It’s in your RNA

Heading into the inaugural Australian Baseball League season, one of the biggest burning questions for a couple of teams was, “where the hell are we going to play?” The Defensive Specialist isn’t going to lie to you, if you don’t have a facility that can hold 2000-3000 people; it’s going to be a little tough to make a buck. It’s all well and good finding a venue that has the seating capacity to hold that many fans, but it’s also important to provide the paying customers with a great experience. While its almost a given that baseball diehards will come out and support a national league, a big part of the business plan is to attract new fans and cultivate these people into long term baseball lovers.

Trying to play baseball on a cricket or football oval can be a logistical nightmare because ultimately you want the spectators as close to the action as possible (in order to increase their chances of being nailed by a screaming line drive). The vast majority of ovals don’t allow baseball fans to get close to the action and therefore has the feel of sitting at a symphony – without the tuxedos. You want the fans on top of the field so they can see and feel the action, after all it's critical to see every cup adjustment by your team’s favourite catcher!

Anyway, the two franchises with the greatest facility issues were Brisbane and Melbourne. Brisbane played at the less than suitable Holloway facility while Melbourne were like vagabonds, bouncing around between Geelong and some university while avoiding the Altona Nuclear Waste facility like the plague.  Fortunately both teams securd better locations for the upcoming season – RNA Showgrounds for the Bandits and  the as yet unofficially announced Melbourne Showgrounds for the Aces. While both are solid and established venues, the Defensive Specialist would imagine that a fair amount of work would be required to get each to a level that truly showcases the game and provides the fans with a wonderful experience.

As is often the case in the Defensive Specialists charmed life, a matter only needs to be reflected on briefly before the universe delivers and someone or something answers the call. In this instance, it was in the form of an anonymous message featuring some interesting tales and photos of the evolution of the RNA Showgrounds into a baseball facility. Of course the Defensive Specialist couldn’t wait to bring this information to the baseball loving public.

A baseball loving Civil Engineer and Surveyor by the name of Raymond Kinsella (or Ray to his friends) has provided his services to the Bandits over the past couple of weeks to transform the showground into a baseball field. The process hasn’t been as simple as throwing down 3 bases and erecting a back net. A couple of examples:

Apparently there were blocked drains at Brisbane RNA and on investigation they found it was caused by all these old rotting baseballs from the Bandits old days at RNA. The homeruns had rolled into the drains and sat there for years.

(The Defensive Specialist has to ask, “don’t they have baseball crazed youngsters who’d trample a pensioner for a homerun ball like in every other state?”)

Under the RNA Showground is a road tunnel and Ray had to scope out and report the depth of drilling the back net pole footings back to Brisbane Transport. Ray has been forced to spec the RNA field to a tolerance of millimeters.

The field specifics are as follows:

Leftfield: 325 feet

Centrefield: 395 feet

Rightfield: 290 feet

The outfield fence height is only 1.8 metres

The Defensive Specialist can only imagine the underwear stirrings that every lefty swinger in the league is getting as they read that its only 290 feet down the rightfield line!

All of the following pictures were taken last week. The field will be completed by next weekend after being cored and aerated. 

It looks like the home plate area is going to be set as close to the grandstand as possible but you can see what the Defensive Specialist was talking about when he said that fans would be removed from the action by the oval shaped facility.

Your standard issue back net footing - looks good and secure!

From just behind second base (typically where the Defensive Specialist gobbles up sure fire singles to centrefield for routine outs). 

The view from centrefield.

The batters box - principles of drainage being accounted for.

Sorting out the home plate area. You can see that  a poke down the right field line wont take much to get out.

Setting the foundation

And the tool used to do it.

Anytime a franchise is able to customise a field, the Defensive Specialist gets excited. It's great to see the Brisbane facility beginning to take life and as mentioned above, it's on pace to be ready for the season opener. A special thanks to the anonymous tipster for sending through the shots and a big shout out to Ray Kinsella for his service to the game - if you build it Ray, they will come!