Momentum is building among local softball fans, men and women alike, as signups are underway, following last week’s manager and player interest meeting for Malibu’s first official city-sponsored adult coed softball league.
“Our goal is to field six full teams,” said Steve Leungsikul of the city Parks and Recreation Department, who will act as coordinator of the league under Director Bob Stallings. “With six teams, three games can be played every Sunday afternoon during the season, which will last for 10 weeks from June 18 to September 10.”
The next step is the open team registration process, which begins May 30, Leungsikul said. Teams must organize on their own, then register and pay the $450 season league fee by June 9. The first six teams that do so will make up the league. The amount of the season fee, plus $20 per team per game, which is needed to pay umpires, field monitors and other necessary personnel and buy special items such as championship trophies, was determined by a survey of similar adult leagues already existing in other cities, he said.
“Anyone who wants to play but doesn’t have a team affiliation can call us and we’ll be glad to help him or her find a team to join,” Leungsikul said.
John Haag, acknowledged by Leungsikul as the sparkplug behind the whole idea of an adult softball league in Malibu, is the acting commissioner of an unofficial “Field of Dreams Committee” that has been promoting the formation of a league since early this year.
A longtime fan and player himself, Haag played both softball and football in a lawyers’ league before the constraining demands of his home and business life in Malibu, and coaching his daughter Lauren in Little League, left no time for it. But being involved with Lauren, who now plays on the Malibu High varsity team, and again with his younger daughter Hayley in Little League, made him acutely aware of how much he missed playing himself. He even put up a batting cage in his own backyard so he could at least smack some flies and grounders.
He soon found that many friends felt the same as he, so last January he sent out a questionnaire in a mass e-mailing to a number of Malibuites-Little League and high school team parents, friends and neighbors-to sound out interest in forming a league of their own.
“I got over a hundred replies,” he said, “from women as well as men, of all ages and all levels of ability, interested in all types of softball, slow pitch and fast. So I checked with the city Parks and Recreation Department, told them about the results of my survey and asked about the possibility of the city backing a softball league.”
Both Stallings and Leungsikul were receptive to the idea but pointed out that space and time presented some problems, with Bluffs Park being taken up with Little League play most of the time. Also, as there were no lights for evening play, games would have to be played only in the daytime. And finally, being under city sponsorship, the league would have to be open to both women and men.
Haag’s “Field of Dreams” survey had already shown that this presented no problem, so the formulation of specific plans and schedules for Malibu’s first Adult Coed Softball League was soon underway. The preliminary schedule worked out by the city calls for games to be played at 1, 2, and 3 p.m. on Sundays.
“With the long hours of daylight in the summer, limiting games to seven innings or an hour and a half, whichever comes first, will allow three games to be played each afternoon,” Leungsikul said. “Because of the traditional summer holidays, no games will be scheduled for July 2, 23, or Sept 3.”
Playoff games would take place on Sept. 17 as needed, he said. Awards for the winners are already being planned: a team plaque and individual league champion sweatshirts for first place, and a team plaque for the runners-up.
Leungsikul and Haag urged anyone interested in this newest community activity to sign up for a team, regardless of their perceived levels of ability to play the game or in what capacity they would like to participate.
With a sizeable enough turnout, Haag, in true Field of Dreams fashion, envisions separate divisions based on experience and ability. He even hopes eventually to establish a fast-pitch softball club, with the players recruited from the most experienced players who turn out for this league.
“We’ve built it,” he said. “Now will they come?”
Interested ballplayers can contact Steve Leungsikul at 310.456.2489 ext. 363, John Haag at 310.200.9513 or Kathy Haag at 310.779.0983.