Father‘s Day at Wuerful Park

June 14, 2009

Father’s Day at Wuerfel Park
Beach Bums team up with Little League

By Rick Coates 6/15/09

When the Wuerfel family decided to bring professional baseball to Northern Michigan, they wanted to have the team and their stadium to become an asset for the region. They have succeeded. Now in their fourth season, the Traverse City Beach Bums and Wuerfel Park have become a summertime destination for local and visiting families.
Going to a Beach Bums game has become part of the summertime culture in Northern Michigan. The Bums play a full schedule of games in the Frontier League, made up of some of the best professional players under the age of 25 hoping to make it to the big leagues someday.

FATHER’S DAY
In keeping with their mission of giving back to the community, the Traverse City Beach Bums have created “Little League Night” for their game this Sunday (Father’s Day) with the Florence Freedom as a way to benefit youth baseball in the region, by offering Little League players the opportunity to sell tickets to raise money for their fields.
“The Wuerfels and their organization are baseball people. They love the game and are very supportive of the efforts of youth baseball in the area,” said Mark Newhouse, co-chair of the Traverse City Little League Fundraising Committee. “This is their third year of supporting our league with a special night. It is an impressive sight to see all the kids there with their uniforms on.”
Little League players are selling tickets for $10 apiece (chairbacks) and the Traverse City Beach Bums are contributing back $5 for each ticket sold. Little League has earmarked the funds for much needed field improvements.
“The conditions of our fields were not only embarrassing; they were unsafe,” said Brad Garmhausen, a coach and co-chair of the field improvements at Elmwood Township. “In the past six months we have invested more than $100,000 in improving our fields.”
Those field improvements included an $80,000 renovation of the Elmwood Township field, making it now the best Little League field north of Grand Rapids. The Traverse City Little League will host the 11/10-year-old All Star tournament in July at their new facility.
“Everyone wants to come to Traverse City, but we just have not had the fields to host tournaments,” said Garmhausen. “This is just the first step in the process; eventually we plan to have a central field complex.”

600 PLAYERS
The Traverse City Little League has more than 600 players and is part of Michigan Little League District 8 that covers communities from Manistee over to Tawas to Mackinaw City. It is part of Little League
International, and teams will start competing for their chance to make it to the Little League World Series.
“Last year, three teams from Traverse City won districts and moved on to the State Championship round and one team made it to the semi finals of the state,” said Garmhausen. “We have some great talent here in Northern Michigan; we just need the fields to support these kids.”
Omelette from the popular morning show on WKLT (97.5 and 98.9) agrees. “Our morning show has sponsored a team, the Omelette & Finster Pirates. I coached Little League in Connecticut before I moved here to Traverse City. It is a great game, a game that requires thinking as much as skill,” said Omelette. “We are getting behind this ticket promotion in a big way and plan to get ‘The People’ (their listeners) out in big numbers.”
The team that sells the most tickets will have their players introduced on the field with the Beach Bums. The game starts at 5 p.m. After the game, Beach Bums will allow all players and other kids the opportunity to come onto the field to run the base paths.
Only tickets sold by Little League players count towards the promotion. Little League hopes to sell 2,000 tickets and raise $10,000.
To purchase tickets to benefit Little League, contact Union Kate of the Omelette & Finster show Monday through Friday 6 a.m.-noon at 231-947-0003. Players from the Omelette and Finster Pirates will be on the show Friday, June 19, 8 am-10 am to sell tickets. For additional information about Little League or how you might be able to help with funds for their fields, contact Mark Newhouse 231-218-4023. For additional details on the Traverse City Beach Bums and a look at their schedule (they play games into early September), check out traversecitybeachbums.com.