Team might have new home
Venue uncertain after playing at Siena since 2017 season
The Albany Dutchmen of the Perfect Game Collegiate Baseball League will be back this summer.
They just might not be playing their games at Siena College any longer.
“I knew you were going to ask me that question,” Dutchmen vice president and general manager Jason Brinkman said Monday. “We will have an announcement coming in the coming weeks in relation to where we will be playing. That’s about all I can say at this moment in time.”
The question was prompted when the PGCBL released its 2021 schedule this morning and the Dutchmen’s home venue was listed as “default.” The Dutchmen have played on Siena’s campus since 2017 after spending their previous five years at the College of Saint Rose’s Bob Bellizzi Field in Albany.
A Siena athletics spokesman said he didn’t know what the Dutchmen’s plans are.
The Dutchmen are scheduled to make their home debut, wherever that might be, on June 5 against Saugerties. Their season opener is June 3 at Glens Falls, and then Albany plays at Amsterdam on June 4.
The PGCBL, a summer wooden-bat league for college players, returns with a 48-game regular-season schedule. The playoffs begin on July 30.
The PGCBL didn’t play last season because of the pandemic. Some league officials formed the Independent Collegiate Baseball League, which consisted of four teams with mostly local rosters and played an abbreviated schedule under COVID -19 protocols. The ICBL played all its games at Shuttleworth Park in Amsterdam or East Field in Glens Falls.
The Albany Dutchmen played under the name Albany Dutch with head coach Nick Davey, who will return to coach the Dutchmen this summer.
“We’re extremely excited to be able to announce a full league schedule and actually plan and prepare for a full season this year after the whole league took a hiatus in 2020,” Brinkman said.
The PGCBL adds three teams — Niagara Falls, Auburn and Batavia — to expand to 16. Auburn and Batavia lost their Major League Baseball affiliation in the contraction to 120 teams that took place over the winter.
“It gives us a really strong footprint across the state and brings in two really good former minor league facilities, but we’re excited about all three teams,” Brinkman said.
He said the league is still waiting to see what kind of COVID protocols and capacity limitations it must adhere to this summer.
“We’re just going to keep following along with all the CDC and state and local guidance and do what we need to do when the time comes to make sure players are safe and fans are safe and host families and everybody else that’s going to be at the ballpark,” Brinkman said.