This story is part of a collaboration between Central Connecticut State University and University of Central Lancashire.
“Take Me Out to the Ball Game” is the song baseball fans in the United States ritually sing during the seventh inning of a game. “You’ll Never Walk Alone” is the anthem belted out by the fans at Liverpool’s football club games. These traditions in athletic stadiums on both sides of the Atlantic are on hold this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“This is my 34th year as president and this was the hardest call I’ve ever had to make,”
Chuck Sturtevant, president of the Cape Cod Baseball League (CCBL), says as he looks back on April 24, the day he officially cancelled the 2020 season. It marked the first time in 74 years that summer baseball won’t be taking place on the Cape.
Stories like Sturtevant’s are being seen across the sports world as COVID-19 continues to spread. While many sports leagues have suspended their seasons indefinitely, many smaller leagues have been left with no choice but to cancel play. The National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball have already discussed the idea of playing in empty arenas, but for the CCBL, that scenario is not an option.
“We don’t charge people to come to games, we ask for donations,” Sturtevant said. “The donations, 50/50 raffles, concessions and all that is where the franchises get a lot of their money from, so without the fans there it would be very difficult for them to operate.”
Paul McNally, manager of Skelmersdale United Football Club. Said, like the Cape Cod League, smaller football clubs in Europe are economically driven by their fans and were already hurt by a cancelled season.
“Basically, the season is a write- off,” McNally said. “We had nine games left so we lost out on all of the revenue we would have gotten from those. You don’t want to finish things off like that but this pandemic has taken lives so you can’t say ‘play football,’ right now that’s way in the back of everyone’s minds.”
Similar to the MLB, the wealthier football clubs in Europe are planning to return to play with no fans. McNally said this is not a possibility for his club.
“They can play behind closed doors, we can’t. I’ve heard just on Twitter and stuff that the league might not even play next season,” McNally said. “I hope not but there’s a bigger thing going around the world right now.”
Brian Guiney, General Manager of the CCBL’s Hyannis Hawks and also a detective for the Barnesville Police Department in Massachusetts, houses a number of his players throughout the summer, something he and his 12-year-old son will miss the most from this year’s cancellation.
“You don’t even know what to do with your time,” Guiney said. “There’s not going to be a summer. You can go out on the boat, go to the beach or whatever, but the part of our life that’s been there the past seven or so years is not going to be there this year. It’s a big void you can’t fill. “
Another problem smaller leagues face is lack of funding. For the CCBL, a majority of its $2 million budget comes from local businesses around Cape Cod that sponsor teams. While sports leagues are struggling, so are restaurants and small businesses, and if they shut down or choose to not sponsor teams next year, “It’ll make things very difficult,” Sturevant said.
Guiney echoes the same concern for the partnership between businesses and his team.
“We’re losing a year of our lives, that’s the way we look at it.”
Brian Guiney
“We’re so embedded in the local community, the restaurants feed our players after games,” Guiney said. “Our big sponsor owns three restaurants and all three are closed down. All these places are hurting, and it hurts everyone in our community, too. I know we’ll pick up new restaurants and sponsors, but with Cape Cod being such a vacation destination and people not wanting to go on vacation right now, this is going to be tough.”
Guiney’s son, who was supposed to be playing for the Little League team his dad coaches this summer, looks forward to meeting the players that stay at his house every season. He calls them his “forever best friends” and was even a junior groomsman in one of the player’s weddings last summer in Mississippi. Guiney says his former and current players facetime his son once a week to keep his spirits up.
“My son has made friends with all these players from all over the country. We’re losing a year of our lives, that’s the way we look at it,” Guiney said.
While managers and owners grieve the loss of their season, the players are left in a strange state of not knowing what they’re preparing for.
“When you’re in high school, you’re just looking forward to the next level, and I was there living it for a few weeks. All of the sudden, it was taken away,” said Reggie Crawford, a freshman infielder from the University of Connecticut who expected to spend his summer playing his first season for the Bourne Braves, another CCBL franchise. “After all the long practices leading up to the season and all the work I put in outside of practice, it didn’t feel like it was for nothing, but it’s something I have to wait a whole other year for now. It was really disappointing.”
Crawford, originally from Pennsylvania, is staying at his girlfriend’s home in Texas because he doesn’t have access to a gym back home. In his spare time, he’s been meeting up with players around the area, including former first overall pick Royce Lewis, to take swings at local high school fields.
“At first I was just hitting paper balls that I made and eventually I was like ‘all right, I’ve had enough of this,’ so I started going on Instagram and looking for minor leaguers from around the area and now I’ve got a really good circle of guys that are all focused on the same goal: getting as much baseball in as we can,” Crawford said.
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Like so many other players and others in baseball, Crawford will never take a game for granted again.
“This is the shortest season I’ve played in years. Sometimes you have a doubleheader and you finish that first game and you really don’t want to play in that second one, now I’m like ‘give me three games, anything.’ I’m baseball -deprived right now for sure,” Crawford said.
Like Crawford and his group of baseball players, McNally said his team has done their part to get together and train safely, though he notes that this is technically the off-season and thus does not feel a need to do intense training.
“They’re running in groups,” McNally said. He doesn’t worry too much about them getting work in right now because “It’s your general pride that keeps you on top of things.”
Skelmersdale United has also done some work to keep their chemistry going.
“The group is not as lively, but there’s still a bit of banter in the WhatsApp group chats,” McNally said. “We’ve had Zoom calls every week, a few FIFA tournaments and laughs here and there. The squad’s moral is quite high, there’s optimism for next season from the lads that we can do well.”
The Cape Cod League is often seen as a launching pad for players to get to the next level: the Major Leagues. With no season in sight, there has been some frustration from players looking to get some recognition this year.
Dawson Barr, a pitcher for the Chatham Angels, said players around the league will be missing that exposure.
“It was one of those things that you have to understand what’s best for the country first, but it’s definitely frustrating. We were all looking forward to that exposure this summer. The Cape has such a good reputation for that and the quality of baseball played up there, that was the most frustrating part. The loss of that is tough, but you have to put it into perspective.”