Club Baseball Weathers Financial Struggles

“Hey, this ain’t the MLB, kid. We only have five balls,” said one of the Harvard club baseball team members when a fan caught a foul ball and wanted to keep it.

When Harvard decided to get rid of junior varsity sports programs and transform them into club programs due to budget cuts, the Harvard club baseball team had to take on a good deal of the financial burden. The guys lost their coaches and had to schedule practices and games themselves. The Undergraduate Council Finance Committee gives the club baseball team $2,000, but it’s not enough to cover all of the squad’s equipment.

But these setbacks have not stopped the club from succeeding and coming together as a team. Even though it’s not a varsity sport, the team takes the practices and games just as seriously. The men are 7-1 so far for the fall season. It may sound crazy for a baseball team to already be playing games this early in the school year, but the squad plays a full season in both the fall and the spring.

Yesterday, the club baseball team continued its winning trend, defeating Holy Cross at O’Donnell Field, 6-3, in seven innings. Junior pitcher Stefan Botarelli struck out the first three batters he faced, and senior outfielder Nick Purcell caught two fly balls in one inning. Botarelli then hit a triple and stole home on the next play. Junior catcher Adam Arthurs also stepped up to the plate and played a phenomenal game.

Two weeks ago, the squad traveled to Yale for a double-header, crushing the Bulldogs in both games. The team plays mostly a mix of other club and junior varsity teams around the area, including the University of New Hampshire and Maine.

Even though the fall season is almost over, the men have the spring season to look forward to. They hope to continue their success, showing off all of the hard work they have put into the season in front of a crowd of their friends.

“I’ll bring you oranges during halftime,” one of the fans yelled to Botarelli.

“We don’t even have a halftime,” he responded.

Maybe now that the guys have found success on the field, they can work on teaching some of the fans more about the basics of the game.