The Martha’s Vineyard Sharks, newly affiliated with the New England Collegiate Baseball League (NECBL), is looking for eight to 10 families who will open their homes to Sharks players, a decades-long tradition in minor leagues and summer collegiate leagues.
Players and their families bond, and often stay in touch long after the player leaves the local town and continues with his collegiate and, often, professional baseball career. Each host family receives a season pass for each family member to games, and the Sharks provide a Sharks T shirt and cap for each member of the family. The Sharks also set aside a “host family day” before a season-ending home game to provide on-field recognition to each host family. Many families host several players. Interested families can reach General Manager Russ Curran at 508-813-0380 or check the mvsharks.com website for details and contacts. Players will be on-Island by May 31, and stay until mid-August.
Host families provide a bedroom, bedding, and linens (sheets, towels, and blanket), with a regular bed, and access to laundry and the kitchen. Providing the players with food and access to the Internet is not mandatory, but encouraged. Host families are not required to provide transportation (many players have cars).
The Sharks and the NECBL insist on a good citizenship culture for their players. Though the 44-game schedule between June 1 and early August is difficult, players may work a part-time job, but they’re also encouraged to work at the Sharks baseball camps for kids, speak to groups on behalf of the Sharks, and participate in local charity work, such as hospital visits or Habitat for Humanity.
Host families run from young families with baseball-happy kids to empty nesters.
Longtime host families love the experience. For example, retired Dukes County Register of Deeds Dianne Powers of West Tisbury has filled her home with these young players for nine years. Add in her brood of four Great Dane show dogs, and it’s a full house: “The greatest part of hosting is getting to know the kids. They are all nice kids, and I think they like the dogs. The benefit of hosting is they get to be part of a promising young player’s life, whether in baseball or after.
“I think a home with a Little Leaguer in it is the perfect match. What better mentor could a kid have? In my mind that’s a perfect host family,” she said.
And then there’s the prospect of knowing a future major league player. The NECBL affiliation offers a higher level of competition for baseball fans, according to Russ Curran, Sharks general manager. “It is rated the second best league in the country after the Cape Cod League. In the NECBL’s 25-year history, more than 150 guys have made it to the Major Leagues,” he said.
And for longstanding Sharks fans, the 23-man roster will have lots of big-school Division One talent, but lots of familiar faces.Catchers Nick Raposo and Josh Spiegel, outfielders Matt Chamberlain and Kai Nelson, infielder Jackson Raper, and pitchers Bryan Ketchie and Devon Dimascio are coming back from the 2018 co-champion Futures Collegiate Baseball League team.