Big league feeling in Center Township
CENTER TWP — The Center Township Baseball Association is not the big leagues — but it is creating a big league feel.
One of the Association’s five baseball fields was refurbished last season by DuraEdge Engineered Soils, a company based in Grove City that works on major league, college, high school and youth diamonds.
“Our officers and kids’ parents got together and decided this is something we wanted to do,” CTBA vice president Brad Dolhi said. “We felt like we could raise enough funds to get one field done a year.
“It’s a safety thing, first and foremost. A lot of youth baseball fields consist of dust and rock these days. One day of rain can make a field unplayable for a week. That’s not an ideal situation for keeping kids interested in baseball.”
Center Township’s Baseball Association serves youths ages 3 to 20. More than 400 youths comprise its teams.
Last spring, the Association decided to apply for a grant through the Pittsburgh Pirate Charities’ Fields for Kids program. It received word late last fall that Pirate Charities would put $13,798 toward the fields’ refurbishing project.
The Center Township Association had to match the grant total and provide specific information as to what the grant money would be used for.
“Our entire organization is volunteer,” said Mike MacDonald, one of Center Township’s coaches. “We fund-raise, take donations and put a lot of work into upkeep of our fields. This grant will impact those efforts.”
“We’re not a wealthy community,” Dolhi said. “There’s nobody handing us a seven-figure donation or anything like that. We look to get funding any way we can. Our concession stands need upgraded, our parking situation ... We need help in a lot of areas, but we targeted this money toward our fields because that’s what is most important to the kids.”
Dolhi said the grant money is enabling Center Township to bring DuraEdge in to refurbish two more fields. Those fields are expected to be done in time for the Association’s Opening Day in late April.
DuraEdge will scrape away the shale and rocks from the field, apply its own infield dressing and through laser grading install proper drainage so the playing surface will drain in all directions from the pitching mound.
“They did an amazing job on our field last year,” Dolhi said. “We didn’t lose any games to rain there. If it poured hard one day, we were on that field playing the next day.”
MacDonald said the Association chose to refurbish the fields involving kids ages 7 to 14 first “because those are our fields that are used the most.”
Center Township’s youth baseball numbers have shot up since the COVID year of 2020, when the organization offered free baseball to kids 10-under.
“We gave kids and families something to do and interest in baseball around here grew again,” Dolhi said. “We’ve doubled our numbers over the past two years.
Baseball signups are being accepted now at centertownshipaa.com.
The Association is beginning a “spring training” Monday in the CT Elementary School gym. That will include practicing on the already refurbished field.
“We want to give the kids an opportunity to experience what spring training is like,” MacDonald said. “The whole idea is to get them into baseball. We want to get that started now.”
