Field of Dreams Baseball turf maintenance creates routine for team

Damo Kouakou | Reporter

There are a number of players throughout the school year waiting for the baseball season to start. With all the daily practice to get ready for opening tournaments the consistent use of baseball cleats, puncture the ground, ruining the field. It is important to keep up with the maintenance of the field to prevent injuries and keep the advantage balanced between the teams. Given this, the district uses a mixture of turf and grass in order to balance the advantages.

“People have different opinions on the field between turf and dirt, people typically like turf because it's more of a true bounce compared to dirt,” senior Jaden Bahl said. “The ball could do a lot of different things.”

Throughout the year, turf fields hold their quality, meaning they need less maintenance than grass fields which need care every few months. Additionally, baseball will bounce differently from different materials between grass and turf. it players have heavy opinions on which they would rather use.

“It's important to keep a field intact. You don't wanna have a bad field because that's just going to make it harder on you to judge the ball,” Bahl said. “Which is why many of us rather

play on grass than turf”

With mostly playing on grass fields the players and coaches once they know it will rain cover the field to help prevent ruts, washouts, and loss of dirt.

“If it's raining we won't play, we will ruin the dirt and grass,” said Bahl. “We bring out the rain covers which is a lot of work to cover the field”

The day before a game day, the field will be put in its best shape. The coaches flatten the dirt with rake to smooth out the pile left by the drag. They use a hand rake to groom the base paths, home plate area and the back radius of the infield.

“Everyone has a different job on the field to make sure it's in good shape,” Bahl said. “The coach uses the tractor to drag it and all of us have different tools we use.”

With all the hard work to keep the field ready for games everyone on the team has its importance to keep the field clean to benefit themselves while playing.

“Even though we know that it is hard to keep the field intact, we still want to refurbish it,” Bahl said. “All of our hard work will benefit us to win more games.”

Sophomore places at State swim meet

On Feb. 18, sopomore Stephanie Oiesen placed 5th in the 100 backstroke with a time of 57.30 and 6th in the 200 freestyle with at time of 1.53.09 at the State UIL swim meet.

She broke the Hendrickson school record for 100 backstroke with a time of 56.96 and broke the team and school record for freestyle with a time of 1.52.49 in the preliminary rounds.