Spring teams come to terms with cancellation of season

He was positioned to head two youth baseball teams in the Pottstown community.

But that was before the COVID-19 pandemic upturned the world in general, and sports specifically, the past couple months.

Chris Petro was recently named head coach of both the Pottstown High varsity and Pottstown Steelers American Legion baseball teams, replacing Geoff Thomas, who led the high school Trojans for two years, and Todd Endy, who logged 15 years as the Legion Steelers’ manager.

But like the rest of the world, the coronavirus outbreak was putting highschool baseball season in limbo at least through April. That became a complete cancellation Thursday when Gov. Tom Wolf announced all Pennsylvania school districts are being kept closed for the remainder of the 2019-20 academic year.

“(Thursday’s) decision by the PIAA Board of Directors was difficult for everyone,” Dr. Robert A. Lombardi, the PIAA’s Executive Director, said in a posting on the association’s website. “Their thoughts remain on the thousands of student-athletes, coaches, officials and family members affected by this decision. However, the Board’s position reflects a steadfast priority of keeping our student-athletes, officials and member schools’ staffs and their communities safe, while following the guidelines provided by the Governor, the Department of Health and the Department of Education.

”We had maintained hope for a continuation of our Winter Championships and an abbreviated Spring season to help bring a sense of normalcy to our communities,” he added. “As we navigate through this difficult time, we need to remember the lessons that interscholastic athletics has taught us: cooperation, patience, sacrifice, responsibility, respect and perseverance.”

So Petro’s hopes for returning to the home dugout at Shantz Field and leading Pottstown’s drive for improvement over last year’s 3-13 record in the Pioneer Athletic Conference (3-15 overall) were dashed.

“With the six talented seniors leading the way, and a plethora of young talent under their wings, we had set our expectations high and our hopes even higher,” Petro said. “During the spring of 2020, we were primed to show just what Pottstown is made of. With the unfortunate circumstances that ensued, we are left only to wonder what might have been if this group of seniors had gotten the opportunity to play this season through.

“As disheartening as it is to think about, we all must set our sights on the future. However, we will celebrate the accomplishments of our seniors prior to them each moving on to bigger and even better things at the collegiate level.”

One of Pottstown’s seniors, planning to undertake an ambitious future past high school, was looking very much forward to the 2020 spring baseball season.

David Hicks, on track for admission to the United States Naval Academy, longed for a last go-round with classmates Jacob Eagle, Brandon Gebhard, Cole Miller, Darion Miller and Josiah Wiggins. For his part, Hicks wanted to impact a turnaround of the highschool program’s recent fortunes as part of a group that dates back to their days playing Little League ball in Pottstown.

“One of the things for me was the ability to take the field, to have one last season,” Hicks said. “We felt Pottstown finally had a team.”

Getting one more season on the diamond was especially big for Hicks. With “plebe summer camp” at the Academy starting in June, he wouldn’t be in position to play for the Pottstown Steelers American Legion baseball team.

Like Petro, Rick Harrison too was looking forward to debuting with Spring-Ford baseball after spending the past 12 years leading the Oley Valley High program. The pandemic hit the team especially hard as it was two days into a spring-training trip to Florida when it had to return home at the start of the quarantine period.

“This certainly wasn’t how I anticipated my tenure at Spring-Ford would begin,” he said. “We had a great offseason, strong leadership, work ethic and high expectations to say the least and we were all looking forward to the season.

“I don’t think, at the time, anyone thought our season would be cancelled. I was hoping the PIAA would continue to wait and maybe let us play into the summer, but I truly understand and support their decision as people’s health is bigger than baseball.”