Indians, Twins will extend safety netting

CLEVELAND — The Cleveland Indians and the Minnesota Twins are the latest Major League Baseball teams to announce plans to expand safety netting at their ballparks for the 2018 season.

The Indians will extend the current vertical netting behind home plate down the foul lines at Progressive Field to the ends of the dugouts in an effort to better protect fans from hard-hit foul balls and bats flying into the stands. Also, the canopy nets will be stretched slightly farther down the third-base line.

The Twins will raise the height of their existing protective netting above the dugouts from 7 feet to about 9 feet. They'll also extend the netting beyond the dugouts down both foul lines along the entire Dugout Box seating area, covering one more section along the firstbase line and two more sections along the third-base line. Lower-level seats at Target Field are closer to home plate than in any other MLB venue.

At least six other MLB teams have expanded safety netting in the last three months since a scary incident in which a young girl at Yankee Stadium was hit in the face by a foul ball. The Twins already have extended their netting once, prior to the 2016 season.

OAKLAND, Calif. — The Athletics' proposed site for a new ballpark near an Oakland community college has fallen through. A statement from the board of the Peralta Community College District said the board had directed the chancellor to discontinue talks about a possible stadium near Laney College.

A's president Dave Kaval and his team had considered this the top spot and had engaged in conversations with community members, officials and business owners in the area in hopes of building a privately financed ballpark to open as soon as 2023. Kaval's group had finalized three spots, including one near Jack London Square in downtown Oakland and the current site of the Oakland Coliseum that the club shares with the NFL's Oakland Raiders.