Website Manager

St. Matthews Baseball

DICK's Coupon

Parents and Coaches, 

Through the generosity and continued partnership of one of our biggest sponsors, we are pleased to announce once again just in time for the Fall Ball season,

St. Matthews Baseball 20% OFF SHOPPING EVENT!

Friday, March 1st – Sunday, March 3rd

Oxmoor, Springhurst & Hurstbourne Dick’s Sporting Goods


DICK’S Sporting Goods, is offering a 20% off discount throughout the store to help you gear up for the season this weekend and next weekend! Be sure to use the coupon attached and linked below, as this is specific to our organization. The coupon is valid in-store on the dates above and should be shown at the register during checkout.

CLICK HERE FOR COUPON

2023 Fall Ball

Parents, players and coaches, 

First, I want to thank each of you for an amazing Spring season of baseball. We had incredible enrollment, the rain cooperated for the most part, and some really good baseball was played.

What’s next? Fall Ball!

Our Fall Ball program is a little different than the Spring season. For Fall Ball we use a “coach brings their own team” format vs. open registration/tryouts. If you are familiar with the St. Matthews Basketball league, it’s essentially like that. If you’re not, the format is simple. Folks who are interested in coaching can recruit and field a baseball team, register and enter them as a team in the league, the coach will send out a special code to his/her parents via email, parents use that code when completing their registration/paying their fee, and their son/daughter will be automatically placed on the coach’s team. 

PLEASE NOTE: your child's spot on a team is ONLY valid if the coach has directly invited and sent you the code. A parent sharing the code with another parent is not only not allowed, we respectfully request you please do NOT do this. These discrepancies are always found by us and the coach when building teams, which then leads to having to unfortunately remove the child from the team roster. Please ensure the head coach has invited and sent you the code. 

Or, another option, if a child wants to play but doesn’t know a specific coach, we will keep your son or daughter as a “free agent” and will randomly assign them to a team if a spot is available. This will be a short list, and we will do our best to place every free agent, but due to space limitations it is first come first served so PLEASE don’t wait to sign up! 

Also, please note that unlike the Spring, in the Fall we DO NOT take coach and/or friend/player requests with either option. Fall Ball will simply be based on whether space is available on a team, and then assigning free agent players to that team.

*** Registration for the 2023 Fall Season OPENS next Sunday, July 23, 2023 at 8:00 a.m. on our website which you can find HERE ***

Age Cutoffs and Playing Up

In Fall Ball we use the same age cut off that we did for Spring so kids are able to play with the same age group/division that they did in the Spring. However, for most divisions your child may “play up” a division to the next age group. I say in most cases since there is one exception here: we typically do not play an 8-year-old up to 9/10 kid pitch unless your son/daughter played Spring 8U machine pitch or played organized 8U machine pitch with another league in the Spring. This is purely for safety reasons. We don’t want a kid’s first experience with kid pitch to be Fall Ball unless they can protect themselves, which a season of 8U machine pitch prepares them for. 

If you want your child or team to “play up,” the system should provide that option at sign up by showing their current age group and the next age group above that for which you can choose. By playing up you acknowledge that your son or daughter can protect themselves at all times while on the field, and that they are capable, athletic and knowledgeable enough to play at the next level. If the system does not provide you the option of the next age group, your son or daughter is too young for the next age level per the Babe Ruth age chart. 

If you need to determine your child's current age group, please consult the 2023 Babe Ruth Age Chart HERE.

Head coaches, beginning July 23, 2023 simply log in to your St. Matthews account, register as a head coach for 2023 Fall Ball, and then you can control team invites from the comfort of your own home! Or, read THIS too. It helps. Scroll about mid-way down to the "Steps for Coaches to Register" section. 

Here are some additional details about the Fall Ball season:

There will be 6 divisions, and all players will be provided a jersey and ball cap:

1. Wee/Tee (4 and 5-year-olds) – PRICE $135 per player

- Age: 4 and 5 combined

- Games played on Weinberg Field (with possible games on Voll Field @ Trinity Stadium)

- Regular season begins 9/11, ends on or before 10/28, no post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games 

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (again, no coach or friend requests in the Fall) 

- Players/Coaches can decide if they want coach pitch or to hit from the tee subject to time constraint rules (hit from tee after 3 pitch attempts) 

- 1-hour games OR first 30 minutes devoted to a joint practice followed by a 2-inning game (approximately 30 min)

2. Coach Pitch (6-year-olds) – PRICE $135 per player

- Age: 5 to 6

- Games played on Weinberg and Matanich Fields

- Regular season begins 9/11, ends on or before 10/28, no post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games 

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (again, no coach or friend requests in the Fall)

- Coach pitch or hit from tee after 5 pitches

- Outs are not kept for purposes of the side, but base runners will be called out and will return to the dugout on a batted ball resulting in an out, a force out, or a tag play.

- 1-hour games OR first 30 minutes devoted to a joint practice, followed by a 2-inning game (approximately 30 min)

3. 7U Machine Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 6 to 7

- Games played on Matanich or McCandless Fields

- Regular season begins 9/11, ends on or about 10/21, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 15 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses

 4. 8U Machine Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 7 to 8

- Games played on Siegel Field

- Regular season begins 9/11, ends 10/21, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 15 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses
  

5. Minors Kid Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 9 and 10 combined

- Games played on McCandless or Look Fields

- Regular season begins 9/11, ends 10/21, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team 

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses

6. Majors Kid Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 11 and 12 combined

- Games played on Look Field

- Regular season begins 9/11, ends 10/21, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team 

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses.

Teams

-We will need at least 5 teams per division at a minimum to play.

-Coaches can select/recruit up to 12 kids for a team in any division (with no more than 6 travel/club baseball players).
 

Practices

We will have equipment pick up, coach meetings and other pre-season prep during the week of August 28th. More info to come. 

Practices will be held the weeks of August 28 and September 4. More info to come on that as far as sign ups with Dan Cook. PLEASE NOTE this ONLY applies to those two weeks. Once games get underway on September 11, we will do our best to accommodate a practice schedule but depending on the number of teams, other tournaments we host, and club/travel ball held at the park, it may not happen. Please consider finding space or locations outside the ballpark to practice. Legends Academy in Louisville has a great indoor facility.


Games

We will start September 11th, approximately two games per week.

4/5 and 6 (Wee/Tee/Coach Pitch) games on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. The younger divisions are usually large, so they may have some Friday evening and/or Saturday morning or afternoon games (but I do try to minimize this). 

7 and 8 Machine games on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, with a possible Friday and/or Saturday thrown in. 

Minors and Majors games likely on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday, with Saturday games in Minors possible.

Spread the word! Coaches, get your teams formed! Fall Ball is right around the corner. 

If you have any questions please look on our website as there is a wealth of information there under our FAQ's and other sections.
You can also contact Dan Cook at [email protected] for additional information. 

Thank you for your support of St. Matthews Baseball, and see you in the Fall!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball



2023 Spring Update

Parents, Coaches and Ball Players,


Below are some very important updates and information to keep in mind as we inch closer and closer to the Spring 2023 season. I may also be sending a few other emails this week with some other important reminders so keep an eye out for those.

Questions/Information

First up, just a reminder that if you have any questions about the league, please check our website as it contains a host of valuable information. Our website Announcements, FAQ and Important Dates tabs should answer most questions, and we do our best to keep that information up to date. If you still can’t find what you are looking for, I do try to have an “open-door” policy for all, just be patient with me as it may take me a day or so to respond with the season starting up! Questions about team formation, team placement, and coach assignments please email Dan Cook at [email protected].

Coaches

Head Coaches currently signed up - please send Dan Cook ([email protected]) an email with you and your two assistant coach staff. Please identify who the head coach of your team will be, and who will be your two assistants. We will need this for tryouts for the older divisions, as well as for league-wide background checks and safe training requirements (more info to come on that).

NOTE: If you are in the 4-5-6 divisions, you may have two assistants, and a few other mom or dads helping out. That is totally fine.

ALSO NOTE: Minors and Majors coaches, the commissioner of your respective division will forward your. tryout evaluation sheets this Friday which will contain a player’s name and his/her corresponding tryout number. They will also attach a sheet with who is coaching with who (as requested above), so we know which kids are already taken off the board. Please bring these sheets with you to tryouts.

Sponsorships

Just another reminder and another shameless plug...we have plenty of teams who need a sponsor so if you or your business want to sponsor a team, hang a sign in the outfield, or sponsor a couple of teams and hang a couple of signs, let us know! You can pick one of our suggested levels of giving, or work with us to customize your support. It is all on the attached form for the 2023 season. Simply review and free to email me directly at stmatthewsbaseballleague@gmail.com if you would like to be a sponsor this year! (If the PDF does not open for some reason let me know and I will email you a copy directly).

Tryouts

Reminder, 4/5 (Tee Ball), 6 (Coach Pitch), 7U (Machine Pitch) and 8U (Machine Pitch) DO NOT have try outs. Your teams are being formed and will be rosters will be released as each division is completed.

If your player is registered for Minor League (9 and 10 year olds) or Major League (11 and 12 year olds), here is the tryout schedule:

Sunday, March 5, 2023

*Majors (11 AND 12-year olds)(St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium – large turf field behind Best Buy)
Time 1:00 - 3:00 pm

*Minors (10-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium)
Time 3:00 - 4:30 pm

*Minors (9-year olds)(St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium)
Time 4:30 - 6:00 pm

** If we have inclement weather, the tryouts will be conducted (same times) at Legends Sports Academy, 10900 Electron Dr, Louisville, Ky 40299 – if there is rain and we need to move indoors to Legends, a determination will be made by 5:00 p.m. on Saturday, March 4, and emailed to all parents, posted on our social media pages, and posted on our website.

                   IF YOU DO NOT HEAR FROM US ASSUME OUTSIDE TRYOUTS ARE STILL ON AT VOLL FIELD**

What to Bring to Tryouts:

  • glove
  • bat
  • batting helmet
  • ball cap
  • regular shoes or non-metal cleats (both facilities are turf)
  • water


Once signed in, please only have your player enter the try-out areas. Parents are free to stay and observe, but please find a place in the bleachers or down the 1st or 3rd baseline behind the fence. Parents are asked not to stand on the field during tryouts.

NO GUM or SUNFLOWER SEEDS are allowed on Voll Field. Thanks!

Make-Up Tryouts and Player Draft Nights:

While we understand weekends are full of competing sports and other events, baseball try outs are crucial for appropriate placement on a team in each division, and so we encourage you to make sure your child will be available to participate on the dates scheduled above. It is the best opportunity for them to be properly assessed by the coaches. However, if your child cannot make the above date and times, we will offer a short make up tryout before the draft night of their respective division.

For those who cannot make the Saturday tryouts, we will hold a short make-up tryout at St. Matthews Baseball Park on McCandless Field (large turf field behind bowling alley):

Tuesday, March 7, 2023

*Majors Make-Up (11 AND 12-year olds)
Time 6:00 – 7:00 pm

*Majors Divisional Draft – at least one coach from each team must attend
Time 7:30 pm (Basement of Compass, 7984 New La Grange Rd, Lyndon, KY 40222)

Thursday, March 9, 2023

*Minors Make-Up (9 AND 10-year olds)
Time 6:00 – 7:00 pm

*Minors Divisional Draft – at least one coach from each teammustattend
Time 7:30 pm (Basement of Compass, 7984 New La Grange Rd, Lyndon, KY 40222)

Regular Season Equipment

In the 4/5 and 6 divisions (Tee and Coach Pitch) your child will need his/her own glove and USA Baseball approved baseball bat. They will NOT need a helmet. Look for the sticker on the stem of the bat that says USA Baseball. A USSSA baseball bat, however, isprohibitedunder Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken rules. Image of the sticker is on our homepage. Regular tennis shoes are fine.

In all remaining divisions (7-12), your child will need his/her own glove, helmet, USA Baseball approved bat, cleats (non-metal), and for the boys a cup. Your coach may also ask that you purchase white or grey baseball pants. Other equipment items such as batting gloves are optional.


The league will provide the Minors (9-10) and Majors (11-12) a bag of league owned equipment catcher’s gear, but you are encouraged to use your own or that of a player’s if they own a set.

Practice baseballs will be provided to coaches.

Equipment pick-up will be scheduled in the coming weeks.

Looking for some gently used, cleaned up, discounted stuff?

Come to Levi G's Gently Used Equipment Sale!
Outside Trinity Stadium/Voll Field Try-out’s
Sunday, March 5 1:00 – 6:00 pm


Couldn’t find what you were looking for at Levi’s? Looking for specific equipment?

March 3-6 is the first St. Matthews Baseball League Weekend of the season at DICK's!
***20% OFF all gear, even non-baseball stuff***
The official coupon will be emailed in a day or two!


Practices and Games
The practice schedule will be released mid-March, while the game schedule will be released towards the end of March.

Thank you all, take care. Looking forward to a great season of baseball!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball


2023 Spring Registration


Registration

- Like last year, registration will be entirely online. There will be no walk-in sign ups. On Sunday at 8:00 am the registration goes live on our website which you can access here. Simply sign in to your existing account and register your son or daughter (or more) for the upcoming season. If you are new to St. Matthews Baseball, create a parent account for yourself first, and then register your child or children as participants. 

- If you are interested in coaching, as you go thru the registration process for your child there is an option to volunteer as an assistant or head coach. The more the better! We can't do this without you!

Team Placement and Try-Out's

In the Tee (4/5 combined), Coach Pitch (6), Machine Pitch (7), and Machine Pitch (8)  divisions, there will not be tryouts and teams will be compiled based on coach and/or teammate requests (more info on this in the next section). Once teams are formed you will hear from your coach and team mid-March. Please remain patient as it takes some time getting the various coach and teammate requests sorted in these age groups, but you will be contacted! When you register there is a section in which to put a teammate or coach request. Please be as specific as possible, otherwise we will assume your son or daughter can be placed on the first available team. First and last names please.

Minors (9-10) and Majors (11-12) tryouts will likely be held the first week of March. Exact dates, times and locations will be sent to you once confirmed. Once tryouts and drafts are complete, you will hear from your coach and team around mid-March. 

Coach and Teammate Requests

One of the benefits of playing with St. Matthews Baseball is that we offer our 4/5 Tee, 6 Coach Pitch, 7U Machine and 8U Machine sign ups the opportunity to request a coach and/or a teammate during the registration process. We’ve tried a try out/draft system in the past for 7 and 8’s, but in the end the kids and parents love to get their kiddos on the same team or with the same coach. It’s about playing with their buddies and having fun at this age, so we want to foster that. It is exhaustive, pain staking work that takes hours figuring out who goes where, but we do our best to honor those requests!


But, some important things to keep in mind about this system and how “the sausage gets made”:

  • Each division will have a different player “cap” per team that must be strictly enforced; so “what’s the big deal, just add one more kid” is easy to say, but it impacts others’ playing time, the amount of at bats or plate appearances they have, it adds another burden to coaches trying to figure out who sits out in what inning, and in general can negatively impact the product and the experience we are trying to offer your kids on the field. 
 
  • Caps:

        4/5 Tee – 14 players per team

        6 Coach Pitch – 14 players per team

        7U Machine – 13 players per team

        8U Machine – 13 players per team

        9/10 Minors – 12 players per team

        11/12 Majors – 11-12 players per team (depends on number of sign ups in this division)

  • It is first registered, first served – let’s say 14 kids sign up for 6 Coach Pitch and request either “Coach Jones” OR a buddy that is on Coach Jones’ team…those first 14 make up the team. Others who sign up behind them will not be guaranteed a spot on Coach Jones’ team OR with a player playing on Coach Jones’ team. In many instances, a second team of kids who attend the same school for instance, may form and another coach will step up, and we avoid a kid playing on a team where he doesn’t know the coach or players. But please keep in mind that it is first registered, first served and this is regardless of whether your child played with Coach Jones in the past or not…so don’t delay!
 
  • Coach Request vs. Coach Formed – the Spring season is guided by the parents’ request of coach or teammate. That is, the coach cannot send us a roster or list of kids in the middle of sign-ups and declare that this is his team and to make sure only these kids are placed on it. That is not how the Spring session works. It is, however, how the Fall session works which is a “coach brings his own team” format. In the Fall, instead of the parents guiding the formation of teams, it is the head coaches who do so by inviting specific players directly to their team.
 
  • Coaches looking to coach a team, bear in mind that in all divisions each team is allowed one head coach and two assistant coaches. Now, in the very young groups, by all means parents please come onto the field if coach needs some help herding the cats! That is totally fine. But for official roster purposes, it is 1 head coach/2 assistants. This is important mainly in 7U and above: the kids, if any, of those 3 coaches are automatically placed on the team for 7 and 8’s and for draft purposes in the Minors and Majors. However, same rule applies in Tee, Coach, 7U and 8U: if one or both of the two assistant coaches fail to sign up in time and fail to sign up their kids before the team is capped, it remains first registered first served. Being asked to assistant coach is not a guarantee of your placement or your player’s on the team…so don’t delay! 
 
  •  Finally, please note that the registration cut off “end date” noted on the registration portal is NOT accurate, it is just a placeholder date set by the system – DO NOT rely on this. Once divisions fill up and reach capacity, the wait list will automatically open for all sign ups in that division going forward…so don’t delay! 


Playing "Up" a Division

In the 4-7 age groups, we will accommodate requests to move a player "up" a division if his/her parent or guardian so desires. You will simply need to complete the player's registration for the age group the system automatically puts them in based on the 2023 Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken Age Chart, and then send me an email requesting the move. I will then manually move your player to the next division. (Ex. When you register, the online system tells you Johnny is only eligible to play Tee Ball (5 yr old), but you would like him to play in the Coach Pitch (6 yr old) division. Register Johnny for Tee Ball (5 yr olds), then email me to request a move up to the Coach Pitch (6 yr old) division and I will manually make the move). PLEASE make sure that the teammate and/or coach you are requesting to play with, however, is in the division you are moving "up" to. Otherwise, we will place your player on the first available team. 

In the 8 Machine, 9-10 Minors and 11-12 Majors age groups, we will assess such moves on a case by case basis taking into consideration experience, birth date, or other factors. This is to ensure a move into an older division does not create a health or safety risk to your child by being placed in a division he or she may not be ready for. The process is the same though. Register in the age group the system has designated, and then contact me via email to discuss the request. 

For your reference, click here for a link to the 2023 Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken Age Chart.

Game and Practice Schedules 

Once teams are formed, your coach will give you a schedule of practices and let you know additional details about the league schedule. Games are expected to start the week of April 10, 2023. There are usually one to two games per week, and are played on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and/or some Saturday’s. Each team may play a handful of Saturday games, it just depends on how many teams we get per division.

The final schedule will be released once completed, which is usually a week or so before games begin.   

The regular season will run 8 weeks, followed by an in-house post season tournament for our older 7-12 divisions. This will likely be held the week of June 3 through June 10, although many divisions could complete their tournament prior to June 10. Again, it simply depends on the number of teams. 

Equipment Needed

Each child must supply their own glove and bat, and in the 7-12 year olds own batting helmet as well. The league will provide a jersey and ball cap. If your child catches, we encourage you to have them bring their own catcher's gear too for the 7-12 year old divisions. We do have some older catcher gear for handing out, but having their own on hand is definitely ideal. There is no catcher in Tee Ball or Coach Pitch.

If for any reason you or your family needs assistance with purchasing equipment, please reach out to me individually and confidentially and I will make sure your son or daughter gets squared away on equipment. Equipment costs will never be an obstacle to a kid wanting to play baseball at St. Matthews. 

That's it for now! And as always, please refer to our website or Facebook page for up-to-date information. If you have additional questions, please also review our website as there is a wealth of information under our FAQ's, Announcements, and other sections. 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

DICK'S 20% Off Shopping event

Parents and Coaches, 


Through the generosity and continued partnership of one of our biggest sponsors, we are pleased to announce once again just in time for the Fall Ball season,

St. Matthews Baseball 20% OFF SHOPPING EVENT!

Friday, September 9th – Monday, September 12th

Friday, September 16th – Monday, September 19th

Oxmoor Dick’s Sporting Goods

DICK’S Sporting Goods, is offering a 20% off discount throughout the store to help you gear up for the season! Be sure to use the coupon linked below, as this is specific to our organization. The coupon is valid in-store on the dates above and should be shown at the register during checkout.

HERE

2022 Fall Ball Announcement

Parents, players and coaches,

First, I want to thank each of you for an amazing Spring season of baseball. We had incredible enrollment, the rain cooperated for the most part, and some really good baseball was played.

What’s next? More. Baseball.

For a third year in a row, we are going to offer another fun, exciting season of Fall Ball!

It will be a little different than the Spring season. For Fall Ball we use a “coach brings their own team” format vs. open registration/tryouts. If you are familiar with the St. Matthews Basketball league, it’s essentially like that. If you’re not, the format is simple. Folks who are interested in coaching can recruit and field a baseball team, register and enter them as a team in the league, the coach will send out a special code to his/her parents via email, parents use that code when completing their registration/paying their fee, and their son/daughter will be automatically placed on the coach’s team.

Or, another option, if a child wants to play but doesn’t know a specific coach, we will keep your son or daughter as a “free agent” and will randomly assign them to a team if a spot is available. This will be a short list, and we will do our best to place every free agent, but due to space limitations it is first come first served so PLEASE don’t wait to sign up!

Also, PLEASE NOTE that unlike the Spring, in the Fall we cannot and do not honor coach and/or friend/player requests with either option. Fall Ball will simply be based on whether space is available on a team, and then assigning free agent players to that team.

*** Registration for the 2022 Fall Season OPENS next Friday, July 15, 2021 at 8:00 a.m. on our website which you can find HERE***

Age Cutoffs and Playing Up

In Fall Ball we use the same age cut off that we did for Spring so kids are able to play with the same age group/division that they did in the Spring. However, for most divisions your child may “play up” a division to the next age group. I say in most cases since there is one exception here: we typically do not play an 8-year-old up to 9/10 kid pitchunlessyour son/daughter played Spring 8U machine pitch or played organized 8U machine pitch with another league in the Spring. This is purely for safety reasons. We don’t want a kid’s first experience with kid pitch to be Fall Ball unless they can protect themselves, which a season of 8U machine pitch prepares them for.

If you want your child or team to “play up,” the system should provide that option at sign up by showing their current age group and the next age group above that for which you can choose. By playing up you acknowledge that your son or daughter can protect themselves at all times while on the field, and that they are capable, athletic and knowledgeable enough to play at the next level. If the system does not provide you the option of the next age group, your son or daughter is too young for the next age level per the Babe Ruth age chart.

If you need to determine your child's current age group, please consult the 2022 Babe Ruth Age Chart HERE.

Head coaches, beginning July 15, 2022 simply log in to your St. Matthews account, register as a head coach for 2022 Fall Ball, and then you can control team invites from the comfort of your own home! Or, read THIS too. It helps. Scroll about mid-way down to the"Steps for Coaches to Register" section.

Here are some additional details about the Fall Ball season:

There will be 6 divisions, and all players will be provided a jersey and ball cap:

1. Wee/Tee (4 and 5-year-olds) – PRICE $135 per player

- Age: 4 and 5 combined

- Games played on Weinberg Field (with possible games on Voll Field @ Trinity Stadium)

- Regular season begins 9/12, ends on or before 10/29, no post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (again, no coach or friend requests in the Fall)

- Players/Coaches can decide if they want coach pitch or to hit from the tee

- 1-hour games OR first 30 minutes devoted to a joint practice followed by a 2-inning game (approximately30 min)

2. Coach Pitch (6-year-olds) – PRICE $135 per player

- Age: 5 to 6

- Games played on Weinberg and Matanich Fields

- Regular season begins 9/12, ends on or before 10/29, no post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (again, no coach or friend requests in the Fall)

- Coach pitch or hit from tee after 5 pitches

- Outs are not kept for purposes of the side, but base runners will be called out and will return to the dugout on a batted ball resulting in an out, a force out, or a tag play.

- 1-hour games OR first 30 minutes devoted to a joint practice, followed by a 2-inning game (approximately30 min)

3. 7U Machine Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 6 to 7

- Games played on Matanich or Siegel Field

- Regular season begins 9/12, ends 10/22, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 15 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses

4. 8U Machine Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 7 to 8

- Games played on McCandless or Siegel Field

- Regular season begins 9/12, ends 10/22, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 15 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses

5. Minors Kid Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 9 and 10 combined

- Games played on Siegel or Look Field

- Regular season begins 9/12, ends 10/22, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses

6. Majors Kid Pitch – PRICE $185 per player

- Age: 11 and 12 combined

- Games played on Look Field

- Regular season begins 9/12, ends 10/22, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no coach or friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses.

Teams

-We will need at least 5 teams per division at a minimum to play.

-Coaches can select/recruit up to 12 kids for a team in any division (with no more than 6 travel/club baseball players).

Practices
The park will be "dark" the week of August 22ndso that we can clean, do some maintenance, and get things ready for Fall Ball.

We will have equipment pick up, coach meetings and other pre-season prep during the week of August 29th. More info to come.

Practices will be held the weeks of August 29 and September 5. More info to come on that as far as sign ups with Dan Cook. PLEASE NOTE this ONLY applies to those two weeks. Once games get underway on September 12, we will do our best to accommodate a practice schedule but depending on the number of teams, other tournaments we host, and club/travel ball held at the park, it may not happen. Please consider finding space or locations outside the ballpark to practice. Legends Academy in Louisville has a great indoor facility.

Games
We will start September 12th, approximately two games per week.

4/5 and 6 (Wee/Tee/Coach Pitch) games on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. The younger divisions are usually large, so they may have some Friday evening and/or Saturday morning or afternoon games (but I do try to minimize this).

7 and 8 Machine games on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, with a possible Friday and/or Saturday thrown in.

Minors and Majors games likely on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday.

Spread the word! Coaches, get your teams formed! Fall Ball is right around the corner.

If you have any questions please look on our website as there is a wealth of information there under our FAQ's and other sections. You can also contact Dan Cook at[email protected]or me at stmatthewsbaseballleague@gmail.com

Thank you for your support of St. Matthews Baseball, and see you in the Fall!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball



Picture Day #2 / #3

Parents and Coaches,

Next week will be Photo Day #2 (May 9, 2022) and Photo Day #3 (May 10, 2022). We added a third photo date to better accommodate players, parents and teams. While there was some confusion concerning our first photo day, hopefully this email will explain it a little better this go-around. In fact, I am going to copy and paste our photographer's email to me because I don't think I can explain it better myself how this will work.

One thing to please keep in mind is that yes, there are going to be teams who are scheduled to have their photographs on a night that they may NOT be playing a game. We have over 80 teams in the league, 3 nights for photos, and not every team plays every night, so please be patient with us and with our photographer as we attempt to get these wrapped up.

Also, please be sure your player is in full uniform (including cleats for the older kids), and brings his/her bat and glove to the photo shoot. Many thanks.

If you have questions, please contact your head coach or Kim Melloan at [email protected]

Chris,

Here are the schedules I put together for the 2ndand 3rdphoto days. The scheduled teams are those that were not scheduled on 4/23 and the teams that were previously scheduled but requested a change. If there is no game time listed then they do not have a game scheduled for either day. I’ve also included an “open” block of time at the end of each night to catch any stragglers or teams I may have missed. We will begin packing up promptly at the “pack up” date indicated at the end of each night. We will NOT take any newcomers after the pack up time. That being said, scheduled teams need to do their absolute best to come to their scheduled times because if not, then the open time could be a disaster (not to mention that it may adversely affect other teams’ schedules). Also, remind teams that they will all need bat and glove and should be in full uniform – including cleats.


St Matthews 5/9 Schedule
Full TeamDivisionTeam                 Date        GameTime                    Pic              Station
Machine Pitch (7yr Olds) - Cardinals (Kuerzi)Machine Pitch (7yr Olds)Cardinals (Kuerzi)9-May5:455:00 PM1
Machine Pitch (7yr Olds) - Yankees (Azevedo)Machine Pitch (7yr Olds)Yankees (Azevedo)9-May5:455:05 PM2
Majors (12yr Olds) - Blue Jays (Rondot)Majors (12yr Olds)Blue Jays (Rondot)9-May6:005:15 PM1
Majors (12yr Olds) - Phillies (Stewart)Majors (12yr Olds)Phillies (Stewart)9-May6:005:20 PM2
Minors (10yr Olds) - Angels (Spalding)Minors (10yr Olds)Angels (Spalding)9-May6:005:30 PM1
Minors (10yr Olds) - Reds (Malone)Minors (10yr Olds)Reds (Malone)9-May6:005:35 PM2
Majors (12yr Olds) - Braves (Cards) (Berry)Majors (12yr Olds)Braves (Cards) (Berry)9-May5:50 PM1
Majors (12yr Olds) - Reds (Brammer)Majors (12yr Olds)Reds (Brammer)9-May8:005:55 PM2
Majors (12yr Olds) - Mets (Meirose)Majors (12yr Olds)Mets (Meirose)9-May8:006:10 PM1
Minors (10yr Olds) - Cardinals (Haag)Minors (10yr Olds)Cardinals (Haag)9-May8:006:15 PM2
Machine Pitch (8yr Olds) - Mets (Zinser)Machine Pitch (8yr Olds)Mets (Zinser)9-May7:156:30 PM1
Machine Pitch (7yr Olds) - A's (Bauman)Machine Pitch (7yr Olds)A's (Bauman)9-May7:156:35 PM2
Majors (12yr Olds) - White Sox (Walters)Majors (12yr Olds)White Sox (Walters)9-May6:50 PM1
OpenOpen9-May6:55 PM
PACK UPPACK UP9-May8:00 PM



St Matthews 5/10 Schedule
Full TeamDivisionTeam                 Date        GameTime                   Pic              Station
4/5 Tee Reds (Weinstein)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Reds (Weinstein)10-May5:305:00 PM1
Machine Pitch (8yr Olds) - Braves (Cassin)Machine Pitch (8yr Olds)Braves (Cassin)10-May5:455:05 PM2
Machine Pitch (8yr Olds) - Cubs (Stanton)Machine Pitch (8yr Olds)Cubs (Stanton)10-May5:455:15 PM1
Machine Pitch (8yr Olds) - Mariners (Lorenz)Machine Pitch (8yr Olds)Mariners (Lorenz)10-May5:20 PM2
Machine Pitch (7yr Olds) - Cubs (Lawrence)Machine Pitch (7yr Olds)Cubs (Lawrence)10-May5:30 PM1
Machine Pitch (7yr Olds) - Dodgers (Arnold)Machine Pitch (7yr Olds)Dodgers (Arnold)10-May5:35 PM2
Machine Pitch (8yr Olds) - Pirates (Cleary)Machine Pitch (8yr Olds)Pirates (Cleary)10-May7:155:50 PM1
Machine Pitch (8yr Olds) - Reds (Walker)Machine Pitch (8yr Olds)Reds (Walker)10-May7:155:55 PM2
Machine Pitch (7yr Olds) - Angels (Cheser)Machine Pitch (7yr Olds)Angels (Cheser)10-May7:156:10 PM1
Minors (10yr Olds) - Dodgers (Young)Minors (10yr Olds)Dodgers (Young)10-May6:15 PM2
Minors (10yr Olds) - Pirates(Jaber)Minors (10yr Olds)Pirates(Jaber)10-May6:30 PM1
Minors (10yr Olds) - Rays (Mathes)Minors (10yr Olds)Rays (Mathes)10-May6:35 PM2
Majors (12yr Olds) - Braves (Cards) (Berry)Majors (12yr Olds)Braves (Cards) (Berry)10-May6:50 PM1
Majors (12yr Olds) - White Sox (Walters)Majors (12yr Olds)White Sox (Walters)10-May6:55 PM2
Machine Pitch (7yr Olds) - Braves (Herring)Machine Pitch (7yr Olds)Braves (Herring)10-May7:10 PM1
Machine Pitch (8yr Olds) - Marlins (Hopkins)Machine Pitch (8yr Olds)Marlins (Hopkins)10-May7:15 PM2
OpenOpen10-May7:30 AM
PACK UPPACK UP10-May8:20 PM

Trash at the Park

Good Morning,

The Spring season is in full swing and overall we have been pleased with how things have been going. Have watched some great games! And I have personally observed many teams and coaches showing good sportsmanship and fair play, with parents cheering on their sons and daughters from the stands without taking the "competitive" part of competitive youth baseball, too seriously. Which is the way it should be. Every kid out there is still learning. Every coach out there is a volunteer. And every umpire out there is not going to get it correct 100% of the time. Have their been exceptions to all of this? Yes. I have personally observed that as well, and we address those issues on a case-by-case basis, but I am grateful that is the exception and not the rule. So keep it up!

Still (there's always something, right?) another more concerning and disappointing practice we have observed this season are people of every age treating the park like their own personal garbage can. Every year and every season I have been a part of this league, there has always been some trash left behind in dugouts, walkways, near fences or on the playground. It has always been an unfortunate byproduct of having hundreds of people visit the baseball park each week, for 7-8 weeks in a season. And every year we, along with members on the Board of Directors, have picked up trash as we find it. A necessary annoyance of helping run a baseball league: there will be folks who leave trash behind and someone has to pick it up.

But this year, for reasons I am not sure I understand nor will ever figure out, there has been overwhelmingly excessive, and frankly blatant, littering at the park each night. And I am asking for your help in putting an end to it. Because here's the reality. Without your help, a small group of volunteer board members and league officials are left to do this on our own. We don't pay have anyone on the payroll to pick up trash, and while the City of St. Matthews collects bags of trash, they do not pick-up actual trash from the ground or bleachers or dugouts. It's us. It's only the few of us who, like yourselves, have families, jobs, kids, other places to be and other things to do. None of us wants to spend an hour after a game wraps at 9:30 picking up trash. We want to get home, see our kids before they go to bed. See our loved ones.

We will do our best to keep trash bins from overflowing, and supply fresh bags in those bins both inside and outside the dugouts. We will also continue to work with the City to ensure all trash bags are collected in a timely manner. But you guys, you guys do me a solid and pick up after yourselves, your kids, and/or your players. And ask the players to do it for themselves as well before they leave the dugout or are simply walking out of the park. Treat the park like it is your own, because itISyour own. It's all of ours.

For over 60 years St. Matthews Baseball has been a community baseball league. Everyone is invited to play here regardless of where they live or where they go to school. I hope it is with that same sense of community that this big baseball family of ours can step up, take ownership of this space, and meet this challenge going forward. Make the ballpark a beautiful, clean and safe place for all who come to watch or play the game of baseball.

Thank you guys.

Chris



Photo Ordering Instructions

Add Content...

Picture Day 1 Schedule



Parents, 

Just a few minutes ago I sent your coaches the schedule for our first of two (maybe three) photo days, which is tomorrow, Saturday, April 23, 2022.

Players: BRING YOUR BAT AND GLOVE AND WEAR YOUR COMPLETE UNIFORM

Our photographer Kim Melloan has put together a schedule for each photo day. So even though you are receiving this email does not necessarily mean you are scheduled tomorrow. You can check our website for the schedule AND instructions on how to order photos with your mobile device (that is also attached here). This info will be on our website by this afternoon under the "Announcements" tab. Also, you should receive an email from your coach today or tonight informing you of your scheduled time.

We understand there will be kids missing, other events going on, but please do everything you can to be there at your designated time and photo station so we can get the other teams scheduled in the next couple of weeks!

If you have questions, please contact your coaches who can then contact the photographer. Our next photo group day will sometime in May, and we will repeat the process!

Thanks all,
Chris Gadansky

Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

 

Full TeamDivisionTeamDateGameTimePicStation
7U Machine Mets (Humphrey)7U Machine (Spring 2022)Mets (Humphrey)4/23/2210:00 AM9:05 AM1
8U Machine Angels (Warren)8U Machine (Spring 2022)Angels (Warren)4/23/2210:00 AM9:00 AM2
7U Machine Reds (Miller)7U Machine (Spring 2022)Reds (Miller)4/23/2210:00 AM9:10 AM3
8U Machine Guardians (Dials)8U Machine (Spring 2022)Guardians (Dials)4/23/2210:00 AM9:20 AM1
4/5 Tee Yankees (Robinson)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Yankees (Robinson)4/23/229:25 AM2
4/5 Tee Cubs (Kaelin)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Cubs (Kaelin)4/23/229:30 AM3
4/5 Tee Red Sox (Vihlidal)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Red Sox (Vihlidal)4/23/2210:30 AM9:40 AM1
4/5 Tee Giants (Mulvihill)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Giants (Mulvihill)4/23/2210:30 AM9:45 AM2
Minors Royals (Clayton)Minors (Spring 2022)Royals (Clayton)4/23/2211:30 AM9:50 AM3
7U Machine Mariners (Norton)7U Machine (Spring 2022)Mariners (Norton)4/23/2211:30 AM10:10 AM1
Minors Marlins (Hill)Minors (Spring 2022)Marlins (Hill)4/23/2211:30 AM10:15 AM2
7U Machine Phillies (Stewart)7U Machine (Spring 2022)Phillies (Stewart)4/23/2211:30 AM10:20 AM3
4/5 Tee Cardinals (Kuerzi)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Cardinals (Kuerzi)4/23/2210:30 AM1
4/5 Tee White Sox (Rosum)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)White Sox (Rosum)4/23/2210:35 AM2
4/5 Tee Mariners (Crowdis)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Mariners (Crowdis)4/23/2210:40 AM3
4/5 Tee Braves (Louis)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Braves (Louis)4/23/2210:50 AM1
4/5 Tee Mets (DeSensi)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Mets (DeSensi)4/23/2211:45 AM10:55 AM2
4/5 Tee Angels (Thomas)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Angels (Thomas)4/23/2211:45 AM11:00 AM3
4/5 Tee Astros (Cunningham)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Astros (Cunningham)4/23/2211:10 AM1
6 Coach Pitch Reds (Kern)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Reds (Kern)4/23/2211:15 AM2
Minors Cubs (Burge)Minors (Spring 2022)Cubs (Burge)4/23/221:00 PM11:20 AM3
4/5 Tee Tigers (Cajka)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Tigers (Cajka)4/23/221:00 PM12:00 PM1
4/5 Tee Nationals (Woods)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Nationals (Woods)4/23/221:00 PM12:05 PM2
4/5 Tee Blue Jays (Lewis)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Blue Jays (Lewis)4/23/2212:10 PM3
4/5 Tee Reds (Weinstein)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Reds (Weinstein)4/23/2212:20 PM1
4/5 Tee Dodgers (Weber)4/5 Tee (Spring 2022)Dodgers (Weber)4/23/2212:25 PM2
6 Coach Pitch Cardinals (McCubbin)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Cardinals (McCubbin)4/23/2212:30 PM3
6 Coach Pitch Cubs (Shuck)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Cubs (Shuck)4/23/2212:40 PM1
6 Coach Pitch Mets(Shrewsberry)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Mets(Shrewsberry)4/23/2212:45 PM2
6 Coach Pitch Nationals (Cook)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Nationals (Cook)4/23/2212:50 PM3
Minors Rangers (Windhorst)Minors (Spring 2022)Rangers (Windhorst)4/23/223:00 PM1:00 PM1
Minors Red Sox (Ventura)Minors (Spring 2022)Red Sox (Ventura)4/23/223:00 PM1:05 PM2
6 Coach Pitch Braves (Seibert)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Braves (Seibert)4/23/222:15 PM1:10 PM3
6 Coach Pitch Tigers (Rosum)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Tigers (Rosum)4/23/222:15 PM1:30 PM1
6 Coach Pitch Brewers (Farnham)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Brewers (Farnham)4/23/223:30 PM1:35 PM2
6 Coach Pitch Rockies (Gilchrist)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Rockies (Gilchrist)4/23/223:30 PM1:40 PM3
6 Coach Pitch Padres (Denbow)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Padres (Denbow)4/23/221:50 PM1
6 Coach Pitch Phillies (Gilmore)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Phillies (Gilmore)4/23/221:55 PM2
6 Coach Pitch Red Sox (Kanobroski)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Red Sox (Kanobroski)4/23/222:00 PM3
6 Coach Pitch Yankees (Uttich)6 Coach Pitch (Spring 2022)Yankees (Uttich)4/23/222:10 PM1

 

2022 Opening Day!

Parents, Coaches, and Players,

Tomorrow is Opening Day!

Man, I love typing those words. Baseball is back!! Just a few quick updates and reminders as we start the season.

Parking

 

PLEASE remember, do not under any circumstances park your vehicle in the shopping center adjacent to the park. Your car will be towed by the property owners and we don’t want that to happen! Please consult the map on our website for field and parking locations. We have built in 15-30 minutes between each game (depending on age division), so hopefully with the extra time, it will allow folks time to leave before the next batch of fans and players arrive. Remember, in our Minors and Majors, feel free to drop your player off at the playground parking lot for warm-up’s, and then return closer to game time. This will also help reduce congestion.

Season Schedule/Uniforms

 

Your specific game schedule is available on your child’s team page thru our website. Simply log in to your account and go to your child’s team page, and you will find the most current schedule, team roster, coach contact info and more! If there are adjustments to the schedule, or a game is rescheduled due to a rain-out for instance, this will automatically update on your team page so please check it regularly.

I have been told uniforms will be handed out before games beginning Monday, and each night thereafter as teams play their first game during opening week. Thank you for your patience as we wait for those to be completed and distributed. Coaches, please contact Dan Cook if you have any questions with respect to uniforms.

Rain-Out's/Game Cancellations


In the event of inclement weather and games are cancelled, our Fields Director will assess and make a final decision by 4:30 p.m. that day and communicate cancellations to me. That information will also be posted on our Facebook page, as well as conveyed to commissioners and then to coaches via email who will then send word out to parents. Assume that NO news means game are ON! But please also note, there may be times when rain makes the dirt fields (Look, Siegel and Matanich) unplayable, but our turf fields (Voll, McCandless and Weinberg) have properly drained and can be played. We will do our best to convey that information as well to the extent necessary.

Rain-out's may not be rescheduled due to time and space limitations. Your coach will be kept apprised of any make-ups scheduled.

COVID

 

For the past few years, we have had an official COVID-19 policy in place. Now, it seems folks are back to a more normal routine with the vaccines and easing restrictions. Which is great! But, if you are not vaccinated, please be considerate of your neighbor and practice social distancing or wear a mask if you cannot practice social distancing. Will this be policed? We will ask for vaccine cards before the first pitch of every game? No. Of course not. Just practice common sense and be a good neighbor is all we ask.

Spectator Conduct


This may go without saying, but as much as we invest in our children and can get caught up in the game and spirit of competition, we encourage and expect good sportsmanship from coaches, players AND fans alike. Please keep in mind, the coaches are volunteers, the scorekeepers are teens and young adults, and our umpires are doing the best they can. Please remain respectful. Yelling, harassing, or antagonizing coaches, umpires, other spectators, or the opposing team on the field will simply not be tolerated.

No college scholarships are being handed out this season. Scouts don’t actually attend youth baseball games. No one will be signing with the St. Louis Cardinals.

Don't be that guy. Don't be that gal. Use common sense. It's just a game.
 

Texas Roadhouse Nights!/Thank You Sponsors!

 

The St. Matthews location of Texas Roadhouse is hosting fundraising nights on our behalf! All you have to do is print and present the attached flyer and Texas Roadhouse will donate 10% of your total food purchase to the league! 

This will take place between 4pm and 9pm every other Monday, beginning with this Monday: Opening Night! Please consider eating at Texas Roadhouse before or after your game, while supporting the league in the process!

And a big thanks to the good folks at Texas Roadhouse for stepping up. For comparison’s sake, there is another establishment just across the way who has made a fortune off our parents and kids, but no matter how many times we’ve approached them for a partnership or sponsorship over the last two decades, zilch. Nada. Crickets. Actually, no. No, that’s not fair. Every time we have approached them, they have offered us day-old fried chicken sandwiches to re-sell at the park. So, we have that going for us. Which is nice.

Did I say the bad part out loud? My apologies. I didn’t mean to say the bad part out loud. (Yea I did).

Day-old fried chicken sandwiches. I think Cousin Eddie said it best in times like these: “You serious, Clark?”

So THANK YOU Texas Roadhouse and ALL of the amazing sponsors who have stepped up for us in big and small ways, some of you new to the park this year, some of you with us year after year, season after season, motivated by little more than helping sustain youth baseball in this community. THAT is true charitable giving, THAT is true community partnership, and we can’t do any of this without you.
 

Questions/Concerns?

 

If you have questions or concerns throughout the season, please speak with your coach. If they cannot address or resolve your concern, they can communicate with the commissioner for each division, who can then speak with me if it requires further attention.

Wishing everyone a safe, healthy, and fun season of baseball!

“But baseball has marked the time. It reminds us of all that once was good and that could be again.”

Play ball.

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

Game Schedules

Parents and Coaches,

The game schedule for Spring 2022 will be released later this evening or first part of tomorrow. Having done this a half dozen times or so over the last 3 years, it dawned on me I usually get the same or similar questions or concerns after the schedule is posted, so I wanted to take this opportunity to review a little “how the sausage gets made” when it comes to the game schedule. (Side note and for the record, the way sausage gets made is both terrifying and, pretty delicious).

This year, we saw more kids sitting on our wait lists than ever before, and earlier than ever before. We are a medium sized league, with only 4 available baseball fields and 1 tee ball field to play, so our rosters and the number of teams per division have to be kept at a razor thin margin. Still, we had a decision to make. Take additional kids off the wait list to play ball, but slightly lower the number of games this season. Or keep kids on the wait list, keep the number of teams we have, and play 1 or 2 extra games. We went with the first. Out of some 100+ kids on our waiting lists, we were able to find teams for 70 of them, which is awesome! But it required me to get pretty creative with the game schedule. Another huge challenge to the whole calculus of this thing, is that our season is starting slightly late due to Spring Break and must end very early due to college and high school tournaments scheduled on our fields in June.

More players, more teams, # of games in the season, less weeks to play in the season, still only have 5 fields………mathematical chaos.  

You may be asking, “So what does any of this have to do with me or my kid’s team? Can I stop reading now, please?” To which I would say, sure you can. But if you just hang with me a little longer I will give you some info on how the season will look so that you can be well-informed of a few things which hath spawned from this diabolical mathematical dementor Hell child of a schedule that I have been staring at and mumbling to myself about for the last 10 days. Ok, let’s go:

  • Working with Trinity Baseball’s Head Coach, I was able to secure us 3 nights to play Tee Ball on Voll Field at Trinity Stadium this season. Very excited about this, and the kids seem to love it year after year. Please be mindful though, that the second games scheduled each night wrap up at 7:45/8:00. This is late for our littlest ball players, I know. But it’s also such a cool experience. I give you full permission to curse my name for whatever sleepy and grouchy child wakes up the next morning for you. Orrrrr, they will be SO excited about playing on the big field, they won’t have time for being sleepy or grouchy! (But seriously, plan accordingly. And I apologize for keeping any kiddo out past their bedtimes).

     

  • With increasing the number of teams in our 4/5 and 6 year old divisions by cutting one game off the schedule, I was still able to stay away from regular Friday evening games as we have done so for the last few years. Although, there are two 6U games scheduled at the verrrry end of the season on Friday, May 27.

     

  • For the rest of the league, with getting more players in the door it does mean that more teams will play at least one or more Saturdays in all age groups. Will you play every Saturday? Unless I really screwed something up, no. You should not! I hope! Every team (except in the Majors) averages around 3-4 Saturday games depending on the division. But this makes it possible to avoid playing on Friday night.

     

  • The game scheduling system we use has been revamped this year, for better or worse. The software builds bye weeks into the schedule automatically, so you may have back-to-back games one week, you may even play 3 times in a given week in some divisions, and then go 7 or 10 days until your next game. With so many teams in our younger divisions (4-8’s), this is typical of the scheduling software to make sure everyone gets the same number of games and field time. So please do not be alarmed if you are game heavy for a while, have some time off, then get thrown back into games. Happens every year.

     

  • For those divisions with pitchers (Minors and Majors), yes, every team will have at least one week where they play on consecutive, back-to-back days. Again, don’t be mad at me. Be mad at math.

     

  • I did my best to ensure no team was playing predominantly “early” or “late” games. This is not a perfect science, however.

     

  • No games on Oaks or Derby. I’m no dummy. We all have bourbon to drink and money to lose.


Finally, a quick reminder. Parking sucks at the ballpark. I’m done trying to dress it up year after year. It is just a fact of life for our ball league. I am often asked, “Chris, is there anything we can do for you guys at the park?” and my answer is always the same, and always impossible: “I need 2-3 more fields and more parking. Not necessarily in that order.”

There are a few things you can do to help minimize the parking issue or even minimize your frustration in finding a place to park. For our older kiddos, we encourage parents to drop off your player near the playground for warm-ups, and then come back closer to the start of the game so that the cars and spectators before you can clear out. We try to stagger games as much as possible to allow for the parking lots to ease up some between games. If you are in our younger divisions, especially those where grandma and grandpa, aunts and uncles want to come watch their little slugger play, consider carpooling on those nights. And while there is a new owner of the shopping center adjacent to us, as always DO NOT PARK there as you will be towed.

Please note these large crowd days at the park:

  • April 26: Trinity v. St. X – no 456’s or Majors groups will be playing that night, ONLY 7 through Minors.
  • May 17: Election night – ONLY 456’s and Minors are scheduled, NO 7 or 8U Machine or Majors.
  • May 14: 3 games scheduled at Trinity Stadium between 10:00 am and 3:00 pm.

Thank you all. Game schedule will be posted soon, and I will send one more email before Opening Day on April 11 to review any last-minute details not addressed here. Once the schedule is posted, unless there is some clear oversight or error, in general we will not edit the schedule. It has a domino effect that is almost impossible to keep a handle on once we start messing with it, so please consider it final.

If you are on Spring Break, be safe! See you all at the ballpark soon!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

Waitlist Update

Parents,

I first want to thank you guys who are still on the wait list for your patience and understanding. Sitting on the wait list is not fun as I know all too well having gone thru it myself a time or two with both of my sons, and for various sports including baseball at St. Matthews long before I took this position. I just wanted to get you guys specifically a note so you aren't left wondering "what is going on?" or "when will we hear something?"

First, please know I wish we could get every last kid who wants to play on a team this season. And the fact that we can't due to simple space, time, and logistical limitations is the stuff that keeps me up at night. I hate it. After Christmas break we were absolutely flooded with sign-ups which quickly began to max out division capacity in a few of our younger age groups, at a rate faster than we have ever seen before. This continued into January and early February and before we knew it, we were capped in literally every division, from 4-year-olds to 12-year-olds. It was the earliest I have ever had to open wait lists, which stinks.

Second, with opening wait lists early, we saw a growing group of players looking for a spot, with anywhere between 10 to 30 kids deep in each division. All told, we have almost 900 kids signed up to play this year, and an additional 100 players who landed on the wait list this season. Of those 100 we have been able to move around 45 off of it to fill cancelled spots in the order in which they joined the wait list. While there is a chance we may see a few more of those spots open, I won't sugar coat it. I cannot say with any confidence it is likely we would see many more cancellations and spots open up this close to the start of the season.

I was recently asked why this is happening. Can't we just squeeze one or two more kids onto a team? And the short answer is, we have. We have been able to squeeze around 45 additional kids onto teams. But the roster size is not infinite, and there is a point where too many kids on a team makes actual playing and coaching baseball near impossible so we have to ensure the numbers are manageable so that kids get more than one at-bat, everyone gets to play in the field, and coaches can provide better instruction to a reasonable roster size. Thus, the rosters as they are today are filled. Perhaps slightly over-filled if we are being honest.

I have also been asked to find a solution for this, which to me is akin to, "Hey Chris. Fix it." Honestly, the only "solution" to this is building one or two more fields at the ball park to host 4, 5 and 6 year old Tee Ball and Coach Pitch. That is the only thing that could be done to "fix" the limitations we face in placing all kids. Because it comes down to math for each division: number of teams in the division x number of games in the season, divided by number of weeks in the season, divided by how many fields are available. It is a razor thin margin of error, and in the end if comes down to field space. Maybe one day we can fund raise the construction of a new field, or convince the City to help us do that assuming we can find a spot on campus in which to do it, but for now that is the unfortunate reality. And again, it is this reality, this part of the job I hate the most. I would field a thousand teams if I could because I feel that strongly about the experience and benefits youth baseball has to offer. But I can't. As much as that sucks.

As a final target date, if we hit Opening Day on April 11 and you haven't heard anything by then, that's a good indicator the wait-listed players won't be offered a spot this season unfortunately. However, we WILL offer another Fall Ball season with sign ups around mid-July. So please keep an eye out for that on our website or social media pages. It is a very fun, short season of baseball that the kids love, and we would love to have them come play some ball with us!

On behalf of the entire St. Matthews Baseball organization, thank you again for your time and patience, and my best regards you all.

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

2022 Commissioners

Equipment Pick Up TOMORROW
Tomorrow, Sunday, March 13, 2022 from 12:00-2:00 pm, Dan Cook will be in the equipment garage which is down the driveway behind the bowling alley and to the left of deep left field of McCandless Field. You will see a row of garage bays. He will be on hand to give out practice baseballs to every age group and/or a bucket of balls to those coaches in the older divisions (7-12's) who do not yet have a bucket from coaching a team before. If you have coached before and have a bucket, supplies are limited so PLEASE don't take a bucket when you don't need one. Cool? Cool.


For 456's, same applies to Tees. We have a very limited supply but are working on getting more.

For 7-12's, same applies to catcher's gear.

You can see where i am going with this – shipment and supply side issues have not spared the league, and we either have some stuff on back order, or are waiting for our supplier to confirm if she can even get us this stuff this year. So, our advice is you may need to get creative. Have a kid who loves to catch and has his own gear? Awesome. Identify that kid at your first practice and make sure he brings his stuff. Have parents on your team that may have an extra tee or catcher's helmet or mitt at home? Excellent. That's your new best friend. Believe me we are working on getting more, and have been for months, but this is the reality we find ourselves at the moment.

Background Checks and Abuse Prevention Training
If you completed the Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken background check and abuse prevention training last year for the Spring 2021 season you do NOT have to complete it again. That is good for two years. If you did not complete it, here is what I need from head coaches:

Head coaches, speak with your assistant coaches who are signed up in the system to assistant coach, NOT the occasional mom or dad off the bleachers helping out with the team, we just need info for those that have officially been allocated to coach a team. Once you have, please email your respective commissioner (below), and let them know whether you as head coach need to complete the check/training AND/OR whether one or both of your assistants need to complete it. This applies to all divisions! Commissioners, please keep the names in a spreadsheet, tabulate by name and email, and then that will give us an idea of how many “tokens” Board President Jayson Brunstetter will need to purchase which will allow coaches to complete the check/training at no cost to them.

If you as head coach and your two assistants completed the check/training last year, then you’re done! NO NEED TO EMAIL COMMISSIONERS. Just need to hear from those that have NOT completed it.

Here are the commissioners again if you need their contact info:

Majors – Brandon Ayers ([email protected])

Minors – Ryan Grigsby ([email protected])

8’s – Matt Kuerzi ([email protected])

7’s – Adam Redden ([email protected])

456’s – Jenifour Jones ([email protected])

Coach Meeting Reminder

Tuesday, March 22, 2022 training room on lower level of Compass Counseling - 7984 New La Grange Rd, Lyndon, KY 40222.

Again, at least one coach from each team MUST attend.

Here are the times, each session will be approximately 45 minutes or less:

4/5 Tee AND 6 Coach Pitch: 6:30 - 7:15
8 AND 7 Machine Pitch: 7:15 - 8:00
Minors 9/10: 8:00 - 8:45
Majors 11/12: 8:45- 9:30

The 4/5 and 6 divisions are by far the largest in the league, with 30 teams between the two of them. For those divisions, please send only one coach per team.

I will email all coaches the night before with the in-house rules for the Spring 2022 season.

Thanks coaches,

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

2022 Tryout Information

Parents, Coaches and Ball Players,

I have been told a few times over the years, “It’s not like parents or coaches read your long emails. They just get skimmed and deleted.”

After fighting back the deluge of tears, despair and ennui welling up, I remind myself that that simply cannot be possible. Certainly someone reads this stuff. Sure, do I write long emails hitting every possible thing I would want to know as a parent? Yes. Do we then take these emails and publish them on our webpage and social media channels? Yes. But do I still receive a handful of emails from parents and coaches minutes or hours after I send these emails asking the exact question(s) just addressed in the earlier email? Yes. Yes indeed. :)

Kidding, of course. There are no tears or ennui. There is no crying in baseball.

I am still doing my best not to blow up and clutter your inbox with information. I am mindful of your time and want to make sure you stay in the loop. Below are some very important updates and information to keep in mind as we inch closer and closer to the Spring 2022 season. I will also be sending a few other emails this week with some other important reminders.

Questions/Information

As referenced above if you have any questions about the league, please check our website and/or our social media pages as it contains a host of valuable information, important dates, FAQ’s, you name it. We do our best to keep that information up to date. If you still can’t find what you are looking for, I do try to have an “open-door” policy for all, just be patient with me as it may take me a day or so to respond with the season starting up!

Coaches

11/12 Majors Division – WE NEED HEAD COACHES! Call this a plea. Usually in this division we get too few sign ups and too many coaches. This year, we have had a solid sign up (we will have 5, maybe 6 teams if more sign ups come in this week) but only two head coaches signed up thus far. So, we need at least three more head coaches, and each head coach will be allowed two assistant coaches (which we can help with, we have assistants signed up). The last thing we want to do is cut kids because there are not enough coaches. If you know even a little about baseball, are good with kids, have a positive attitude, and know how to keep parents in the loop and up to date, congrats! You are head coach material! Please volunteer and help make this season a success. I promise it is not as time consuming as you may think, and the reward you get from watching these kids get better at the game while having fun is worth its weight in gold. Or even put together three moms or dads and head coach by committee, that works too!

Tryouts (more on that below) are a week from today, and we need to have good people stand up and help out. If that is you, please contact me and Dan Cook ([email protected]) as soon as possible, and log in to your account and select the Volunteer tab to the left to register yourself to coach!

Head Coaches currently signed up - please send Dan Cook ([email protected]) an email with you and your two assistant coach staff. Please identify who the head coach of your team will be, and who will be your two assistants. We will need this for tryouts in the older divisions, as well as for league-wide background checks and safe training requirements (more info to come on that).

NOTE: If you are in the 4-5-6 divisions, you may have two assistants, and a few other mom or dads helping out. That is totally fine.

ALSO NOTE: Minors and Majors coaches, the commissioner of your respective division will forward you tryout evaluation sheets this Friday which will contain a player’s name and his/her corresponding tryout number. They will also attach a sheet with who is coaching with who (as requested above), so we know which kids are already taken off the board. Please bring these sheets with you to tryouts.

Sponsorships

Call this one a shameless plug and request. St. Matthews baseball is a nonprofit organization that exists and provides baseball to our youth thru the generous donations of our sponsors. Quite simply, we could not do this without their help! From sponsoring a team (yes, you can sponsor your son or daughter's team and have your logo on the back of the team's jerseys!) to hanging a sign in the outfield, these contributions mean we do not ask parents to volunteer at the concessions table, players are not asked to sell candy bars or magazines, and you can simply come to the park, relax, and enjoy watching baseball.

But we still need your help. A great way to show your support is to become a sponsor yourself. Whether it is for your business or you, we offer a variety of options. Your contribution to the league helps us purchase new equipment, uniforms, field materials/upkeep, ballpark upkeep, and everything in between.

If you would like to become a sponsor – and we hope you do! – please review the attached sponsorship form, and free to email me directly at [email protected] if you would like to be a part of keeping St. Matthews Baseball running strong for years to come! (If the PDF does not open for some reason let me know and I will email you a copy directly).

Thank you for allowing this shameless (but much needed) plug and request. Now on to....

Tryouts

Reminder, 4/5 (Tee Ball), 6 (Coach Pitch), 7U (Machine Pitch) and 8U (Machine Pitch) DO NOT have try outs. Your teams are being formed and will be rosters will be released as each division is completed.

If your player is registered for Minor League (9 and 10 year olds) or Major League (11 and 12 year olds), here is the tryout schedule:

Sunday, March 6, 2022

*Minors (9-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium – large turf field behind Best Buy)
Time 1:00 - 2:30 pm

*Minors (10-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium)
Time 2:30 - 4:00 pm

*Majors (11 AND 12-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium)
Time 4:00 - 6:00 pm

** If we have inclement weather, the tryouts will be conducted (same times) at Legends Sports Academy, 10900 Electron Dr, Louisville, Ky 40299 – if there is rain and we need to move indoors to Legends, a determination will be made by 5:00 p.m. on Saturday, March 5, and emailed to all parents, posted on our social media pages, and posted on our website. IF YOU DO NOT HEAR FROM US ASSUME OUTSIDE TRYOUTS ARE STILL ON AT VOLL FIELD**

What to Bring to Tryouts:

  • glove
  • bat
  • batting helmet
  • ball cap
  • regular shoes or non-metal cleats (both facilities are turf)
  • water

Once signed in, please only have your player enter the try-out areas. Parents are free to stay and observe, but please find a place in the bleachers or down the 1st or 3rd baseline behind the fence. Parents are asked not to stand on the field during tryouts.

Make-Up Tryouts and Player Draft Nights:

While we understand weekends are full of competing sports and other events, baseball try outs are crucial for appropriate placement on a team in each division, and so we encourage you to make sure your child will be available to participate on the dates scheduled above. It is the best opportunity for them to be properly assessed by the coaches. However, if your child cannot make the above date and times, we will offer a short make up tryout before the draft night of their respective division.

For those who cannot make the Saturday tryouts, we will hold a short make-up tryout at St. Matthews Baseball Park on McCandless Field (large turf field behind bowling alley):

Wednesday, March 9, 2022

*Majors Make-Up (11 AND 12-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - McCandless Field)
Time 6:00 – 7:00 pm

*Majors Divisional Draft – at least one coach from each team must attend
Time 7:30 pm (Basement of Compass, 7984 New La Grange Rd, Lyndon, KY 40222)

Thursday, March 10, 2022

*Minors Make-Up (9 AND 10-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - McCandless Field)
Time 6:00 – 7:00 pm

*Minors Divisional Draft – at least one coach from each team must attend
Time 7:30 pm (Basement of Compass, 7984 New La Grange Rd, Lyndon, KY 40222)

Regular Season Equipment

In the 4/5 and 6 divisions (Tee and Coach Pitch) your child will need his/her own glove and USA Baseball approved baseball bat. They will NOT need a helmet. Look for the sticker on the stem of the bat that says USA Baseball. A USSSA baseball bat, however, is prohibited under Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken rules. Image of the sticker is on our homepage. Regular tennis shoes are fine.

In all remaining divisions (7-12), your child will need his/her own glove, helmet, USA Baseball approved bat, cleats (non-metal), and for the boys a cup. Your coach may also ask that you purchase white or grey baseball pants. Other equipment items such as batting gloves are optional.

The league will provide the Minors (9-10) and Majors (11-12) a bag of league owned equipment catcher’s gear, but you are encouraged to use your own or that of a player’s if they own a set.

Practice baseballs will be provided to coaches.

Equipment pick-up will be scheduled in the coming weeks.

Looking for some gently used, cleaned up, discounted stuff?

Come to Levi G's Gently Used Equipment Sale!
Outside Trinity Stadium/Voll Field Try-out’s
Sunday, March 6 1:00 – 6:00 pm

Couldn’t find what you were looking for at Levi’s? Looking for specific equipment?

March 4-6 is the first St. Matthews Baseball League Weekend of the season at DICK's!  
***20% OFF all gear, even non-baseball stuff***
The official coupon will be posted on our website and social media accounts soon!

Practices and Games

The practice schedule will be released mid-March, while the game schedule will be released towards the end of March.

Thank you all, take care. Looking forward to a great season of baseball!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

 

2022 Spring Update/ Used Equipment Sale

Parents,

In anticipation of the upcoming season, I will send along an email here or there to keep you in the loop, remind you about some important dates to keep in mind, and give you some general information without (hopefully) blowing up your inbox too much. So just a quick update here, and some information to pass along before we get going this season. 

Registration and Wait Lists

First, sign-ups are going great so far, and the Board of Directors and I want to thank you for choosing St. Matthews Baseball. They are going so great, however, that spots are filling up fast! If you receive this and have been on the fence or have been meaning to get signed up, or maybe know of a family that hasn’t signed up yet, spread the word and get signed up today! Even though we keep registration open into March, if a division reaches capacity first, registration will immediately close for that age group and a wait list will be formed. And once that occurs there is unfortunately no guarantee a spot will open for Spring Ball. This is especially true in the younger divisions which are usually the largest group(s) of players in our league. Don’t wait!

New or Used Equipment Donations and Sale!

One of our veteran ball players, Levi Gladstein, proposed an amazing idea to us, and we are excited to help him get it going! His plan is to hold a baseball equipment donation day at the park, take whatever is donated and clean it up if needed, and then hold an equipment sale at the ballpark so parents can save some money outfitting their ball players with gloves, pants, bats, and other equipment for the coming season. The money raised and leftover equipment would then be donated to the ballpark and put towards park improvements along with charitable outreach for surrounding baseball leagues in need. How cool is that!

Have a box full of baseball pants that were hardly worn but never quite fit, and for years have been telling yourself you would get rid of it? Donate them! Maybe you have a glove or two lying around the house that were replaced by something newer as your player grew over the years? Donate them! Have a brand new batting helmet, baseball bat, or set of batting gloves that, for whatever reason, have been sitting in your car trunk for the better part of 18 months because your player wasn’t very happy with the size or color maybe and you have been meaning to return it but it’s just a big hassle when you really stop to think about it because who has time for that you have more important things on your mind right now? Great! Donate! (That last one may or may not be me projecting from personal experience). 

So, mark your calendars. Saturday, February 19 and Saturday, February 26 from 1:00 to 3:00, we will open the garages on the left field side of McCandless Field (and behind the bowling alley parking lot) for donations. Can’t make it to the park? No problem. Levi and his mom Heather will provide porch pick-ups too! Simply email Heather Gladstein at [email protected] and arrange a time to have them come pick it up. 

Questions/Information

Finally, if you have any questions about the league, how Spring Ball will be organized, or just about anything else, please check our website and/or our social media pages as it contains a host of valuable information, announcementsimportant datesFAQ’s, you name it. We do our best to keep that information up to date.

That’s all for now. Looking forward to a great season of baseball!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

2022 Spring Registration

Parents, players and friends, hello again! I bet you're thinking to yourself right now, "Man, I really thought I wouldn't be hearing from this guy again for at least another few weeks." Well, the baseball gods wait for no person, and believe it or not, it's already that time again: registration for the Spring 2022 St. Matthews Baseball season opens this Sunday, December 19, 2021 at 8:00 a.m.! And with it, I want to provide some important updates, news and information. 

As always, I will try to be brief. And as always, it will not be brief. Still, please read.

Registration



- Like last year, registration will be entirely online. There will be no walk-in sign ups as we have offered for many years in the past. On Sunday at 8:00 am the registration goes live on our website which you can access here. Simply sign in to your existing account and register your son or daughter (or more) for the upcoming season. If you are new to St. Matthews Baseball, create a parent account for yourself first, and then register your child or children as participants. 

- If you are interested in coaching, as you go thru the registration process for your child there is an option to volunteer as an assistant or head coach. The more the better! We can't do this without you!

- Like we did last year, there will be an early registration drawing! If you register between December 19, 2021 and January 16, 2022, your player(s) will be automatically entered to win a fabulous showcase of amazing prizes and baseball goodies! So don't delay, register as soon as you can!

Team Placement and Try-Out's



In the Wee (4), Tee (5), Coach Pitch (6), and Machine Pitch (7) divisions, there will not be tryouts and teams will be compiled based on coach and/or teammate requests. Once teams are formed you will hear from your coach and team mid-March. Please remain patient as it takes some time getting the various coach and teammate requests sorted in these age groups, but you will be contacted! When you register there is a section in which to put a teammate or coach request. Please be as specific as possible, otherwise we will assume your son or daughter can be placed on the first available team. 

Note about the Machine Pitch (8) division: as we have done in the past, we will be returning to a try-out/draft system for the 8 year old Machine Pitch division like the system we use in our Minors and Majors divisions. This is for a couple of reasons, but chief among them is keeping the division as balanced and competitive as possible so no one or two teams "dominate" the others week in/week out. It is not much fun for the kids if the games are not competitive, and this is a great way of trying to achieve some parity across the division. Further, kids at this age will be taking the big step into kid pitch next year, and this will introduce them to the try-out process, getting drafted to a team, and working with a team all season, making friends, and remaining competitive. 

Machine (8), Minors (9-10) and Majors (11-12) tryouts will likely be held the first week of March. Exact dates, times and locations will be sent to you once confirmed. Once tryouts and drafts are complete, you will hear from your coach and team around mid-March. 

Playing "Up" a Division



In the 4-7 age groups, we will accommodate requests to move a player "up" a division if his/her parent or guardian so desires. You will simply need to complete the player's registration for the age group the system automatically puts them in based on the 2022 Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken Age Chart, and then send me an email requesting the move. I will then manually move your player to the next division. (Ex. When you register, the online system tells you Johnny is only eligible to play Tee Ball (5 yr old), but you would like him to play in the Coach Pitch (6 yr old) division. Register Johnny for Tee Ball (5 yr olds), then email me to request a move up to the Coach Pitch (6 yr old) division and I will manually make the move). PLEASE make sure that the teammate and/or coach you are requesting to play with, however, is in the division you are moving "up" to. Otherwise, we will place your player on the first available team. 

In the 8 Machine, 9-10 Minors and 11-12 Majors age groups, we will assess such moves on a case by case basis taking into consideration experience, birth date, or other factors. This is to ensure a move into an older division does not create a health or safety risk to your child by being placed in a division he or she may not be ready for. The process is the same though. Register in the age group the system has designated, and then contact me via email to discuss the request. 

For your reference, click here for a link to the 2021 Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken Age Chart. The 2022 chart has not been published yet, but simply add a year to this chart to figure out the 2022 age bracket. (Ex. if your child was born in April 2013, under the 2021 chart it will have him in the 8 year old division. Add a year to that age, and that will give you his Babe Ruth age for 2022: 9 years old). 

Game and Practice Schedules



Once teams are formed, your coach will give you a schedule of practices and let you know additional details about the league schedule. Games are expected to start the week of April 11, 2022. There are usually one to two games per week, and are played on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and/or some Saturday’s. The final schedule will be released once completed, which is usually a week or so before games begin.   

Equipment Needed


As we did last season, due to Covid-19 concerns and protocols, we are asking that each child supply their own glove and bat, and in the 7-12 year olds own batting helmet as well. The league will provide a jersey and ball cap. If for any reason you or your family needs assistance with purchasing equipment, please reach out to me individually and confidentially and I will make sure your son or daughter gets squared away on equipment. Equipment costs will never be an obstacle to a kid wanting to play baseball at St. Matthews. 

That's it for now! And as always, please refer to our website or Facebook page for up-to-date information, important dates, and FAQ's. Most, if not all, of your questions can be found on our website. 

From everyone here at St. Matthews Baseball, we look forward to a great season, and wish you and yours Happy Holidays! 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

Lost and Found Policy

As it is every season, things at the ball park have a way of going missing. Gloves, water bottles, sun glasses, keys, gloves, and...did I already say gloves? :) So in the interest of doing our best to get you your stuff back, please allow this to be our official Lost and Found Policy going forward. If you have any further questions regarding our policy, please reach out to Board Member Beth Morgan ([email protected]- st matthews baseball lost and found @ gmail.com) and she can assist! 


Parents:

 

·  Label your player’s gear! First and last name. This is the easiest way to get you reunited with your stuff!

·  Our central lost and found box can be found at the main concession stand between Siegel and Look Fields. 

·  The lost and found box will be available Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday from 6:00-9:00 pm during the regular season.

Please ask your coaches first, and then look in the lost and found box if you have missing gear.

 

Coaches and Other Spectators:

 

·       If you see a loose piece of gear floating around after a game:

·       Pick it up and look for a name. 

·       If it belongs to someone on your team or anyone else you may know, keep it and give it to that player or their parent the next time you see them.

·       If it has no name or you don’t know the name, take the item to the concession stand where it will be placed in the lost and found bin.

·       If you see something that is NOT baseball gear (keys, cellphone, wallet, etc):

·       Please give it directly to someone working in the concession stand. They will keep valuables separate from the rest of the baseball lost and         found items.

·       If you need to retrieve a valuable item, you will need to speak with a concession stand worker or league staff member and be able to accurately describe the item before it is released.


Thanks everyone for your attention to this new policy, and we hope this will help get items back into the hands of their owners quickly and efficiently. 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

2021 Fall Ball FAQ's

Parents and Coaches, 


You should have received an email notification of the game schedule for your child’s team which has now been released. Please review the schedule and ensure you note game dates, times, and especially field location as that may change depending on your division and day of the week. As always, if you log in to your account, and visit your main dashboard/account page, there should be a link to your child’s team page which will have the schedule now that it is posted. 


And for the 4/5 division especially, please note your game times on Voll Field @ Trinity Stadium. This is a special thing we try to do each season for the little ones, getting to play a game on the big high school field! 


With this many teams, a shortened Fall season, and very limited field availability, I wanted to touch on a few things before we get to playing baseball:


· We have spent days preparing the schedule and thus please consider it final. There may be some changes made by the league to accommodate certain, narrow exceptions as the season gets underway, but by and large this is the schedule.


· Changing the schedule is like trying to steer the Titanic, or maybe a better analogy is moving/knocking over a piece in a domino display. If we move one game, or one time, or one day, the ripple effect it has is massive. That is why we are reluctant to adjust it. 


· Coaches, if you come up on game date and you are short players, remember you can ask players from other fellow teams in your division to play for you. That is totally fine. The only limitations on that are that it must be a player registered for Fall Ball 2021 with our league (no outside players please), and the borrowed player(s) may not pitch for you (applies to Minors/Majors). 


· There will likely be NO rain-make ups. Again, it being Fall Ball, the season is pretty short. IF we can find a spot to put a make up game, we will do our best, but the general rule for Fall is just plan to play on with little to no make-ups. 


· There will also likely be little to no practice time after this Saturday. That too is the nature of Fall Ball. Smaller season, less fields, etc. Dan Cook will look into it as the season gets going and if he can squeeze some practice in for some divisions, will let coaches know. This is not a guarantee that he WILL offer it, and thus PLEASE do not reach out asking for practice time. :) If he can make it happen I promise he will let you know!


· Across all the divisions, we do our best to space things out as much as possible. This means there should be NO double headers on the schedule (playing back-to-back games on the same day), but could mean there are back to back days you may play, or even have a week where you play 3 games, or in certain divisions play on a few Saturdays. It’s simply how the math worked out, but we did our best to make this a loose and fun schedule. 

 

Finally, here are our commissioners for the Fall 2021 season:


Majors – Jeff Schaftlein [email protected]


Minors – Ryan Grigsby [email protected]


8’s – Todd Patrick [email protected]


7’s – Matt Kuerzi [email protected]


456’s – Jenifour Jones [email protected]


Parents, if you have any questions please send to your coaches, and coaches if you missed the Zoom Coach Meeting last night and/or need further info please reach out to your division commissioner. 


Thanks again,
Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

DICKS Coupon

2021 Fall Ball

Parents, players and coaches, 

First, I want to thank each of you for an amazing Spring season of baseball. We had incredible enrollment, the rain cooperated for the most part, some really good baseball was played, and it was good to get back out there to some normalcy with Covid restrictions slowly but surely lifting.  

What’s next? More. Baseball. 

For a second year in a row, we are going to offer another fun, short, exciting season of Fall Ball! 

It will be a little different than the Spring season. For Fall Ball we are going to use a “bring your own team” format vs. open registration/tryouts. If you are familiar with the St. Matthews Basketball league, it’s essentially like that. If you’re not, the format is simple. Folks who are interested in coaching can recruit and field a baseball team, register and enter them as a team in the league, the coach will send out a special code to his/her parents via email, parents use that code when completing their registration/paying their fee, and their son/daughter will be automatically placed on the coach’s team. 

Or, another option, if a child wants to play but doesn’t know a specific coach, we will keep your son or daughter as a “free agent” and will randomly assign them to a team ifa spot is available. This will be a short list, and we will do our best to place every free agent, but due to space limitations it is first come first served so PLEASE don’t wait to sign up! Also, please note we cannot honor friend/player requests with either option. Unlike Spring, the Fall league will simply be based on whether space is available on a team, and then assigning free agent players to that team.

*** Registration for the 2021 Fall Season OPENS this Thursday, July 15, 2021 on our website which you can find HERE ***


Age Cutoffs and Playing Up

In Fall Ball we use the same age cut off that we did for Spring so kids are able to play with the same age group/division that they did in the Spring. However, for most divisions your child may “play up” a division to the next age group. I say in most cases since there is one exception here: we typically do not play an 8-year-old up to 9/10 kid pitch unless your son/daughter played Spring 8U machine pitch or played organized 8U machine pitch with another league in the Spring. This is purely for safety reasons. We don’t want a kid’s first experience with kid pitch to be Fall Ball unless they can protect themselves, which a season of 8U machine pitch prepares them for. 

If you want your child or team to “play up,” I will need a direct email from the child’s parent or guardian expressly requesting that they play up after registration has been completed for their normal age division. I will then go into the system and manually move the player up. (For example, the online system automatically places Tommy in 7U Machine based on his date of birth, but his parents want him to play 8U. Complete and pay registration for 7U, then email me to request move to 8U and/or to the team that invited you). 

If you need to determine which age group your child would play in, please consult the 2021 Babe Ruth Age Chart HERE.

Head coaches, beginning July 15, 2021 simply log in to your St. Matthews account, register as a head coach for 2021 Fall Ball, and then you can control team invites from the comfort of your own home! Or, read THIS too. It helps. Scroll about mid-way down to the "Steps for Coaches to Register" section. 

Here are some additional details about the Fall Ball season:

There will be 6 divisions, and all players will be provided a jersey and ball cap:

1. Wee/Tee (4 and 5-year-olds) – PRICE $125 per player

- Age: 4 and 5 combined

- Games played on Weinberg Field (with possible games on Voll Field @ Trinity Stadium)

- Regular season begins 9/13, ends 10/18, no post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games 

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests) 

- Players/Coaches can decide if they want coach pitch or to hit from the tee  

- 1-hour games OR first 30 minutes devoted to a joint practice, followed by a 2-inning game (approximately 30 min)

2. Coach Pitch (6-year-olds) – PRICE $125 per player

- Age: 6

- Games played on Weinberg and Matanich Fields

- Regular season begins 9/13, ends 10/18, no post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games 

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests) 

- Players/Coaches can decide if they want coach pitch or to hit from the tee  

- 1-hour games OR first 30 minutes devoted to a joint practice, followed by a 2-inning game (approximately 30 min)

3. 7U Machine Pitch – PRICE $145 per player

- Age: 7

- Games played on Matanich Field

- Regular season begins 9/13, ends 10/15, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 15 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses

 4. 8U Machine Pitch – PRICE $145 per player

- Age: 8

- Games played on McCandless or Siegel Field

- Regular season begins 9/13, ends 10/15, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 15 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses
  

5. Minors Kid Pitch – PRICE $145 per player

- Age: 9 and 10 combined

- Games played on Siegel or Look Field

- Regular season begins 9/13, ends 10/15, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team 

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses

6. Majors Kid Pitch – PRICE $145 per player

- Age: 11 and 12 combined

- Games played on Look Field

- Regular season begins 9/13, ends 10/15, followed by post season tournament

- Approximately 8-10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team 

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses.

Teams

-We will need at least 5 teams per division at a minimum to play.

-Coaches can select/recruit up to 12 kids for a team in any division (with no more than 6 travel/club baseball players). 

Practices
The park will be "dark" the week of August 23
rd so that we can clean, do some maintenance, and get things ready for Fall Ball. 

We will have equipment pick up, coach meetings and other pre-season prep during the week of August 30th More info to come. 

Practices will be held the weeks of August 30 and September 6. More info to come on that as far as sign ups with Dan Cook. PLEASE NOTE this ONLY applies to those two weeks. Once games get underway on September 13, we will do our best to accommodate a practice schedule but depending on the number of teams, a short season, other tournaments we host, and club/travel ball held at the park, it may not happen. Please consider finding space or locations outside the ballpark to practice. Legends Academy in Louisville has a great indoor facility.

Besides, practice? Practice?? You talking about PRACTICE?!? It’s Fall Ball! It’s about a few weeks of fun games anyway! 

Games
We will start September 13th, approximately two games per week.

4/5 and 6 (Wee/Tee/Coach Pitch) games on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. The younger divisions are usually large, so they may have a Friday and/or Saturday game thrown in there. 

7 and 8 Machine games on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, with a possible Friday and/or Saturday thrown in. 

Minors and Majors games likely on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday.

Spread the word! Coaches, get your teams formed! Fall Ball is right around the corner. 

If you have any questions please look on our website as there is a wealth of information there under our FAQ's and other sections. You can also contact Dan Cook at [email protected] or me at stmatthewsbaseballleague@gmail.com

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

 

2021 Wee Ball World Series

Coaches and parents of our 4 year old Wee Ball Division:

Just wanted to send a reminder that the Wee Ball World Series is tomorrow, Saturday May 29, 201, on Voll Field at Trinity Stadium. Here is the schedule:

12:00 pm: Yankees @ Nationals
1:00 pm: Giants @ Cubs
2:00 pm: Cardinals @ Braves
3:00 pm: Tigers @ Cardinals

Coaches, so that our announcer Dick Farmer can call out your team's players as they go to bat,PLEASEbring with you a lineup, including first and last name of your player and his/her jersey number. I will bring a print out of the rosters as well for Dick to have, but it is up to you guys to get the press box a line up so that he can call their names in the correct order! Thanks for your attention to this!

Immediately following your game, both teams will line up on the first and third baseline, and trophies will be handed out by the head coach. I will be at the games tomorrow and will have the trophies on hand.

Again,please feel free to show up about 15 minutes before your game time so we can keep the train rolling!

Thanks again for a great season of baseball, and helping us make this spring a great success!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

2021 Spring Opening Day

Parents, Coaches, and Players,


Tomorrow is Opening Day! 

Man, I love typing those words. The winter hibernation/quarantining/”when can we leave the house?!?” days are behind us, and baseball is back!! 

So, just a few quick updates and reminders as we start the season. 

 

Parking

PLEASE remember, do not under any circumstances park your vehicle in the shopping center adjacent to the park. Your car will be towed by the property owners and we don’t want that to happen! Please consult the map on our website for field and parking locations. We have built in 15-30 minutes between each game (depending on age division), so hopefully with the extra time and Covid attendance limits (more below), it will allow folks time to leave before the next batch of fans and players arrive. 

 

COVID Policies

I have reattached our official COVID-19 policies for your review. This is also available on our website under the Rules and Procedures tab. Please review these policies prior to the season kicking off, and prior to coming to the park. We would ask that everyone (players, coaches, parents, spectators) have a mask on hand if social distancing cannot be achieved. 

In the very young divisions (4-6) this is especially important for coaches who may have to be very close to kids, lining them up in the batter’s box, showing them where to hit the ball off the Tee, where to stand in the field, etc. 

There are sanitizer stations and dispensers throughout the park. Please observe and follow posted signage.

Please remember only two adults per child are permitted to attend games. Brothers and sisters of a player may also attend. While I understand there is finally hope that herd immunity can be reached with the vaccine rollout, the Health Department has also advised we need to maintain these basic measures to make such immunity a reality. Therefore, we will do our part, keep our attendance on the low side to comply with social distancing requirements, and ask that the two adult attendance rule be strictly followed. 

 

Also, any other time, in any other season I would be saying the exact opposite of this, but while we would love nothing more than to have people stay and enjoy themselves at the ballpark, when your son or daughter’s game(s) are complete we ask that you not congregate and leave as soon as possible. 

 

For Fall Ball (yes, we are going to hold another season of Fall Ball!) we will revisit and likely relax some of these restrictions and policies, but it all depends on where the numbers stand. Thank you for your understanding! 

 

Season Schedule

Your specific game schedule is available on your child’s team page thru our website. Simply log in to your account and go to your child’s team page, and you will find the most current schedule, team roster, coach contact info and more!

 

Rain-Out's/Game Cancellations

In the event of inclement weather and games are cancelled, our Fields Director will assess and make a final decision by 4:30 p.m. that day and communicate cancellations to me. That information will also be posted on our Facebook page, as well as conveyed to coaches via email who will then send word out to parents. Assume that NO news means game are ON! But please also note, there may be times when rain makes the dirt fields (Look, Siegel and Matanich) unplayable, but our turf fields (Voll, McCandless and Weinberg) have properly drained and can be played. We will do our best to convey that information as well to the extent necessary. 

Rain-out's may not be rescheduled due to time and space limitations. Your coach will be kept apprised of any make-ups scheduled. 

 

Spectator Conduct

This may go without saying, but as much as we invest in our children and can get caught up in the game and spirit of competition, we encourage and expect good sportsmanship from coaches, players AND fans alike. Please keep in mind, the coaches are volunteers, the scorekeepers are teens and young adults, and our umpires are doing the best they can. Please remain respectful. Yelling, harassing, or antagonizing coaches, umpires, other spectators, or the opposing team on the field will simply not be tolerated. 

No college scholarships are being handed out this season. Scouts don’t actually attend youth baseball games. No one will be signing with the St. Louis Cardinals. 

Don't be that guy. Don't be that gal. Use common sense. It's just a game.  

Questions/Concerns?

If you have questions or concerns throughout the season, please speak with your coach. If they cannot address or resolve your concern, they can communicate with the commissioner for each division, who can then speak with me if it requires further attention. 

Finally, on a personal level I am going into this season with a bit of a heavy heart after losing someone to Covid who was very close to me and close to what we do at the league. Yet, because of that, I can’t think of a time in my life when I have wanted baseball to start back up more than I do right now. And all of you, your kids, and those who volunteer their time and talent, are to thank for that. For making all of this possible. So THANK YOU!

Wishing everyone a safe, healthy, and fun season of baseball! 

 

“But baseball has marked the time. It reminds us of all that once was good and that could be again.”

 

Play ball. 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

 

2021 Spring Schedule

Parents, coaches and players, in a few moments I will release your division’s game scheduled for Spring 2021. The system should send an automated email with a link to your team’s schedule. 


Just a few quick notes with regard to this year’s schedule.


-Are there mistakes? I can almost guarantee it! :) Heck I would be shocked if there weren’t mistakes! But please understand with over 800 kids signed up, over 60 teams, and only 5 fields to schedule, this is as close to a fine-tuned clock as we can get. So, the only changes we will make are to correct clear mistakes/edits/typos. We can’t take specific requests due to conflicts or other sports and the like. 


-We have teams playing on different fields, at different times, on different days. So PLEASE check your schedule closely to make sure you have the correct time and field!

-We tried to stagger start times as best as possible to open up parking spaces and get kids and parents in and out when games end so next group of players and parents can find parking. And in that spirit, a reminder to NOT park in the shopping center as you will be towed.


- Rain make-up’s – we will get rain cancellations I am sure, and we will do our best to make up games, but there is no guarantee that we will. We will also do our best to make a decision on rain cancellations by 4:00 on weekdays. And note, there is the chance some fields are cancelled (dirt fields like Siegel) while others may not (turf fields like Weinberg). So we will communicate that accordingly out to the league. 


For our 4 and 5 year old teams – I managed to get every team in the 4 and 5’s at least one game on Voll Field/Trinity Stadium which the little kids love! Please note those dates and times. Parents are allowed to come on to the field, but NO folding or tail gate-style chairs are allowed. The games will be played in left and right field, and parents can sit along the fence line or along the burm going down the left and right field lines. 


Also, for the 4’s and 5’s, your very last game of the season will be part of your Wee or Tee Ball “World Series.” This is a very neat event in which each team bats and plays the field on McCandless Field, hitters are called by their name over the PA system, followed by a trophy presentation. More info to come!


For our younger groups, I also did my best keep you from playing back-to-back days or no more than 2-3 Saturdays (for those divisions that will have games on Saturdays).
 

For our older divisions in the 7’s, 8’s, Minors and Majors, the regular season will run to June 10 or 11 (depending on division) with our in-house postseason tournament to begin June 12. That will last a week and all postseason games will and should conclude no later than June 19. The Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken All Start trail will begin a week or two after that. Majors, your schedule will come later as we are working with J-Town to finalize now. 


We kept weekends free for our older divisions due to travel ball and other sports. Yes, it may mean you will need to get creative with pitching rotation, but it means all teams will have the weekend off to reset pitchers and possibly practice if we have field availability (more on that in a few days after Dan and I have looked at schedule).

I also did my best to keep you from playing back-to-back days, but each team will have to do it at least once, and in some instances twice, throughout the season. It is simply how the math worked out. But NO team should have a double header on the same day.
 

Field Musical Chairs! 


7’s if you have a game on Monday, it should be on McCandless, otherwise all other games during week are on Matanich 



8’s if you have a game on Monday, it should be on Siegel, otherwise all other games during week are on McCandless



Minors (9 and 10) if you have a game on Monday, it should be on Look, otherwise all other games during week are on Siegel



Majors (11 and 12) all games on Look or in J-Town (schedules pending).



Concessions, Scorekeepers and Umpires – we will get you the schedules this evening!


That’s all for now. Will have more information for everyone this weekend as we close in on Opening Day next Monday! Thank you all, and if you have any questions please reach out to your coach and/or your commissioner. Commissioners, please feel free to reach out to me or Dan if you need additional information. 

Excited we get to play ball in a week!


Best regards, 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball


 

 

2021 Preseason Communication

Parents, coaches and ball players,

 

As we inch closer and closer to the Spring 2021 season, there will be quite a bit of important information to share with you, so emails from me will become a little more frequent, although I will do my best not to blow up your inbox! Please take a moment to read each thoroughly. I will try my best not to send my usual short-novel length emails, but we all know it is still gonna happen…the following being no exception.  

 

Questions/Information

If you have any questions about the league, please check our website and/or our social media pages as it contains a host of valuable information, important dates, FAQ’s, you name it. We do our best to keep that information up to date. If you still can’t find what you are looking for, I do try to have an “open-door” policy for all, just be patient with me as it may take me a day or so to respond with the season starting up!

 

Coaches

Head Coaches - please send Dan Cook ([email protected]) and me an email with you and your two member assistant coach staff. Please identify who the head coach of your team will be, and who will be your two assistants. We will need this for tryouts in the older divisions, as well as for league-wide background checks and safe training requirements (more info to come on that). 

 

NOTE: If you are in the 4-5-6 divisions, you may have two assistants, and a few other mom or dads helping out. That is totally fine. 

 

ALSO NOTE: Minors and Majors coaches, the commissioner of your respective division will forward you tryout evaluation sheets this Friday which will contain a player’s name and his/her corresponding tryout number. They will also attach a sheet with who is coaching with who (as requested above) so we know which kids are already taken off the board. Please bring these sheets with you to tryouts. 

 

Sponsorships

Call this one a shameless plug and request. St. Matthews baseball is a nonprofit organization that exists and provides baseball to our youth thru the generous donations of our sponsors. Quite simply, we could not do this without their help! From sponsoring a team (yes, you can sponsor your son or daughter's team and have your logo on the back of the team's jerseys!) to hanging a sign in the outfield, these contributions mean we do not ask parents to volunteer at the concessions table, players are not asked to sell candy bars or magazines, and you can simply come to the park, relax, and enjoy watching baseball. 

 

But we still need your help. A great way to show your support is to become a sponsor yourself. Whether it is for your business or you, we offer a variety of options. Your contribution to the league helps us purchase new equipment, uniforms, field materials/upkeep, ballpark upkeep, and everything in between.

If you would like to become a sponsor – and we hope you do! – please review the attached sponsorship form, and free to email me directly at [email protected] if you would like to be a part of keeping St. Matthews Baseball running strong for years to come! (If the PDF does not open for some reason let me know and I will email you a copy directly). 

Thank you for allowing this shameless (but much needed) plug and request. Now on to....

 

Tryouts

Reminder, 4 (Wee Ball), 5 (Tee Ball), 6 (Coach Pitch), 7U (Machine Pitch) and 8U (Machine Pitch) DO NOT have try outs. 

 

If your player is registered for Minor League (9 and 10 year olds) or Major League (11 and 12 year olds), HERE is the tryout schedule: 

 

Saturday, March 6, 2021

Minors (9-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium – large turf field behind Best Buy)

Time 2:00 - 3:30 pm

 

Minors (10-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium)
Time 3:30 - 5:00 pm

 

Majors (11 AND 12-year olds) (St. Matthews Baseball Park - Voll Field Trinity Stadium)
Time 5:00 - 6:30 pm

 

** If we have inclement weather, the tryouts will be conducted (same times) at Legends Sports Academy, 10900 Electron Dr, Louisville, Ky 40299 – if there is rain and we need to move indoors to Legends, a determination will be made by 12:00 p.m. on Saturday, March 6, and emailed to all parents, posted on our social media pages, and posted on our website. IF YOU DO NOT HEAR FROM US ASSUME OUTSIDE TRYOUTS ARE STILL ON AT VOLL FIELD** 

What to Bring to Tryouts: 

 mask (to be worn if 6-foot social distancing cannot be achieved)

glove

bat

batting helmet

ball cap

regular shoes or non-metal cleats (both facilities are turf)

water

Once signed in, please only have your player enter the try-out areas. Parents are free to stay and observe, but please find a place in the bleachers or down the 1st or 3rd baseline behind the fence. Parents are asked not to stand on the field during tryouts. Please also observe social distancing rules and bring a mask.

 

Make-Up Tryouts and Player Draft Nights:

While we understand weekends are full of competing sports and other events, baseball try outs are crucial for appropriate placement on a team in each division, and so we encourage you to make sure your child will be available to participate on the dates scheduled above. It is the best opportunity for them to be properly assessed by the coaches. However, if your child cannot make the above date and times, we will offer a short make up tryout before the draft night of their respective division. 

For those who cannot make the Saturday tryouts, we will hold a short make-up tryout at St. Matthews Baseball Park on McCandless Field (large turf field behind bowling alley):

 

Wednesday, March 10, 2021 

Majors 
Make-Up(11 AND 12-yearolds)
Time 6:00 – 7:00 pm

Majors Divisional Draft – at least one coach from each team must attend
Time 7:00 pm (St. Matthews Community Center)

 

Thursday, March 11, 2021

Minors Make-Up (9 AND 10-year olds)
Time 6:00 – 7:00 pm

 

Minors Divisional Draft – at least one coach from each team must attend

Time 7:00 pm (St. Matthews Community Center)

 

Regular Season Equipment
In the 4, 5 and 6 divisions (aka Wee, Tee and Coach Pitch) your child will need his/her own glove and USA Baseball approved baseball bat. They will NOT need a helmet. Regular tennis shoes are fine. Look for the sticker on the stem of the bat that says USA Baseball. A USSSA baseball bat, however, is prohibited under Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken rules. Image of the sticker is on our homepage.  

In all remaining divisions (7-12), your child will need his/her own glove, helmet, USA Baseball approved bat, cleats (non-metal), and for the boys a cup. Your coach may also ask that you purchase white or grey baseball pants. Other equipment items such as batting gloves are optional. 

The league will provide the Minors (9-10) and Majors (11-12) a bag of league owned equipment (catcher gear, helmets). 

Practice baseballs will be provided to coaches. 

Equipment pick-up will be scheduled in the coming weeks. 

 

Looking for a deal on equipment? March 12-14 is St. Matthews Baseball League Weekend at DICK's!  ****20% OFF all gear, even non-baseball stuff!!**** The official coupon will be posted on our website and social media accounts soon, or simply mention St. Matthews Baseball at checkout to receive 20% OFF!

 

Practices and Games

The practice schedule will be released mid-March, while the game schedule will be released towards the end of March. 

Ok, that’s plenty for now. I think it is right around here people’s eyes start glazing over and they are saying “make it stop…too…much…information.” So that is all for now I promise. Until, you know, the next time. 

 

Thank you all, take care. Looking forward to a great season of baseball!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball


 

St. Matthews Baseball Spring 2021 COVID-19 Policies and Procedures

Regular Season and Tournament


The Spring 2021 season will begin April 12, 2021 and will consist of an eight-week season of approximately 1-2 games per week, followed by an in-house tournament in the 7/8, Minor and Major Divisions to conclude the season.

The Spring 2021 season will include an All-Star trail per Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken Baseball rules, policies and procedures.

Regular season rain make-up’s will be rescheduled at the Executive Director’s discretion.

These Covid-19 policies and procedures shall apply to the regular season, post-season, All-Star tournament where not superseded by Babe Ruth/Cal Ripken rules, and/or any rain make-up games.

COVID-19 Preparedness and Policy


To best ensure the safety of players, coaches, and spectators, St. Matthews Baseball has implemented the following 2021 Covid-19 policies and procedures which are effective immediately.

Parents, Players, and Spectators


·        Parents, guardians, spectators and players must be responsible for monitoring their own health. Any person with a fever, or other COVID-19 symptoms, will be asked  to not visit the baseball park, or if a determination is made onsite that a visitor has COVID-19 symptoms, he/she will be asked to leave. 

·        Parents and guardians will be asked to take players’ temperature(s) before leaving the house. If the player or another family member is running a fever, or showing  any other symptoms, we ask that you please stay home. 

·        To minimize crowds and facilitate social distancing, we ask that only parent(s) or guardian(s) (up to two) attend any practice, scrimmage or game. Please keep other      immediate family members at home, unless he/she is a registered player with SMB. This would include asking siblings, grandparents, other relatives, or friends to  not attend practice or games when possible. 

·        Seniors and those with significant health risks are asked to follow CDC guidelines and to either refrain from attending events or to take appropriate precautions. 

Ballpark Safety Measures


·        St. Matthews Baseball Contractors and Board Members will be required to wear a mask or face covering, while attending practices and games, or to practice safe social  distancing from other people of at least 6 feet at all times.

·        Parents/spectators must practice safe social distancing of at least 6 feet from other players, parents or spectators at all times. 

·        If for some reason safe social distancing cannot be achieved, parents/spectators must wear a face mask (e.g in any congested area such as the space in front of the  main concession stand and between Siegel and Look Fields).

·        Parents/spectators will also be asked to spread out from each other by at least 6 feet, not congregate, and bring their own chairs.

·        Bleacher areas will be reserved as “dugout” space to further social distance players from one another while at-bat or in the middle of innings. 

·        Participants, parents and/or spectators are requested to leave SMB at the conclusion of their respective game/practice.

·        SMB will increase the frequency of cleaning and sanitizing in the park, especially in high traffic areas such as restrooms, concessions, and dugouts. 

·        Concessions will have limited staff (2-3 people) and may have a limited menu. Workers are required to wear PPE at all times. Designated spots will be marked on  the ground for standing in line to help ensure social distancing, and no side-by-side windows will be used in the stand. Plexiglass will be present in between concession  staff workers and people ordering.

·        Games and practices will be staggered, increasing the time between each, to help minimize overlap of teams and players waiting and to help limit or prevent  congregating.

Wee, Tee and Coach Pitch


·        Players in Wee, Tee and Coach Pitch Divisions (4-6) must sit with their parent(s)/guardian(s) while not on the field and must practice safe social distancing of at least  6 feet  from other players, parents or spectators at all times. Dugouts will not be utilized. 

·        While on defense, coaches must spread players out in infield and outfield by at least 6 feet and discourage and prevent to the greatest extent possible kids “swarming” to  balls hit into play. 

·        In addition to Weinberg Field (our normal 4-6 field), we are also working to possibly utilize Voll/Trinity High School Field for multiple games at a time while giving the 4-6  divisions, as well as their parents/spectators, a larger space to spread out and ensure safe social distancing of at least 6 feet. 

7 Machine, 8 Machine, 9-10 Minors and 11-12 Majors


·        Dugouts will be limited to three players at any time, with the bench marked for seating to help ensure safe social distancing.

·        Bleachers and/or outside fence areas will be used as the main dugout and marked for seating or standing to help ensure safe social distancing.

·        Players must hang their baseball bag, if any, on the outside fence area before and during games or practices, and store any other equipment outside the dugout, until the  conclusion of a game or practice. 

·        Players and coaches in dugouts and/or the bleacher or outside fence areas must practice safe social distancing of at least 6 feet from other players, parents or  spectators at all times or will be required to wear a face mask.

·        Sharing personal player equipment will be prohibited during the season. Each player will need to bring their own glove, batting helmet (ages 7 and up), and bat. 

·        Team shared equipment (catcher’s gear) will be maintained by the head coach at all times and must be cleaned and sanitized after each use. 

·        If a player has his own catching gear, please bring it each practice and/or game and it must not be shared. 

·        Pre-game meetings, pitching changes, and mound visits should adhere to social distancing requirements.

Game and Practice Precautions - All Ages


·        No team or dugout coolers, or team snacks following games, are permitted. Players should have their own marked water bottle that is kept in their bat bag or with their  parent/guardian. 

·        No chewing gum, candy, or sunflower seeds will be permitted by players or coaches.

·        Pregame conferences will be limited to one coach per team and one umpire while practicing safe social distancing of at least 6 feet. 

·        Before/After game sportsmanship rituals will be conducted in ways other than the traditional lining up and shaking hands/high fiving.

·        A rules committee will review rules specific to each age group and determine if additional rules need to be implemented to further help ensure children safety.

·        All policies and procedures of SMB will be subject to revision, change or modification with approval by the SMB Board of Directors. 

Park Closure 9/23/2020

In light of recent events, please be advised that St. Matthews Baseball Park will be CLOSED tonight. No baseball practices, scrimmages or games, regardless of recreational or travel/club baseball, are allowed. As of right now we will resume baseball activities tomorrow unless conditions should change. 

For Minor games scheduled tomorrow night, if those games proceed please note that the first game of the evening will begin at 5:15 - 6:45, and the second game will begin 7:00 - 8:30 in order to comply with the county-wide curfew at 9:00.

ALL games must begin and end on time. ALL games or practices must end no later than 8:30 until the curfew is lifted. 

Thank you, and please stay safe. 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

Fall Ball Team Information

Coaches and parents, of COURSE I'm not done bothering you. In addition to the below information that was sent out to coaches last night, I wanted to supplement with just a few more issues and answers to questions I am getting about sign up's and the like. 

Then, I promise to stop bothering you all....maybe...unlikely.

Let's start with how teams will be completed and free agents. As you know, if you received an email directly from a coach in our league, then your son/daughter has been automatically placed on a team and after registering there is nothing more for you to do at this point. However, PLEASE sign in to your account, check your child's team page, and ensure he/she has been placed on that team. If you were invited, but did not enter a code, chances are your child is currently a "free agent." This can be fixed, but I will need you to forward me the coach's email invite. If you do not have it, please reach out to your coach and ask them to email me the player's name, division and team name. 

Free agents - as noted below, we have quite a few free agents in the 456 division, the 7/8 division, and the Minors 9-10 division, and that has probably grown a few since last night. This is awesome to see, so many kids wanting to play. I promise you, I will do my level best to make sure EVERY child has a team to play on for Fall Ball. In order to do that, this weekend I am going to adjust the maximum player amount per team in the 456 division and 7/8 division from 12 to 14. This will allow us to get free agents on teams, and fill out teams who are still low on numbers. 

**Coaches in the 456 and 7/8's, if your team is not maxed by Monday, I will fill in your squad with free agents to bring you to 14**

But, another way to handle is to have a mom or dad for a free agent player to coach!! Yes, COACH!! If your son or daughter is a free agent, and you are interested in fielding a team, please let me know! It will be a great way to make sure every kid gets to play this Fall!

In the Minors, we have a similar issue. Some of the existing teams will need free agents to fill out their roster, but we very well may need a free agent parent to coach so that any remaining free agent kids get to play as well. But we will see how the numbers and rosters shake out on Monday.

Thank all. Will follow up with you all soon once we get clearer picture on team formations. Coaches, appreciate you all for volunteering and for getting this handled so quickly so that we can get uniform orders placed asap. 

Best, Chris

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Coaches,

Thank you for volunteering to coach the Fall 2020 season at St. Matthews. We are looking forward to a great season, and think it's a great way to get kids just a little extra baseball this year before winter hits!

A few important updates/requests/deadlines to keep in mind. 

Registrations

While registration will remain open next week for parents, we are asking that you have your rosters completed and kids invited and placed on your team no later than this Monday if possible. Fact is, our jersey and ball cap supplier needs to begin ordering as soon as possible if we are going to have any chance of getting uniforms in time for games starting on September 8. So where do you come in? If you know players that still haven't signed up, have players on the fence, or thought your roster was already set but turns out it isn't, BADGER AND CALL AND TEXT AND EMAIL YOUR PARENTS to get their player(s) signed up ASAP!!

Review your Team Page and see where your enrollments stand, and who you need to start badgering!

Reviewing the teams, in the 456 and 7/8 divisions we have quite a few "free agent" kids (kids that don't have an invite to a specific team, but still wish to play). Thus, even if you can't fill your team, there is a good chance we can assist with that. Same goes for the Minors and Majors to some extent. 

Here is where we stand per division:

456 Combined Tee/Coach Pitch - we are capped at 12 teams, with 18 free agents currently

7/8 Combined Machine Pitch - we are capped at 12 teams, with 18 free agents currently

9-10 Minors - 3 teams, with 19 free agents currently (enough to form 2 teams if we can find head coaches)

11-12 Majors -  3 teams, with 1 free agent currently

Games

We will start September 6, approximately two games per week.

456 Tee/Coach Pitch games on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. The younger divisions are large, so they may have a Friday and/or Saturday game thrown in there. 

7/8 Machine games on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, with a Friday and/or Saturday thrown in. 

Minors and Majors games on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday.

Practices

The park will be "dark" the week before September 8 so that we can clean, do some maintenance, and get things ready for Fall Ball. Once games start, Dan and I will see if we can get a practice schedule going but with this many teams, a short season, other tournaments we host, and club/travel ball held at the park, it may not happen. Please consider finding space or locations outside the ball park to practice. Legends Academy in Louisville has a great indoor facility.

Coach Meeting

Typically we will hold a coach's meeting the week before games begin to discuss rules, expectations, and answer questions. This will be held via Zoom (30 min per division) on September 3, 2020 beginning at 7:00 pm. Invites will be sent out next week. 

Thanks again for volunteering, we couldn't do it without your help. Please complete your teams as soon as possible!

Take care,
Chris Gadansky, Executive Director

2020 Fall Ball

*Registration for the 2020 Fall Season is OPEN and begins Today, Saturday, August 15 at 8:00 am and closes on September 6, 2020*


4 Divisions:


1. Tee/Coach Pitch – PRICE $100 per player


- Age: 4, 5 and 6 combined

- Games played on Weinberg Field

- Begins 9/8, ends 10/17

- 8 games

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests) 

- Players/Coaches can decide if they want coach pitch or to hit from the tee  

- 1-hour games OR first 30 minutes devoted to a joint practice, followed by a 2-inning game (approximately 30 min)


2. 7/8 Machine Pitch – PRICE $125
per player


- Age: 7 and 8 combined

- Games played on McCandless Field

- Begins 9/8, ends 10/17

- 8 - 10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 15 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses  


3. Minors Kid Pitch – PRICE $125 per player


- Age: 9 and 10 combined

- Played on Siegel Field

- Begins 9/8, ends 10/17

- 8 - 10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team (unless it is an 8U team playing up)

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses


4. Majors Kid Pitch – PRICE $125 per player


- Age: 11 and 12 combined

- Games played on Look Field

- Begins 9/8, ends 10/17

- 8 - 10 games, season ends with seeded single elimination tournament

- 1 hour 30 min game

- Bring your own team or sign up as a single player (no friend requests)

- No more than 6 travel/club players per team (unless it is a 9U/10U team playing up OR a A or AA USSSA ranked team)  

- Score will be kept along with wins and losses.


Additional comments:

  • We will need at least 5 teams per division at a minimum to play

  • Coaches can select/recruit up to 12 kids for a team in any division

  • A child’s division/age group will be the same division/age group he or she played in (or would have played in) during our spring/summer league. If you need to determine which age group your child would play in, please consult the 2020 Babe Ruth Age Chart here.

  • Head coaches, beginning Saturday simply log in to your St. Matthews account, register as a head coach for 2020 Fall Ball, and then you can control team invites from the comfort of your own home! Or, read this. It helps too.

 

August 2020 Update: Executive Director Chris

Parents, Players and Coaches,

We are in the home stretch, the final week of the regular – nothing about this has been “regular” – season! Couple of quick reminders. The weeks of August 17 and August 24 will be our post season in-house tournament for our 7 thru Majors divisions. The 4 and 5’s Annual World Series One Inning Spectacular Extravaganza on McCandless Field will be Saturday, August 22 (Wee Ball) and Saturday, August 29 (Tee Ball)

Coaches will have details to you soon about all of this if they haven’t sent them already.
 

“So … what are we supposed to do once that’s over, Chris?” Well I’m glad you asked…rhetorical voice in my head since the quarantine started! More. Baseball.

For the first time, in a LONG time, we are going to give Fall Ball a shot. With many high-contact and indoor sports in limbo due to on-going COVID concerns, baseball is maybe one of the few sports that may be available to kids this Fall. This is as good a year as any to let kids keep playing ball!

It will be a little different than the spring/summer season. For Fall Ball we are going to use a “bring your own team” format vs. open registration. If you are familiar with the St. Matthews Basketball league, it’s essentially like that. If you’re not, the format is simple. Folks who are interested in coaching can recruit and field a baseball team, register and enter them as a team in the league, parents can pay fees online, and then play other formed teams in the league using a similar schedule as spring/summer.

Or, another option, if a child wants to play but doesn’t know a specific coach, we will keep your son or daughter as a “free agent” and will randomly assign them to a team if a spot is available. This will be a short list, as we will not be able to place every free agent due to space limitations, so it is first come first served.

Also, please note we cannot honor friend/player requests with this last option. Unlike spring/summer, the fall league will simply be based on whether space is available on a team, and then assigning to that team.

Spread the word! Coaches, get your teams formed! Fall Ball is right around the corner.

If you have questions please contact Dan Cook at [email protected] or me at [email protected]

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

 

August 10, 2020 - COVID- 19 Update

     As we strive to make St. Matthews Baseball a place where each and every one of our players, coaches, staff and spectators feel safe, we are committed to full transparency. We will continue to inform you of any information we have pertaining to COVID-19 in our community, while paying due regard to everyone's privacy. We were informed yesterday that one of our assistant coaches on the 8U Dodgers tested positive Sunday for COVID-19. First, we send our best wishes to the coach and wish him a speedy recovery. We have spoken with him at length, as well as the head coach for the team, and head coach of the team they played Thursday.


     The good news is this coach is extremely diligent about social distancing and COVID precautions, had no direct interaction with his players or coaches, had no interaction with the opposing team players or coaches, and there is no concern/evidence at this time to suggest his exposure to the virus occurred at our ballpark.  His son and family have been tested and are awaiting their results. With baseball played outside, this coach practicing safe social distancing, and acting immediately like he has, we believe the risk of any exposure to other players, coaches or spectators to be extremely minimized at this time. I will be notifying the Department of Public Health today, and we will of course cooperate with any additional contact tracing they wish to explore and follow any recommendations they may have.  In staying transparent, we will continue to update you as to any additional positive COVID cases we may receive. As much as we fight against it and take these precautions, that will remain a possibility unfortunately. Still, in every case we will work to find out the level of exposure, who could be impacted, and report it accordingly. 


     And even though we made it to the last week of regular season baseball before the first positive result in our community (with close to 650 players and 70+ coaches!), this is once again a reminder to us all that extreme vigilance is required and we must all do our part to keep ourselves safe, continue to wear masks around the park and maintain a safe distance from one another. As a precautionary and pre-emptive measure, we continue to ask that, per our COVID policies, that you test yourself and your player(s) for a fever prior to arriving at the park. Further, we continue to ask that each team designate a family member each night to help with sanitizing the player dugout bleacher area, the spectator bleacher area, and the actual dug out bench after a game with the cleaning solution and rags available inside the dugouts. We will also continue our park-wide daily sanitation regimen.



     As an additional reminder, it is the express policy of St. Matthews Baseball that only two adults are allowed per child to the park. On Weinberg Field, where the 4-5-6 Wee, Tee and Coach Pitch teams play, we have seen an increase in game attendance, especially with respect to some of our elderly spectators (grandparents and the like). Again, we want everyone to have a chance to watch their child or grandchild play, but you must also understand that in order to minimize the spread, risk, or exposure of COVID 19, two and only two adults per child are allowed at the park at any given time. We don’t want to see bleachers full of spectators…any other year you would never hear me utter that sentence, but this is 2020, and in 2020 up is down, left is right, and we are all living in a very strange time to be certain. So please, spread out, wear a mask, and keep it to the 2-adult maximum. 


     By and large, the vast majority of game days have been amazing. We have all stepped up as a community to do our part, practice social distancing, and limit exposure to our neighbors. We truly appreciate it, and truly appreciate your continued support of St. Matthews Baseball. 

Now, to end on some good news, we will have information soon on the final game/World Series Game for Wee and Tee divisions, the end of year tournament in the 7, 8, Minor and Majors, and the return of Fall Baseball to St. Matthews! Information coming soon!!

Take care, 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball


Opening Day!

Parents and players,

The day we’ve all waited, and waited, AND waited for is less than 12 hours away: Opening Day! Not sure about you, but I am as excited as a kid on Christmas Eve night. We finally get to play baseball.

Just a few quick updates and reminders as we start the season.

Parking
PLEASE remember, do not under any circumstances park your vehicle in the shopping center adjacent to the park. Your car will be towed by the property owners and we don’t want that to happen! Please consult the map on our website for field and parking locations. We have built in 30 minutes between each game, so hopefully with the extra time to sanitize the area it will also allow folks time to leave before the next batch of fans and players arrive.

COVID Policies

I have reattached our official COVID-19 policies for your review. This is also available on our website. Please review these policies prior to the season kicking off, and prior to coming to the park. We would ask that everyone (players, coaches, parents, spectators) have a mask on hand if social distancing cannot be achieved.

In the very young divisions (4-6) this is especially important for coaches who may have to be very close to kids, lining them up in the batter’s box, showing them where to hit the ball off the Tee, where to stand in the field, etc.

There are sanitizer stations and dispensers throughout the park. Please observe and follow posted signage.

Please remember only two adults per child are permitted to attend games. We need to keep our attendance on the low side unfortunately due to COVID and to comply with social distancing requirements, and this is the most effective way of doing it.

Season Schedule

Your specific game schedule is available on your child’s team page thru our website. Simply log in to your account and go to your child’s team page, and you will find the most current schedule, team roster, coach contact info and more!

Rain-Out's/Game Cancellations

In the event of inclement weather and games are cancelled, our Fields Director will assess and make a final decision by 4:30 p.m. that day and communicate cancellations to me. That information will also be posted on our Facebook page, as well as conveyed to coaches via email who will then send word out to parents. Assume that NO news means game are ON! But please also note, there may be times when rain makes the dirt fields (Look, Siegel and Matanich) unplayable, but our turf fields (Voll, McCandless and Weinberg) have properly drained and can be played. We will do our best to convey that information as well to the extent necessary.

 

Due to the shortened season, rain-out's will not be made up or rescheduled.

Spectator Conduct

This may go without saying, but as much as we invest in our children and can get caught up in the game and spirit of competition, we encourage and expect good sportsmanship from coaches, players AND fans alike. Please keep in mind, the coaches are volunteers, the scorekeepers are teens and young adults, and our umpires are doing the best they can. Please remain respectful. Yelling, harassing, or antagonizing coaches, umpires, other spectators, or the opposing team on the field will simply not be tolerated.

No college scholarships are being handed out. No one will be signing with the St. Louis Cardinals.

Don't be that guy. Don't be that gal. Use common sense. It's just a game.

Questions/Concerns?

There will be at least one board member at the park each evening. You can spot them wearing a St. Matthews lanyard with their photo on it. If you have a question or concern, don’t hesitate to ask them! If you cannot locate a staff member, you can speak with a coach who can easily get a hold of me or another staff member if the matter is urgent. I will be up at the park most nights either coaching or keeping an eye on things.

If you have other questions or concerns throughout the season, please speak with your coach. If they cannot address or resolve your concern, they can communicate with the commissioner for each division, who can then speak with me if it requires further attention.

We want everyone to have a safe, healthy, and FUN season of baseball. I can’t wait to meet as many of you as possible. Look for me at the park, I’m hard to miss. I’m the guy with the David Letterman-like quarantine beard. :)

Finally, on a personal note, I would like to extend a very special thanks to the good folks who have tirelessly volunteered their time, talent and treasure to make this season happen. The head and assistant coaches in every division, all of our generous sponsors, the Board of Directors of St. Matthews Baseball, Jeff Schaftlein, Beth Morgan, Brandon Ayers, Bruce Gadansky, Doug Dreisbach, Jim Hamilton, Jayson Brunstetter, Jeff Stephenson, Joe Ventura, Kevin Judd, Lee Greenamyer, Mary Alice Greenamyer, Matt Kuerzi, and Todd Patrick. To our partners at Trinity High School, the St. Matthews Parks Department, City Council and Mayor Tonini, and Governor/Coach Beshear.To my right-hand man Dan Cook, and our Fields Director Doug Netherton. Thank you. ALL of these good people have been partners, big or small, in one objective: getting kids safely playing baseball this year at St. Matthews. If you see them around the park, give them a pat on the back. Well, a virtual pat on the back…

And thank YOU parents for sticking with us, showing so much patience and understanding as we have all navigated the last few months together.

“But baseball has marked the time. It reminds us of all that once was good and that could be again.”

Amen and Play Ball!

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

 

 

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Dick's Sporting Goods Coupon

St. Matthews Baseball Official 2020 Re-Opening Policies and Procedures

I feel like I have waited 3 years to say those words, "play ball" even if it's only been 3 months. For many I know it FEELS like 3 years. We are happy to announce that the Governor and the City of St. Matthews have given us the go-ahead to open the parks on June 15th and play ball! Below should be all of the information you will need right now, including our final/official policies and procedures with respect to re-opening. 

In the next few weeks, we are going to work double time to meet with coaches, prepare practice schedules, finalize uniforms and equipment orders, clean and bring the ballpark and fields back to tip-top playing shape, and we will be implementing park precautions and safety measures relative to COVID-19. 

We have much to do but we are so excited (and grateful) to do it. I will keep doing my best to respond to email inquires in a timely fashion, but please know it could take some time for me to get back to you. I also have been trying to stay on top of calls and texts, but email is likely the best (and fastest) way to get a hold of me. Thank you parents, coaches, and sponsors!

St. Matthews Baseball Official 2020 Re-Opening Policies and Procedures

In anticipation of the June 15, 2020 re-opening date per Governor Beshear’s prior announcement, below please find St. Matthews Baseball’s (SMB) Official 2020 Reopening Policies and Procedures based on Kentucky’s “Healthy at Work: Guidance for Youth Sports and Athletic Activities.” 

Please review this document in full.

Practice, Regular Season and Tournament

Practices will begin June 15, 2020. SMB will work with division commissioners and coaches in developing and re-instituting a practice schedule. 

The regular season will begin July 6, 2020 and will consist of a six-week season of approximately 2 games per week, followed by a double elimination in-house tournament to wrap up the year. Because of time constraints, there will NOT be a traditional All-Star trail and no regular season rain make-up’s will be played. 

COVID-19 Preparedness and Policy

To best ensure the safety of players, coaches, and spectators, St. Matthews Baseball will be making modifications for the 2020 season. The following is a list of St. Matthews Baseball planned modifications. 

 

Parents, Players, and Spectators

· Parents, guardians, spectators and players must be responsible for monitoring their own health. Any person with a fever, or other COVID-19 symptoms, will be asked to not visit the baseball park, or if a determination is made onsite that a visitor has COVID-19 symptoms, he/she will be asked to leave. 

· Parents and guardians will be asked to take players’ temperature(s) before leaving the house. If the player or another family member is running a fever, or showing any other symptoms, we ask that you please stay home. 

· To minimize crowds and facilitate social distancing, we will ask that only parent(s) or guardian(s) (up to two) attend any practice, scrimmage or game. Please keep other immediate family members at home, unless he/she is a registered player with SMB. This would include asking siblings, grandparents, other relatives, or friends to not attend practice or games. 

· Seniors and those with significant health risks are asked to follow CDC guidelines and to either refrain from attending events or to take appropriate precautions. 

· SMB is working to implement broadcasting of games via social media. 

Ballpark Safety Measures

· Each game day, at least one assigned board member will be walking the park to help ensure that safety procedures and precautions are being followed. Board members will be identified wearing a name tag or lanyard. 

· St. Matthews Baseball contractors and board members will be required to wear a mask or face covering, while attending practices and games, or to practice safe social distancing from other people of at least 6 feet at all times.

· Parents/spectators must practice safe social distancing of at least 6 feet from other players, parents or spectators at all times. 

· If for some reason safe social distancing cannot be achieved, parents/spectators must wear a face mask (e.g in any congested area such as the space in front of the main concession stand and between Siegel and Look Fields).

· Parents/spectators will also be asked to spread out from each other by at least 6 feet, not congregate, and bring their own chairs. Bleachers will be reserved as “dugout” space to further social distance players from one another while at-bat or in the middle of innings. 

· Bleachers will be cleaned and sanitized between games.

· Participants, parents and/or spectators are requested to leave SMB at the conclusion of their respective game/practice.

· SMB will increase the frequency of cleaning and sanitizing in the park, especially in high traffic areas such as restrooms, concessions, and dugouts. 

· Concessions will have limited staff (2-3 people) and may have a limited menu. Workers are required to wear PPE at all times. Designated spots will be marked on the ground for standing in line to help ensure social distancing, and no side-by-side windows will be used in the stand. Plexiglass will be present in between concession staff workers and people ordering.

· Games and practices will be staggered, increasing the time between each, to help minimize overlap of teams and players waiting and to help limit or prevent congregating.

Wee, Tee and Coach Pitch

· Players in Wee, Tee and Coach Pitch Divisions (4-6) must sit with their parent(s)/guardian(s) while not on the field and must practice safe social distancing of at least 6 feet from other players, parents or spectators at all times. Dugouts will not be utilized. 

· While on defense, coaches must spread players out in infield and outfield by at least 6 feet and discourage and prevent to the greatest extent possible kids “swarming” to balls hit into play. 

· In addition to Weinberg Field (our normal 4-6 field), we are also working to possibly utilize Voll/Trinity High School Field for multiple games at a time while giving the 4-6 divisions, as well as their parents/spectators, a larger space to spread out and ensure safe social distancing of at least 6 feet.
 

7 Machine, 8 Machine, 9-10 Minors and 11-12 Majors

· Dugouts will be limited to three players at any time, with the bench marked for seating to help ensure safe social distancing.

· Players must hang their baseball bag, if any, in the dugout before games or practices, and store any other equipment in the dugout until the conclusion of a game or practice. 

· Bleachers and/or outside fence areas will be used as the main dugout and marked for seating or standing to help ensure safe social distancing.

· Players and coaches in dugouts and/or the bleacher or outside fence areas must practice safe social distancing of at least 6 feet from other players, parents or spectators at all times or will be required to wear a face mask.

· Sharing personal player equipment will be prohibited during the season. Each player will need to bring their own glove, batting helmet (ages 7 and up), and bat. 

· Team shared equipment (catcher’s gear) will be maintained by the head coach at all times and must be cleaned and sanitized after each use. 

· If a player has his own catching gear, please bring it each practice and/or game and it must not be shared. 

· Game umpires will be positioned behind the mound with appropriate social distancing. 

· Pitching changes and mound visits should adhere to social distancing requirements.

Game and Practice Precautions - All Ages

· At the start of every defensive inning, all players for the defensive team will be required to apply hand sanitizer before taking the field, or during practice every 30 minutes, which will be made available by SMB and administered by coaches. 

· Any baseball(s) used during a game must be sanitized with disinfectant between every inning, or during practice every 30 minutes, which will be made available by SMB and administered by coaches. 

· No team or dugout coolers, or team snacks following games, are permitted. Players should have their own marked water bottle that is kept in their bat bag or with their parent/guardian. 

· No chewing gum, candy, or sunflower seeds will be permitted by players or coaches.

· Pregame conferences will be limited to one coach per team and one umpire while practicing safe social distancing of at least 6 feet. 

· Before/After game sportsmanship rituals will be conducted in ways other than the traditional lining up and shaking hands/high fiving. 

· A rules committee will review rules specific to each age group and determine if additional rules need to be implemented to further help ensure children safety.

· All policies and procedures of SMB will be subject to revision, change or modification with approval by the SMB Board of Directors. 



2020 Proposed Reopening Plan

St. Matthews Baseball 2020 Proposed Reopening Plan and Refund Policy

Parents, I hope this finds you well. I apologize in advance for the length of the following, but please take time to read this detailed announcement in its entirety as it contains important information on St. Matthews Baseball’s plan for the 2020 season.

As stated in my last communication, Governor Beshear announced the re-opening of outdoor youth sports beginning June 15 as part of the Phase 2 reopening plan. We are still waiting for further details on youth sports proposed guidelines from the Governor’s Office. Thus, as they have been since March, the fields will remain closed until we get final approval from City of St. Matthews Mayor Tonini to reopen based on direction from Governor Beshear. In the meantime, we are making plans in anticipation of the June 15 opening date and wanted to share with you what that will look like this season.

Before we do that, we also wanted to let you know that we have opened registration for the 2020 season back up! If you know of any families who may have missed sign up’s this spring, or who are now able and looking to play ball feel, free to pass along that registrations (4-12) are open on our website. We will use the same birthday cut-off (May 1) for division assignments. Thank you!

Practice, Regular Season and Tournament

We will look to hold three weeks of practices prior to the regular season games starting on July 6. Practice time will allow coaches to reacclimate with their teams, get kids ready to play games, and review updated guidelines with coaches, parents, and players before games begin. 

Beginning July 6, we would play a six-week season of approximately 2 games per week, followed by a double elimination in-house tournament to wrap up the year. Because of time constraints, there will not be a traditional All-Star trail and no regular season rain make-up’s will be played. 

This is subject to change based on any further guidelines issued by Governor Beshear and approval from Mayor Tonini. 

COVID-19 Preparedness and Policy

To best ensure the safety of players, coaches, and spectators, St. Matthews Baseball will be making modifications for the 2020 season. The following is a list of St. Matthews Baseball planned modifications, based on both Babe Ruth and CDC guidelines. These modifications are subject to change based on further guidance from Governor Beshear and/or review and approval from Mayor Tonini.

Parents, Players, and Spectators

· Parents, guardians, spectators and players must be responsible for monitoring their own health. Any person with a fever, or other COVID-19 symptoms, will be asked to not visit the baseball park, or if a determination is made onsite that a visitor has COVID-19 symptoms, will be asked to leave. 

· Parents and guardians will be asked to take players’ temperature(s) before leaving the house. If the player or another family member is running a fever, or showing any other symptoms, we ask that you please stay home.

· To minimize crowds and facilitate social distancing, we will ask that only one parent or guardian per player attend a practice or game, whenever possible. Please keep other immediate family members at home. This would include asking siblings, grandparents, other relatives, or friends to not attend practice or games. Seniors and those with significant health risks are asked to follow CDC guidelines and to either refrain from attending events or to take appropriate precautions. We understand this is not ideal, but our goal this season is to get kids playing ball again and minimize possible spread of the virus. Accordingly, we are looking into broadcasting games via social media as a way for family and friends to watch games from home.

 

Ballpark Safety Measures

· Each game day, at least one assigned board member will be walking the park to help ensure that safety procedures and precautions are being followed. Board members will be identified wearing a name tag or lanyard.

· St. Matthews Baseball contractors, board members, and parents/spectators will be asked to wear PPE, such as face buffs/surgical masks, while attending practices and games.

· Parents/spectators are requested to please wear a face mask while watching games and cheering on your child, and to maintain a proper social distance of 6 feet when in the park.

· Parents/spectators are also asked and encouraged to spread out and bring their own chairs, as bleachers will be reserved as “dugout” space to further social distance players from one another while at-bat or in the middle of innings. Bleachers will be cleaned and sanitized between games.

· While we love having you at the park, participants and spectators are requested to leave after their games/practices are over and not congregate.

· St. Matthews Baseball will increase the frequency of cleaning and sanitizing in the park, especially in high traffic areas such as restrooms, concessions, and dugouts.

· Concessions will have limited staff (2-3 people) and may have a limited menu. Workers are required to wear PPE at all times. Designated spots will be marked on the ground for standing in line to encourage social distancing, and no side-by-side windows will be used in the stand. Plexiglass will be present in between concession staff workers and people ordering.

· Games and practices will be spread out to minimize overlap of teams and players waiting.

 

Wee, Tee and Coach Pitch

· The younger age groups (4-6) will require and will be given more attention given their age and tendency to interact (closely) with each other. To that end, we are discussing using Voll/Trinity High School Field for multiple games at a time while giving us a much larger space to spread out children from each other. 

· Also due to their age, parent involvement will likely be necessary to ensure social distancing. This may include having your child sit with you until it is his/her turn at bat and sitting with you briefly before they take the field.

 

Game and Practice Precautions - All Ages

· Youth field dugouts will be limited to three players at any time to encourage social distancing. Bleachers and/or outside fence areas will be used as main dugouts.

· Sharing personal player equipment will be prohibited during the season. Each player will need to bring their own glove, batting helmet (ages 7 and up), and bat.

· Team shared equipment (catcher’s gear) will be kept and maintained at each field vs. on a per coach basis. This gear will be cleaned and sanitized after each use. If a player has his own catching gear, please bring it each game and it will not be shared with other kids. Baseballs will be sanitized with a disinfectant between half innings.

· No team or dugout coolers, or team snacks following games, are permitted. Players should have their own marked water bottle that is kept in their bat bag or with their parent/guardian. No chewing gum, candy, or sunflower seeds will be permitted by players or coaches to avoid potentially sharing these items.

· Umpires will be positioned behind the mound with appropriate social distancing.
 

· A rules committee will review rules specific to each age group and determine if additional rules need to be implemented this season to further help ensure children safety.

· Pregame conferences will be limited to one coach per team and one umpire. Social distancing of 6 feet is required. Pitching changes and mound visits should adhere to social distancing requirements.

· Before/After game sportsmanship rituals will be conducted in ways other than the traditional lining up and shaking hands/high fiving. One possible idea would be to have players line up across from each other, with proper spacing, and then bow. This is just one idea, but we will have others to continue promoting good sportsmanship and comradery.

· All restrictions will be subject to change based on new information or guidance from local, state, or national health officials.

Refund Policy

We hope that you still want your son or daughter to participate this season. Baseball, even with these changes, will provide our youth with at least some measure of normalcy. Not to mention, getting out of the house a few times a week for some sun and exercise! But please know you have the full commitment of St. Matthews Baseball to make the environment this season as safe as possible. Baseball, by its very nature, is a relatively socially distanced sport already, and we believe these steps will help ensure that is only further achieved. Above all, we appreciate your patience as we have worked thru this challenging time and look forward to seeing your child on the field for the 2020 season.

If you choose not to play, St. Matthews Baseball will offer a full refund to anyone registered in the spring 2020 season. So that we can plan the season accordingly, please email me at [email protected] by June 1, 2020 if you do NOT wish for your child to playWe will attempt to issue all requested refunds by June 302020.

However, even if you are thinking of requesting a refund, let me make one plea with you before you do so. St. Matthews Baseball is obligated to our yearly expenses (utilities, insurance, Babe Ruth charter, field care/maintenance, repairs, etc.) whether we play a season or not. As we do each year in anticipation of a new season, we had already made significant investments into field maintenance, supplies, new equipment and uniforms immediately before COVID-19 hit our shores. As a result, we have taken numerous and significant measures to reduce expenses during the shutdown. But, the reality is we still have many remaining financial obligations facing our league.

If you choose not to play, please consider making your registration fee a tax-deductible donation to the league.

While St. Matthews Baseball is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, volunteer organization, we are 100% responsible for all of our maintenance and operational costs. Your donation to the league would be greatly appreciated. 

Thank you for participating in and supporting St. Matthews Baseball! We look forward to seeing everyone back on the field soon. If you have any questions, I will do my best to answer them (and my level best to get back with you in a timely manner!). We will also provide another update once we get further guidance from Governor Beshear and Mayor Tonini, so please be on the lookout for that.

Our best to you and yours, 

Chris Gadansky

Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball



 

 

 

Update

5/8/2020

I think that great American poet, Hank Williams, Jr., said it best…

“Are you ready for some baseball???” 

(Yes. I know that isn't the correct lyric…doesn’t matter. Because the topic of the day is BASEBALL!)

As I am sure many of you have heard, Governor Beshear announced yesterday during his daily address that some outdoor youth sports (like baseball) are included under the Phase 2 reopening in Kentucky. This is exciting, fantastic news. And more importantly, and with appropriate restrictions and precautions in place, we may begin baseball on June 15!

I know you may have a ton of questions, and I promise that more detailed information will follow which should hopefully answer them all, but for now know that the Board of Directors are formulating a re-opening plan for the season, are working with the Mayor and City of St. Matthews on the how, when, and what’s of the re-opening plan, and that we are as excited as you and your kids at the prospect of playing ball! Finally!

Stay tuned. Our Board is meeting this Monday night, and we will have a clearer plan in place which we will then take to the Mayor for his approval, subject to any adjustments needed as more information comes from the Governor’s Office. We will share this with you as soon as possible, so be on the lookout for more information in the coming week. 

In the meantime, we greatly appreciate the patience you have shown as we have navigated how to play ball again, and we hope and pray you and your families are doing well. 

Best to you all,

Chris Gadansky

Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

Sponsor Support

4/22/2020

Parents, players and supporters of St. Matthews Baseball,

 

We hope you and your family are staying safe and healthy while we wait further notice for getting back to baseball! The plan, as we have said before, is to resume the moment we get the go-ahead. In the meantime, we wanted to show support to St. Matthews Baseball’s generous sponsors whose financial contributions help make our league happen. We encourage you, the St. Matthews Baseball family, to support them too in whatever way you can.

 

Additionally, over the coming weeks we will be recognizing sponsors individually on our social media channels, so please give us a follow: Facebook: @StMatthewsBaseball and Twitter: @StMatthewsBase1.

 

We thank you again for participating in St. Matthews Baseball and look forward to seeing you at the park this year. Until then, please show your support for our sponsors. Wishing you and all of your families health and well-being during this time.

 

Here is a list of restaurants that are open and providing curbside and/or delivery for your safety and convenience. Please consider them for your dining out needs:

 

·      Blaze Pizza – 818-861-4520

·      Cheddar Box Too – 502-896-1133

·      Ehrler’s Ice Cream – 502-749-2236

·      FDKY BBQ – 502-785-4273

·      Joella’s Hot Chicken – 502-895-2235

·      McDonald’s – 502-896-5660

·      Plehn’s Bakery (Currently Closed)

·      Saint’s Pizza – 502-891-8883

·      Taco Bell – 502-893-6084

 

Other St. Matthews locally owned restaurants:

 

·      Crescent Hill Tap House – 502-895-9400

·      Diamonds Street Grub – 502-709-5113

·      DiOrio’s Pizza – 502-618-3424

·      Drake’s – 502-614-7327

·      Frankfort Avenue Beer Depot – 502-895-3223

·      Lou Lou Food + Drink – 502-893-7776

·      Molly Malone’s – 502-882-2222

·      Nam Nam Café – 502-891-8859

·      Silvio’s Italian Restaurant – 502-883-6369

·      Simply Tai – 502-899-9670

·      Taco Choza – 502-409-5080

In addition, below is a list of other local businesses that support St. Matthews Baseball. Please utilize their services as you can:

 

·      ADP

·      American Family Orthodontics

·      American Legion Post 180

·      Bachman Chevrolet

·      Better Business Bureau

·      Bluegrass Auto Motorsports

·      Brian Morrison State Farm Insurance

·      Carlon Roofing

·      Compass Counseling

·      Dave & Busters (Currently Closed)

·      Dicks Sporting Goods (Currently Closed-Online Open)

·      DuPont Pediatric Dentistry

·      Eclipse Bank

·      Emergency Services

·      Family Realty

·      Gardner & Brunstetter Real Estate

·      Hoagland Commercial Realtors

·      Independence Bank

·      John Waters Heating Cooling & Electric

·      Judd & Judd PLLC

·      Kentucky Deli Provisions

·      Denzil Blevins KY Farm Bureau Insurance

·      Legends Sports Academy (Currently Closed)

·      McBrayer PLLC

·      Medley Auto Care

·      Mortenson Family Dental

·      MPC Promotions

·      Norton Sports Health

·      Planet Fitness (Currently closed- Free In-Home Workouts on their Facebook page (Link to: https://www.facebook.com/Planet.Fitness.3036BardstownRd.Louisville.KY/ ) and YouTube Channel Link to: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZ0PnRz4jxOLZZ9XvGCiqfA)

·      ProRehab

·      Republic Bank

·      St. Matthews Animal Clinic

·      St. Matthews Care Center

·      Steepleton

·      The WNK Group at Morgan Stanley

·      The Underwriters Group Commercial Insurance

·      Zinser Benefit Service

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Chris Gadansky

Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

2020 Spring Season Update

3/26/2020

Parents and Coaches,

 

I hope this email finds you well, and that you are well stocked on food, TP and sanity. Just wanted to drop a note and check-in. 

No huge change. We are still shut down pending further notice from the City of St. Matthews, with whom we have stayed in contact and teleconferenced with today. They are following the state’s guidance and have assured us they will keep us in the loop when they know more. 

 

I know I sound like a broken record on some of this, but it is important that you know we are 100% committed to playing, and as soon as possible. “But when will we play?”, you may be asking. Short answer: we are still hoping to play Spring baseball. That is our primary goal. However, if things get worse and we are postponed past Spring, we are preparing for that as well in the form of a Summer/Fall season. If Derby being postponed until September isn’t strange enough for you, a little Summer or Fall baseball should be no problem, right? :) 

 

We will continue to keep you informed about the timing of Opening Day this year (without clogging your inbox up with messages after this message!) and will report back once we have more information from the City.

 

In the meantime, take care of yourself and your loved ones. Thank you for your patience, understanding, as well as the kind words I have received via email, text and phone calls. It is very much appreciated. I have yet to meet all of you, but I am looking forward to that as much as I am starting baseball. If there is anything we as an organization can do for you during this craziness or if there is anything we can do to help, don’t hesitate to ask.

 

Best regards,

 

Chris Gadansky

Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

COVID-19 Response

3/17/2020

“The one constant through all the years . . . has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it's a part of our past. It reminds us of all that once was good and that could be again.” 
Terrence Mann


Where to start? I think the most important place to start is praying and hoping and praying some more that this email finds you, your ball player(s), your family, friends and loved ones in good health and in good spirit. I believe that to be paramount right now. To me. To the St. Matthews Baseball organization. To all of us. That you and your family are well.

 

As I wrote a few days ago, the Board had a chance to meet last night (telephonically as it were) to discuss what this new reality means or may mean for the baseball season all of us so desperately want to start, balanced with when that would even be possible given that this pathogen – for now at least – has become part of our everyday lives, routines, and customs.

 

Yesterday, the City of St. Matthews declared the community center and baseball fields closed until further notice. They are following guidance coming from Frankfort, Louisville Metro, and every stretch of the country in deciding to place a lid on any further sports activity until we have a better handle on infected numbers, more testing is available, and a clearer picture of just how far or wide this thing has spread into the Commonwealth and especially high-population centers like Louisville. This will take time. Because, as a friend of mine is fond of saying, we don’t know what we don’t know yet. 

 

The short of it is, the City is erring on the side of caution and for good reason. Containment, containment, containment is the key to beating this thing and limiting exposure to ourselves, our children, and at-risk groups. 

 

Do we know when this will be lifted? We do not. As state government has stated in press conferences, and doctors and researchers on a national level have been saying, the fight right now is on flattening the curve: spreading of the virus/exposing those at risk, with the amount of time since the virus first arrived on our shores. Thus, we will do our part; follow the City’s mandate, and close the fields until we obtain more guidance from local government while at the same time maintaining a clear line of communication open with City officials, and keeping you guys updated as well. 

I only have one request of you: please bear with us. It is our every intention to play baseball this year. When exactly that is to occur is unclear right now, like many other things related to this virus, but we do intend to play baseball. Will opening day be delayed? Yes, it likely will. How long will it be delayed? We simply do not know. Because this disease, along with our response and efforts to combat it, is ever-changing. Week by week, day by day, hour by hour. 

 

And we understand that such uncertainty can be frustrating, it can be scary, it can be confusing, and it can be downright unsettling. We’re human, after all, so that is completely and totally understandable. Yet, I hope we can all agree that while this disease is indeed new, or scary, or uncertain, it can be beaten if we take the right steps. Consistently, this has meant social distancing, self-care, hand washing, not gathering in large groups, and not going out unless it is necessary. And, for now, holding off on playing baseball. 

When will this distancing from each other be over? We don’t know that either. When will the curve be flattened enough, or the risk be diminished, or it will be safe to venture back out into the world? Again, without more information, more research, we simply don’t know right now. But here is what we do know. Once it is over, will it be the simple act of watching your son or daughter step onto a baseball diamond that will bring us all back togetherreminding us of all that once was good and that could be again?

You’re dang right it will. 

 

Because we will be back. At some point we will play baseball. Of that I have no doubt. And we want you to be there with us when it happens. We could not do this without your support, and we could not do this without your communal spirit.

In the meantime, use this time to keep the kids playing in the backyard. Swinging the bat. Throwing. Catching. Taking grounders, and pop-ups. Pitching. Believe me, we're all going to need to get out of the house! 

Stay well. Our best to you and yours. Will be in touch soon.

 

Chris Gadansky
Executive Director, St. Matthews Baseball

Announcements


Job Posting:

The Concession stand at the park is now hiring workers. For more information please email: Marilyn Kawa [email protected] or call
(502) 269-0832. (Ages 14 and up) 

St. Matthews Baseball is also looking for scorekeepers (Ages 14 and up) and umpires (Ages 16 and up). For more information please email: Dan Cook [email protected]





Exciting News about St. Matthews Baseball!

As the World Series takes place between the Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, it is never too early to start thinking about the 2020 St. Matthews Baseball Season. I took over as President of the Board half way through the 2019 season and received a lot of feedback, both positive and constructive. As a Board, we understand that there are many opportunities for us to improve the St. Matthews Baseball experience. Please know that we are committed to making it happen. In advance of next season, I want to communicate some important changes that we are in the process of making. Please take a few minutes to read the following:

1.     Affiliation again with Cal Ripken Baseball vs. Little League. We will be returning as a league to Cal Ripken Baseball. Cal Ripken uses the more popular and widely accepted April 30 birth date cutoff. The return to Cal Ripken will allow more kids in the league to play with their classmates and be aligned with summer baseball competitive teams. Cal Ripken also provides a larger boundary for kids to play in St. Matthews Baseball and also be eligible for postseason All-Star tournaments.

2.     Executive Director Transition. I want to thank Doug Netherton for everything that he has done for our league as he has really pulled double duty with both administrative tasks and facility operations for the league. The plan is for Doug to continue overseeing facilities and fields for the 2020 season, which aligns to his strengths and passion. We will be announcing a new Executive Director to handle the administrative tasks in November. 


3.     Physical improvements to the park. Through a more aligned partnership with the City of St. Matthews, clear expectations are in place regarding park upkeep. The City of St. Matthews is making much needed physical improvements, such as new steps for Look Field and Siegel Field press boxes and landscaping around the park. They’ve also committed to painting dugouts and buildings in preparation for next season, which will coordinate with the new Voll Field colors. We are also committed to ensuring that the public restrooms are well maintained and cleaned on a regular basis. 


4.     Parking plan with the City of St. Matthews and Trinity High School for the 2020 season. We are aware that parking in St. Matthews Baseball designated parking spots was a challenge at the beginning of the season. Once discovered, we adjusted game times and field usage to address the issue. As we look ahead to the 2020 season, we have already met with the City of St. Matthews and Trinity High School to put a formal plan in place in order to improve the parking situation. It is important that St. Matthews Baseball families DO NOT park in the adjacent shopping center during practice or game times. There is no parking agreement in place with the owner of the shopping center, and we don’t want to see any St. Matthews Baseball family’s cars towed.


5.     Early registration incentive. Ever get the question from a grandparent about a Christmas gift idea for their grandchild? How about grandparents gifting the season’s league registration! We will open the league registration website early this season, in November, to help families plan ahead. Sign up by December 22  and get your child’s name in a drawing for a pizza party at Voll Field! This will take place on a Sunday during the Spring season and the drawing will also include some new equipment donated by Dicks Sporting Goods. 


6.     No player draft in the 7-year-old age group. We want kids in the early years of playing baseball to have the opportunity to play with friends and classmates and have fun doing it. There will not be a player draft until you reach the 8-year-old age groups. 


7.     Improved communication with families. This is a top Board priority. Better and more timely communication was the top constructive feedback that we received. We plan to utilize the full capabilities of our league website and leverage social media channels (follow us at Facebook: @StMatthewsBaseball and Twitter: @StMatthewsBase1) to improve how and when we communicate with parents. This will include a faster response time as well. More to come, but we heard you loud and clear on this critical area for improvement. 

 

Having played myself at St. Matthews Baseball and having two sons that have played, the league is very important to me personally and to our community. Each year we serve over a thousand players between our Spring Youth league, summer tournaments, and Fall High School season. We hope that you experience the above actions to your concerns as positive and understand that it is our goal to improve the overall experience of players and parents alike at St. Matthews Baseball. We ask that you continue to entrust us with the opportunity to serve your child next baseball season and every season thereafter. Please feel free to share this with other families that could benefit from St. Matthews Baseball. 

 

Please feel free to contact me with any questions or feedback. If you are looking for a tax deduction for 2019, we are accepting 2020 season sponsorships now. I can be reached at [email protected] or 502-905-8360. 

Sincerely,

Jeff Schaftlein, St. Matthews Baseball Board President 

 

 

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