17U WWBA Ft. Myers September 29th - October 3rd

I am not sticking up for anyone, but this is Florida folks.

It's pretty amazing that we have actually not had bad weather this summer, but we natives knew with the waters being exceptionally warm things were going to heat up. Look at what happened with Fiona. FWIW this is peak hurricane time.

Once the storm hits the path is to hit the panhandle perhaps go up through GA or cross the state and hit Jacksonville.

But hurricanes are umpredictable.

My suggestion is that you have been given fair warning. There are 3 more days until landfall.  Use your best judgment.  Many are now being forced to evacuate in the Tampa area including tourists.

PG or any other company will not cancel an event until they absolutely have to.

Use your best judgment!

Having grown up on the NC coast and eastern NC, I am ALL TOO familiar with hurricanes. They are extremely unpredictable and can cause major havoc! I for one don't mess around with them and I am not driving 12 hours through NC, SC, GA and Florida in hurricane/TS winds and rains. No tournament is worth the potential for a serious accident!

Plus, it's just rude to tax the local area when the locals are already having fuel shortages and supply issues! That's just my 2 cents on that!

As far as I am aware, there hasn't been too many shortages of gas, water, supplies, etc anywhere. And little rain this summer but there is that storm surge.

@IKETBD posted:

Just heard from a friend that our ‘24 team canceled attending.  (I wonder if they will get their $ back?) There’s no way that they will be able to fly in from the Midwest.  And once there, will there even be any college coaches?  This team does only one national tourney, and this was it.  Now those boys have even less exposure opportunities in a saturated market.  PG should re-schedule and not string teams along.

I enjoyed the PG events in FL and GA when my son played. But you don't need to do PG for college recruiting. Do the right regional showcases and/or tournaments. The player is more likely to shine regionally without the distraction of the top national studs. Besides, with the D1 world the way it is now unless a kid is a top shelf stud coming out of high school there probably isn't the need to do PG FL and GA.

Looks pretty bad here in FL. Folks have had to evacuate according to zones, and airports closing.  Students at Flagler in St Augustine sent home. UF, FSU as well as Jacksonville on hold.

Ian possibly headed to Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina next.

@TPM posted:

Looks pretty bad here in FL. Folks have had to evacuate according to zones, and airports closing.  Students at Flagler in St Augustine sent home. UF, FSU as well as Jacksonville on hold.

Ian possibly headed to Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina next.

Stay safe!!!

My son's coach just told him that they were canceling the event. But I have not seen anything on their page yet is on their page.

Officially cancelled. What’s next for all the kids who had coaches lined up to watch them play? Scramble to get to as many camps as possible?

It says something about relocating the event to Jupiter/West Palm. While that area won't have the wind damage the Gulf Coast is going to get, the rain will last longer in that area.

Our team canceled yesterday too. A bit ago, just received an email from PG canceling the event. It seems that the PG is working on alternative ways as below.

9/27 10AM EST Update:
After our morning discussions with Lee County officials, we have both decided that it is in everyone’s best interest to cancel the event in Fort Myers. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we continued to monitor the weather over the last few days.  We are working on a few alternative events:

October 1st-3rd - WWBA Underclass Championship relocated to Jupiter/West Palm, FL
October 7th-10th – WWBA Underclass Fall Nationals in Fort Pierce, FL

@Baseballdad2024 posted:

Our team canceled yesterday too. A bit ago, just received an email from PG canceling the event. It seems that the PG is working on alternative ways as below.

9/27 10AM EST Update:
After our morning discussions with Lee County officials, we have both decided that it is in everyone’s best interest to cancel the event in Fort Myers. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we continued to monitor the weather over the last few days.  We are working on a few alternative events:

October 1st-3rd - WWBA Underclass Championship relocated to Jupiter/West Palm, FL
October 7th-10th – WWBA Underclass Fall Nationals in Fort Pierce, FL

In my personal opinion, I can't see the 10/1 - 10/3 dates working.  That would still mean that people would have to travel into Florida this Thursday/Friday. With the widespread effect of this storm on Florida, I can't see that being a viable option.

@BaseballMOM05 posted:

In my personal opinion, I can't see the 10/1 - 10/3 dates working.  That would still mean that people would have to travel into Florida this Thursday/Friday. With the widespread effect of this storm on Florida, I can't see that being a viable option.

I'm sure they'd be able to scrape together 30-40 teams willing to drive to Jupiter. The weather won't be as bad driving down the east coast. I'm not saying it won't be tough driving, but it won't be as bad as driving through the middle of a hurricane. There also won't be much damage on the east coast and the flood waters should recede by the weekend.

@DroppedStrikeThree posted:

Officially cancelled. What’s next for all the kids who had coaches lined up to watch them play? Scramble to get to as many camps as possible?

No coaches will be going with this weather unless they are local.  Since it was cancelled my son is going to a camp this weekend instead which those coaches are excited about since they weren't sending anyone to WWBA.

Looks like they made the right decision.

I hope all our posters in Florida are safe.

They are moving it to Jupiter and trying to figure out how many teams are playing. There is another small PG tournament already scheduled this weekend for Jupiter. The area got a ton of rain but should be dried out by the weekend

@TerribleBPthrower posted:

They are moving it to Jupiter and trying to figure out how many teams are playing. There is another small PG tournament already scheduled this weekend for Jupiter. The area got a ton of rain but should be dried out by the weekend

I just looked and there are 37 teams signed up.

Wow. It was 100 teams this morning. Looks like down to 33 teams now.

It is still going to be very difficult to travel into Florida over the next day or two with the residual affects of Ian.  It's coming through GA, SC and NC.   Awful storm!

Turface dealers in Jupiter going to make a killing this weekend thanks to PG.

Mostly FL teams. This is a tournament I would typically look forward to. It won’t be anywhere close to what it usually is. If I were coming from out of town I’d be having second thoughts on the time and expenses.

Rain should be gone by tomorrow afternoon and the fields should be ready for play by Friday afternoon. No rain expected this weekend.