INSIDE THE PARK: Baseball Manitoba, Miller happy with return to normalcy

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This article was published 10/06/2022 (1363 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Baseball Manitoba executive director Jason Miller is actually thinking about the sport again, and he couldn’t be happier.

After two seasons dealing with the pandemic, there are no restrictions remaining, which Miller said is a relief.

“I don’t think we thought much about baseball specifically or all the things that go into a season,” Miller said of the last two years. “We had to be so focused on the pandemic and the ever-changing health orders and how to adapt. Baseball became secondary and that’s really frustrating as we look back on it.

“Baseball is primary now and I think you see it on the kids’ faces.”

If there was a silver lining, it was the buy-in from administrators, leagues and players as Miller and Baseball Manitoba gingerly stepped their way through the COVID-19 minefield. He said there was never a problem as the organization released its return-to-play protocols that set the rules for the sport in the province.

“It was unbelievable,” Miller said. “I really feel like the baseball community stuck together through all of that. There was so much going on and they reacted quickly to things, they communicated well, they were willing to work with things that didn’t always make sense to them, and I’ll be honest, it didn’t always make sense to me but we were told we had to do them.

“I can’t thank them enough. It’s such a great group of league presidents and administrators across the province. They worked together and did all the right things.”

However, a worrisome trend through the pandemic for most minor sports was the reduction in youngsters playing as some families reduced their public exposure.

Miller said instead of year-over-year comparisons, Baseball Manitoba looked at 2019, its last season prior to the pandemic. This summer, the sport is at 90 per cent registration of what it had in 2019.

That number was closer to 50 per cent in 2020 and 2021.

“Baseball players came back, there’s no question,” Miller said. “We’re very close to getting back to 2019 numbers but we didn’t quite get there. We’re sitting at about 10 per cent under, which is kind of what we planned for. We planned for 90 to 95 per cent so that worked out OK.”

If there is a post-pandemic challenge facing the sport, it’s a shortage of umpires. He said many games now have just one official, who has to handle the job behind the plate and on the base paths by themselves.

He said recruiting and retention of umpires has always been a problem, but the sport now has 20 to 25 per cent fewer people doing the job after the pandemic.

“That’s realIy hard to recover from,” Miller said. “That means there is going to be a ton of one-umpire games and there are going to be times when there are no umpires.”

Part of the concern is that fewer umpires are doing more games, which could lead to burnout. Miller coached a doubleheader on Saturday and another game on Sunday. It was the same guy behind the plate, and he was working by himself.

“It’s the same faces over and over again,” Miller said. “In a lot of ways, it’s good. You can develop rapport behind coaches and umpires, and players and umpires, which is a good thing, but over a long period of time and as the weather gets warm, there will be some burnout.

“We have to find a way to keep them engaged and happy.”

Miller said there will always be turnover because lots of people who try it simply don’t enjoy it, but there was a significant decrease after the pandemic. He suggested people simply found other things to do and perhaps could make easier money elsewhere.

The organization has responded by increasing the pay and offering incentives for umpires to attend clinics, such as free shirts and more reasonable rates to attend.

“I think it’s a direct result of the pandemic,” Miller said. “I do believe as we have a full season here and provincial championships and tournaments and national championships and the exposure of the game gets bigger, that we’ll get some of those back and closer to 2019 numbers each year ongoing.”

As Miller suggested, there is a full schedule of provincial championships this summer, with Westman certainly doing its share. The rural hosts include Hamiota (15U AA, July 15-17), Wawanesa (Senior A and Twi-lite, July 22-24) and Rivers (Senior AA, Aug. 5-7).

Brandon is looking after the 18U AA event (July 15-17), prospects showcases (July 22-24) and 15U AAA Tier 1 and 2 provincials (July 29-31). The prospects showcase will draw players from around the province who don’t play at the AAA level but aspire to move up to that level.

While Miller chuckles that the only significant hurdle is relearning how to host major events, it’s a nice problem after two years without provincials.

“We’re scrambling to get things where they need to be to be planned properly, and again, umpires are part of that,” Miller said. “I can tell you that being at a couple of tournaments already, the tournament atmosphere for baseball is something that’s really infectious. it’s contagious, it’s what brings families back.

“Having the canteen open, having opening ceremonies with the national anthem sung, those things on a baseball diamond, for baseball families there’s nothing that compares.”

Beyond the provincial level, Baseball Manitoba is hosting the senior women’s national championship from July 20 to 24 in Stonewall, plus a pair of western Canadian championships, the 22U men in Stonewall from Aug. 12 to 14, and the 14U girls at Optimist Park in Winnipeg from Aug. 19 to 21.

On a local level, longtime Brandon Minor Baseball president Blake Stephens and vice-president Glen Simard are stepping aside after nearly a decade in the top two jobs.

Miller said it’s hard to overstate what they’ve contributed on a local and provincial level.

“They are open to try new things, they are excellent communicators, they think logically and with the big picture in mind,” Miller said. “Just about everything they’ve done since they got on has been for the betterment of every baseball player in Brandon, with the understanding that the decisions they made had impacts on players all over the province.

“Those two guys have been a part of countless committees to make things better. They have put their hand up more times than I can count over the last eight years, and especially this past year when things got opened up for provincials.”

Miller is hopeful the pair will remain advisors to Brandon Minor Baseball’s new administrators, and Miller plans to continue to lean on them for advice.

“They’re going to step down from Brandon Minor but they are not going to leave the baseball community,” Miller said. “I can assure you of that for a long time.”