based team but really, you’d never know it, there was absolutely no religious message in any of the announcements, inning breaks or literature. It says here that the Rapids promote their faith through their behavior, which was exemplary.
Such devotion is hard to find – literally. Welcome, Rapids. Just show us the way…
Signal back to Base Paths via pollyndoug@hotmail.com
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