The CDMSBL Capital Division will begin its second season this Saturday with an 11:00 AM game at the American Legion Field.
The Capital Division was originally designed to provide players in their 60s an opportunity to get more playing time in games that were well played but in a more relaxed atmosphere. As we launched the Capital Division in 2018, we expanded the age group and invited players in their 50s and 70s to enjoy the same experience. By all accounts, the inaugural season was very successful. We played eleven games between June and August (two rain-outs, no make-up games). We had at least twenty players at every game. Players sporting their blue or red Capital Division jerseys got to play "pick-up" style baseball with their long-time CDMSBL buddies. And it was rumored that some players enjoyed a couple of cold ones after the games!
The obvious next step is to do it again!
If you are in your 50s or 60s or 70s and would like to play some baseball on Saturdays, email me at ataball@msn.com. There is a $30 registration fee. After that, you play on the weekends that you are available and pay just $10 per game. There is a limit of 24 players per Saturday and from that group we select two well-balanced teams. You will play at least five innings in the field and everybody bats. As one player exclaimed after one of last year's games "That was a lot of fun! Don Ball sure did a nice job putting this together!"
OK, maybe nobody said that. But it was a lot of fun. So, if you want to play, shoot me an email. We are putting the teams together for this Saturday.
"That was a lot of fun! Don Ball sure did a nice job putting this together!"
OK, maybe nobody said that. But it was a lot of fun. So, if you want to play, shoot me an email. We are putting the teams together for this Saturday.
Thank you.
I wouldn't say you've done a good job Don .. I would call it outstanding! Your fall ball and now the Capital Division have resulted in a lot of people having a lot of fun playing ball. Thanks for doing it.
Thanks John - The nice part about organizing those activities is that I have also been able to play a lot more baseball. It has also been a great way to meet players outside of my own teams.
The purpose of my post was to recruit more players into the division. Currently there are only 25 players registered in the Capital Division. We need at least 18 players for each game and, ideally, we would have 24. That means that every week we need at least 72% of the registered players to show up or we cannot play. The response so far for this week's game has been 6 "yes" and 5 "no". At that rate we will not be able to play.
One of the most difficult and frustrating elements of organizing events outside of the regular season games - banquet, golf tournament, Matinee Division, Capital Division - is recruiting enough people to make the event succeed. That may be hard to imagine in a league of over 500 members. Do you know that, at the 2019 banquet attended by over 100 people, only 45 players actually paid to attend? 45 out of 500!
I realize that there are other activities that compete with the Capital Division for attendees. The 55+ division is sending a team to Cooperstown on Friday. Several players who were regulars in the Capital Division last year are on the roster of the new 45+ Grays team that plays on Sundays. Maybe guys don't want to play two days in a row. Guys have family events on Saturdays. Hell, they might even be fishing for stripers in the Hudson! However, my efforts to organize the Capital Division were in response to a perceived demand for this type of baseball - not as an effort to create the demand.
When I send out the invitations to play in the fall ball games, there is a race for players to reserve one of the 24 slots. Within 24 hours of sending the invitations I have the two teams formed and then I can sit back and look forward to playing. The response to this week's Capital Division invitation has me less than enthusiastic. I am going to try my best to keep the Capital Division going strong. But there is a part of me that thinks fishing for stripers in the Hudson wouldn't be a bad way to spend a Saturday morning!
