Dirt vs Grass Base Paths

quote:

Originally posted by coachbyrd:
What are the pros and cons of having grass base paths between home and 1st and 3rd and home?

Now there’s a question that should elicit a lot of different answers.

A weak con for me would be that it bucks tradition.

I can’t see how it would be possible for a normal program with limited funds, to be able to keep the grass intact, unless the field use was minimal. The 3rd base line would likely hold up fairly well, but the 1st base line would have its grass pretty well beat up in just a few games, and there’d be no way to get it to recover during the season because grass grows too slowly.

Once the grass starts to get worn out, unless it’s a grass like Bermuda that spreads by sending out stolons, there’s no way the traffic areas won’t become lumpy and bumpy, depending on the severity, it will cause crazy bounces on bunts, and might cause injuries like a turned ankle. And when the grass gets thinner because of wear, weeds will have a perfect spot to grow because they normally are fast growers, and will quickly take over.

One Pro for grass base paths is that the majority of most amatuer and HS fields are not taken care of by professional groundskeepers.....

The amatuers skills are usually limited to cutting the grass and dragging the infield... the vast majority of the fields I get to call on with dirt base paths are over dragged (base patchs wallowed out)....

Grass base paths can eliminate the uneven base paths.....but given the skills of the people keeping care of the field, your results might vary..

I have grown our paths in and will continue to do so as long as I have to coach, teach, and do field maint. The maint. of grass paths is simple compaired to dirt. Basically just have the same routine you have for the rest of the infield. To help prevent wear we have a protective cover we lay down during practice. Actually we have as much wear and tear on our third base line because of the way we run practice, but neither side is a problem to maintain.

Amen to what d8 said.
I love working on my field, but I hate edging grass baselines. Grooming my infield edge (from 1st to 3rd) is enough for me without doing both sides of the home to 1st/3rd lines. Also, when you alone are responsible for getting your wet field ready...it's nice to know the baselines are gonna be ok without raking/diamond drying them.

Dirt vs. grass base paths is a difference between a foul or fair ball.

Our local community just build a brand new stadium. It opened very late this season. It has a grandstand with overhang that seats about 300 and there are lots of sits that are like at a big league ballpark. Anyways back to the subject. We have grass basepaths. The city owns the field and takes care of cutting the grass. We played 2 games on it at the end of our season. The grass was so long that there was no way a ground ball was getting through the infield at a fast rate. After about 2 games by us, 1 game by the town team and a 14 year old state tournament you could tell the ware and tare of the basepaths and the grass right in front of the dugout was getting beat up pretty bad. The one good thing i saw about was we dragged the infield with the gator and then he drove the gator down by the batters box and dragged in a big circle and we were pretty much done with field care.