Bulls ready to play some ball this summer

By Dale Woodard on May 27, 2021.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDsports@lethbridgeherald.com

After more than a year away from the ball diamond due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Bulls are ready to charge.

With the province announcing its three-stage Open For Summer plan with the hopes of being fully open by late-June or early July as vaccination targets are ideally reached and hospitalizations decline, the Lethbridge Bulls are getting ready to step up to the plate.

After losing their entire 2020 Western Canadian Baseball League season due to the pandemic, the Bulls open training camp June 11 at Spitz Stadium with the anticipation of a June 18 home opener against their rival Okotoks Dawgs.

If the provincial reopening goes as planned, that will also include the Tanner Craswell/Mitch MacLean Memorial Game June 21 at Spitz Stadium and a Canada Day game against the Edmonton Prospects.

“It’s exciting for us,” said Kevin Kvame, president and general manager of the Bulls and president of the WCBL. “We’re coming up to well over 700 days since we played a game. It’s kind of exciting. You never had a firm date, you were always hopeful, but it looks like right now we know we are 23 days away from having our home opener once again.”

Just having that date has sparked excitement among the players, said Kvame.

“They’re so excited they’re going to be back on the field and they are excited the schedule is now set. There is a finish line here. We were checking out the vaccination rates of our team and we are close to 90 per cent of our players who have had at least one dose of vaccine. So it makes us feel really safe as a team, that we are not going to have a problem during the year with an outbreak once these numbers come down even more.”

Back in late-March, the WCBL announced this year’s rosters will be all-Canadian because of border issues due to the pandemic that will prevent Americans from coming up for the summer.

However, Kvame said some of this year’s Bulls players were able to play in the States over the past year.

“It has gone fairly well for the ones who have come back from the U.S. to Canada for the summer because their homes are here. It’s good that they are going to have the opportunity to show their skills in front of fans on the field in 23 days.”

But first up is training camp in a little over two weeks as the Bulls pay heed to Stage 1 of the Open For Summer plan with up to 10 players allowed for outdoor recreational activities.

“It’s basically going to be practices in groups of 10,” said Kvame. “We’re going to make sure the infielders get some batting practice and keep them in groups of 10 until we get to stage 2.”

In Stage 2, ideally by mid-June, indoor and outdoor sports can resume with no restrictions.

“We are going to take measures during training camp,” said Kvame.

“We’re not going to have an indoor clubhouse or anything like that. We’re just going to have some players go out on the field, get their work in and go back and stay safe with the rules until we help drive those rates down when we start to play games.”

If the province is well into stage 2 for the Bulls’ home opener, Kvame said the club hopes to have between 400 and 500 socially distanced fans in the stands.

“We are anticipating being fully into stage two by June 18, that is our hope,” said Kvame.

And if Alberta hits Stage 3 by Canada Day, Kvame said the Bulls are hoping for a capacity crowd of 2,300 when they host the Prospects at 7:35 p.m.

While Canada Day is normally a double-header, this year will be one game.

“It’ll be so nice to get people back in the park and in a safe way, too,” said Kvame. “We want people to feel safe here. We’ll continue to encourage sanitation and hygiene that has kept the bulk of the population safe for the last 15 months. It’s exciting, to put it mildly, to get back.

“That’s the plan right now. We have a lot of stuff to get in place in the next 23 days. It feels like we have been in slow motion for 16 months and somebody suddenly hit the gas pedal and we have to go from 10 miles an hour to 100 miles an hour in about five minutes.”

The Bulls currently have roughly 30 players on their roster, including a number of locals due to the all-Canadian lineup.

“We had a local contingent that did us pretty good and we are hoping to see that happen once again and show the talent we have here in southern Alberta,” said Kvame.

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