May 22, 2008 Issue                                       

©2007 The Chestnut Hill Local

Water Tower baseball slowed by rainy weather
by Kristin Pazulski

?Soggy weather has dampened the spirits of Chestnut Hill Youth Sports Club baseball players who’ve experienced more than their fair share of rainouts this spring. Here, weekend rains collected quickly under the Water Tower’s bleachers. (Photo by Erin Vertreace)

Waterlogged baseball fields have kept parents and coaches from the Chestnut Hill Youth Sports Club busier than their young players this year.

Last Wednesday, Joe Pié, the program’s baseball commissioner, walked around the two baseball fields behind the Water Tower Recreation Center, while his son, Philip, raked the dirt fields with a tractor.

“There’s really not anything you can do when it comes to rain water,” Pié said, though he and his son were trying hard to get the fields dry, flat and ready for that evening’s game.

Last weekend, three of the eight games that were to be played were postponed because of the soggy field. The weekend before, on May 10, three more games were postponed. Even most of opening day’s games were rained out, though the club still went forward with the day’s festivities.

In all, Pié said, eight of the younger players’ 44 games and five of the older players’ 44 games have had to be postponed.

“It sounds like there’s not a lot of rain but really we’re just all getting a lot skinnier from working on the fields,” Pié said.

Most rained-out games are re-scheduled, Pié said, but he has six waiting for rescheduling because Sunday — a typical make-up day — was rained out and teams could not make it.

“We’re doing well compared to other fields in the city,” Pié said, but he noted that this season has still been a pretty wet and delayed one. And wet fields mean that he and other fathers are out on the field making holes to help drainage, adding drying chemicals to the dirt and raking the fields when the dirt gets dry enough.

This past Monday, Pié said they put down about 600 pounds of drying chemicals to get the field ready for the evening game — and even as they worked, dark clouds rolled in threatening more rain.

“This year it’s payback,” Pié said, referring to last year’s dry season which had only one rainout.

Fortunately for Pié and the players in the CHYSC, the Water Tower fields are nearly brand new, and, despite some drainage problems and standing water, an “army of dads” and tractor/raking equipment are able to clean up the fields quickly.

The larger field, referred to as the “major league” field because the older boys play on it, was built about five years ago and was re-graded this spring. The smaller, “minor league” field was rebuilt this spring.

He said that the CHYSC is lucky, as far as fields go — they are owned by the city, but the league, through dues and donations, has the funding to pay for the grounds’ upkeep.

Pié said that, despite the upgrades and maintenance, the fields still have their problem spots.

“If I look real close, I can find 1,000 things that need to be fixed,” he said.

Ideally the fields would be completely dug out and redone to manage water and improve leveling, but “that’s not going to happen unless I hit the lottery and convince the city to let me close it,” he said.

Other teams — such as a men’s softball league — also use the field during baseball season, and, during the fall, soccer fields occupy the baseball fields, so closing for full repairs, even if the money was there, is problematic, Pié said.

For now, Pié is keeping busy with rescheduling games, as volunteers — which he said he needs more of — continue to repair the fields between this season’s rainy days and its games.