Australian Baseball League revamps competition
The Australian Baseball League will introduce an international hub for its 2020-21 season in an effort to keep the competition alive, with three Australian teams locked in an overseas hub.
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Brisbane Bandits owner Mark Ready said baseball’s refusal to be “defeated by a virus’’ should be congratulated after a revamped Australian Baseball League was unveiled overnight.
The Bandits organisation has made a number of significant sacrifices to play its part in reducing the potential impact of COVID-19 in the season which starts in December.
Key changes include:
+ Brisbane Bandits would spend the majority of the 24-game season in a hub in New Zealand as part of the International Conference. This conference would include Auckland, Adelaide and Geelong-Korea along with a possible fifth international’ team.
+ The Bandits’ sole home series would be against Adelaide in late December or early January
+ Effectively Brisbane has given up two home series and will go into the hub to help ensure an ABL season this summer
+ The Bandits will no longer be in the same division as rivals Sydney and Canberra. The two conferences this season will not face each other until the playoffs, which the format for has not been finalised.
+ Brisbane’s conference would also play seven-inning games rather than the traditional nine
“We don’t want to be defeated in sport by a virus,’’ Ready said.
“Sport plays a big part in the lives of many people, especially kids and Bandits baseball is very family orientated.
“We are heads down, working away and waiting to get the season underway,’’ he said.
Under the new-look model each team will play 24 games with the International
Conference likely to be based almost entirely in New Zealand at Auckland’s North
Harbour Stadium.
The Auckland Tuatara will be joined by Geelong-Korea with the Adelaide Giants
and Brisbane Bandits also entering the New Zealand ‘hub’ after playing each
other home-and-away in Australia.
An international team is also in the mix to join the International Conference as the fifth team and ABL’s ninth.
Canberra Cavalry, Melbourne Aces, Perth Heat and the Sydney Blue Sox will play
home-and-away in Australia with no crossover play between the two
conferences until the playoffs.
“We’ve faced massive obstacles just to get to this point and our work isn’t done
yet, but in front of us now is a really appealing model to work to,’’ Baseball Australia chief executive Cam Vale said.
“A New Zealand hub allows us to overcome the possibility a Trans-Tasman bubble will not be set up by our season to allow weekly in-and-out travel, which would have put a huge question mark over Auckland competing.”
He said the hub model would see the International Conference play seven-inning games
with most contests part of double-headers.
But the Australian Conference will retain traditional nine-inning games as part of
its home-and-away schedule.
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Vale said the new-look structure would see the bulk of the 96 regular-season
games played during the popular January school holiday period.
Ready was also excited about the prospect of additional television coverage, saying the sport was perfect for TV.
Broadcast details were yet to be finalised, although the ABL stated:
“The ABL has been in promising discussions with domestic and international broadcast partners”