Folks,
Myself and a few other of the baseball folk from Central Illinois are trying to organize something similar to the Schaumburg Flyers Classic. We want to hold it in late April/early May at O'Brien Stadium in downtown Peoria. We have some issues/concerns that maybe you folks can give us direction on.
1) Teams-First and foremost, we need prospective teams. The Teams from the Peoria area that we know are in (because they're helping plan it) are Limestone and Illinois Valley Central. Other possibilities include (but they haven't been extended invitations): Galesburg, Springfield Sacred Heart-Griffin, Olympia, Beardstown, Rock Falls and Ottawa. Don't be concerned about the Class A schools on the list. They're more than willing to play up and they have the talent to hold their own.
We'd be looking at pairing these schools against the best of the best from the Chicago area and even St. Louis. So if anyone has suggestions for looking ahead one year, throw them out there. We're looking for teams that are traditionally very strong (in the Addison Driscoll, LaGrange Lyons vein) and teams that have also been blessed with major Division I/draftable talent.
2)Format-While I like Schaumburg's format, I'm not sure every coach likes burning at least three pitchers (at least) in one weekend, especially so late in the season. We're thinking of a shootout (for lack of a better term) format, with each team playing once on Friday and again on Saturday. Is pitching that much of a problem at Schaumburg or am I making too much of it?
3) Conference games-One of my cohorts raised a question about conference games. Are there some schools in the Chicago area that play conference games on the weekend?
For any coaches interested, you can e-mail me at BDiggle74@yahoo.com. We'd love to have you call come down and see our gem of a ballpark and see what Central Illinois baseball has to offer.
Thanks for your time,
Ben Diggle
Peoria Journal Star
Sports Dept.
Original Post