GALION — Mike O’Leary would like nothing more than to see baseballs flying at Heise Park this summer, but the Galion Graders’ general manager is a realist.
The Graders are a member of the Great Lakes Summer Collegiate League, a wooden bat league sanctioned and supported by Major League Baseball and founded in 1986. The GLSCL board of directors announced this week it would delay the start of the season until July 1 because of the coronavirus pandemic.
“(We) understand that the uncertainty of our operations is causing some anxiety and consternation,” league officials said in a release. “Because of this highly fluid situation, we feel we need to take as much time as possible to give us the greatest chance to play.”
O’Leary, who brought GLSCL baseball to Galion in 2015, hopes the league can start then, but understands the challenges franchises are up against. Three of the 12 GLSCL teams, the Cincinnati Steam, the Southern Ohio Copperheads and the St. Clair (Ontario) Green Giants, already have announced they have suspended operations for the summer but will return in 2021.
“Everybody wants to get out there, but there’s so many question marks,” O’Leary said. “It’s when you really start working through it that you start running into road blocks.
“It’s been an ongoing process and it feels like you run into a new hang-up every week.”
Gov. Mike DeWine still hasn’t announced when spectator sports and sports leagues would be allowed to resume in Ohio. There are GLSCL franchises in Ohio, Michigan and Indiana, meaning all three states would have to sign off before the league could begin operation.
Even if the league is green-lighted, there would almost certainly be restrictions on the number of people allowed to gather at stadiums and ballparks in an effort to adhere to each state’s social distancing guidelines. GLSCL teams are allowed to carry 30 players on the roster. If gatherings of no more than 100 are permitted, more than half of those spots would be taken by participants.
Then there are coaches (usually no fewer than three per team), umpires and game-day personnel (concessions, announcers, media, press box workers, etc.). That would leave precious few spots for fans, who help pay the bills with ticket, merchandise and concession purchases.
“What if we open the season on July 1 and the crowd size is only 100 people? It takes almost 100 people to stage a game,” O’Leary said. “There are 75 to 80 people right there. It would be hard for any club without at least a 50-percent capacity allowance for attendance.”
Then, of course, there are the players themselves. Players in the GLSCL, along with every other summer college league in the nation and even low minor leagues, are housed by host families. Those families may not be willing to open their doors to complete strangers during a health crisis.
“And who can blame them?” O’Leary said. “I’ve talked to the GMs of some well-established teams and they have seen a 50-percent drop in host families.”
Several summer collegiate leagues, including the venerable Cape Cod League, have canceled their seasons. Professional baseball is still in a holding pattern with no end in sight.
“A lot of college leagues on the East Coast are shut down for the summer because they got hit really hard,” O’Leary said. “I get emails every day from players looking for a place to play this summer.
“I’m hopeful that we’ll play, but my biggest concern is if we loosen restrictions, something is going to pop up and everyone is going to react to that and extend this (delay) even longer. We’ll have to wait and see what happens.”
