Bringing baseball back

DUNKIRK — Deon Jeffers just got off of his third-shift factory job.

On his drive home, he passed the fields he used to grow up playing at and decided to give them a visit.

Walking through the overgrown and vandalized park was a disappointing reminder to Jeffers of the state of his hometown league, but it also sparked an idea.

Two months and a healthy amount of work later, baseball is coming back to Dunkirk.

After a five-year absence, Dunkirk Junior League baseball will come back after Jeffers got the inspiration to revive the league.

The league last played in 2018, and failed to get enough kids to sign up in 2019 according to a post on the Dunkirk Junior League Facebook page on March 21, 2019. Since then, baseball has been absent from Dunkirk.

“It almost made me cry to see something that I cared about so much in my childhood in that state,” said Jeffers, the new president of the league. “My daughter … was the reason I wanted to get this going. That way she could play on the same diamonds I grew up on. …

“I’ve got friends for life through baseball and softball and I wanted to make sure that was ready for the next generation. That was my real driving factor to show my daughter that if you make a friend on that ball diamond, more than likely 20 years from now, you’ll be sitting in the bleachers with your friend watching your kids.”

After seeing the state of the fields and the absence of a league the past years, Jeffers took to his friend group on Facebook to see if there would be interest to restart the league. He described the feedback and support that he received as “overwhelming,” ensuring that revival was an achievable goal.

While interest in having a league existed, it wasn’t possible to play on the fields in that state.

The support of the community tackled that problem head on.

Jeffers found a group of people willing to help work on the field, and with efforts made on June 7 and June 9, turned the diamonds from grass fields with home plates to diamonds that could be played on.

That wasn’t all that needed to be done. Thanks to fundraising efforts of Jeffers and Dru Hall and donations – monetary and labor – from local businesses, the group was able to replace fencing that was struggling to stand up, renovate the concessions area and scoring towers, replace sections of bleachers and build a new scoring tower.

Pictured above is the sign that sits next to Haskel Road outside of Dunkirk Junior League. Over the last two months, the fields have been worked on to get rid of the weeds and grass, fencing was replaced and the score towers, dugouts and concessions were renovated in preparation for the restart of the league. (The Commercial Review/Andrew Balko)

 

“For me it’s overwhelming and not overwhelming in a bad way,” Jeffers said. “(The support) is a lot bigger than I ever expected.”

That support has culminated in the renewed league that is set to open up at 6 p.m. Monday.

Going forward, the board plans to continue holding the league in the late summer and the fall to avoid conflicting with other leagues.

“We picked the fall so that it wasn’t competing with the other leagues,” said vice president Cory Ward. “This is a community process. We have our kids who play in Redkey as well, so we didn’t want to fight for the kids.”

“It’s more opportunities year round, not just all at the same time,” treasurer Mikaela Robbins added.

Between the community interest within Dunkirk and holding the league at a different time, the league has amassed 313 kids to register to play.

“It’s all centered around the kids,” Ward said.

“I don’t even have kids,” said grounds crew manager Spencer Pittman. “We just want them to be able to have everything we had when we were younger and to know that no matter what’s going on in the world, baseball is going to be there for them.”

“One of the most important things is how the community has jumped in and the support that’s behind it,” Jeffers added. “I’d just want to thank the community for the support, the donors and all those that have given their time and the eight board members who have gone down this rabbit hole with me and made it all possible.”