With Hanover Insurance Park at Fitton Field unavailable because the College of the Holy Cross is closed, Worcester Bravehearts (summer collegiate; Futures League) owner John Creedon is looking for a 2020 temporary home.
The team had assumed that Hanover Insurance Park at Fitton Field would be available for what ended up being a limited Futures Collegiate Baseball League 2020 season beginning July 2. The league will feature six teams playing a 39-game slate running through August 19. But with the college deciding last week not to open the ballpark, even on the limited basis required by health officials as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Creedon was left to scramble for a temporary venue. From the Worcester Telegram:
“Typically,” Creedon said, “our priorities are setting an attendance record and doing the best job we possibly can with the production and hoopla of a Bravehearts baseball game. That’s not going to happen this summer. We’re going to be playing elsewhere and there are not going to be fireworks and all sorts of stuff being given away. We’re reducing everything to the baseball game and keeping people healthy.”…
Creedon said canceling the season would have been “the easier route to take, but that’s not our style. If there’s a way, we’ve got the willpower to try to get this done. We believe deeply enough in the mission of the Futures League of creating the opportunity for these student athletes to play baseball, and secondarily to provide some smiles and open-air, socially distanced enjoyment for families in our communities, that we wanted to see it through an end point.”
The Futures Collegiate Baseball League, Texas Collegiate League, Northwoods League, Coastal Plain League, Expedition League, Florida Collegiate Summer League and Midwest Collegiate League are playing this season, though some teams are not participating. The West Coast League, Prospect League, Western Canadian Baseball League, MINK League, Great Lakes Summer Collegiate League, Perfect Game Collegiate Baseball League, New York Collegiate Baseball League, Ohio Valley League, New England Collegiate Baseball League, Cape Cod League and the Valley Baseball League have canceled the 2020 season.
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