From the press box column: Field is terrible
HOLLI L. RAPP
A baseball field? Do we have one? Yes, located by the track? But is it playable? No.
The field has rusty fences, part of a dugout that blew away, and every time it rains, water standing in the infield. And the team is supposed to start playing at home next week.
The team is not going to be able to play on the field, or anywhere else on campus, so off campus locations are being considered. But if the team plays somewhere else, isn’t that going to hurt attendance at the games?
Athletic Director Mike Riley says the field problem is being looked at, but why wasn’t it looked at in the fall, when something could have been done before the start of the season?
I was told, "We are currently meeting on it." If they had been meeting on it in September, something could have been done by now.
The main problem with the field, according to one source, is broken pipes which do not allow water to get to and from the field. Question: How long have those pipes been broken and why have they been left sitting so long.
Problems with the field were brought to the attention of the athletic staff in August, seven months ago, which could have resulted in several months of working on the field. And in September, a baseball player got hurt when he was hit in the throat by a ground ball.
The other schools, scheduled to play on the field, haven’t been notified about the problem. If I were a player or a coach on another team, I wouldn’t want to play on a dangerous field.
With the dwindling number of athletes participating on teams this year (and the baseball team the only one that has 20+ players), what would happen if someone would have been seriously injured on the field.
Someone could have broken a leg and maybe never played baseball again. Is that something to be remembered for? "No place so close can take you so far" to a hospital, or in a cast.
March 15, 1999 the Apache