Cape Goats: Hartford set for historic game

The Cape Cod Baseball League will make history with an assist from the Hartford Yard Goats next week, when the storied summer collegiate league plays its first regular season game ever in the state of Connecticut.
While arranging an event across state lines for such a historic circuit might seem like a monumental undertaking, it didn't really play out that way.
"It's funny," Wareham Gatemen general manager Andrew Lang said with a laugh. "It took 12 hours to put this together."

On July 24, Lang's Gatemen will take the field at the home of the Rockies' Double-A affiliate, hosting the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox in a day of firsts for the teams, their players and their league -- as well as for the Yard Goats.
"[Hartford president Tim Restall] called me up in the afternoon," Lang said of a conversation that took place this spring. "The next mid-morning, I called him up and said, 'Hey, this is a go.' I had to get approval from, obviously, my coaching staff. The team we're playing against, we had to run it by them to see if it was something they're interested in, and then I had to run it up to the commissioner and ask him if we could do it. Everybody said yes. Everybody said it was a great opportunity."
Founded in 1885, and now partially backed by Major League Baseball, the Cape League is the preeminent summer circuit for college stars. From June until August, some of the nation's top amateurs test themselves -- using wood bats, sometimes for the first time -- in the 10-team proving ground that has produced well over 1,000 Major Leaguers, including 306 alumni who saw action in The Show last year. While the league has churned out professionals on an annual basis, it's rarely found itself in surroundings like it will in Hartford. Lang wanted to change that.

"I've taken our team on essentially barnstorming [tours] before our season starts," he said. "I had never thought about doing it for a regular season game. A couple years ago we went around [Massachusetts] to Brockton, Worcester, Martha's Vineyard [and] Bristol, Connecticut. We took a little tour around as a preseason thing. I don't know, I saw an opportunity to maybe get the word out. Sometimes the Cape League is a little isolated. I know people involved in college baseball know what the Cape League is, but a lot of people don't. Any way we can get the word out is a positive for me."
Prior to the 2018 season, the Yard Goats -- who have hosted Connecticut high school and college games as well as USA Baseball's Collegiate National Team among their special events at Dunkin' Donuts Park -- made a pitch to the Cape League.
"We had a ton of demand for daytime games for tickets and hospitality, and we only had a few this year," Yard Goats general manager Mike Abramson said. "We just had so much demand that we sat around and said, 'How can we get some sort of baseball game here in the park on a weekday during the summer?' I think when you think of baseball and you think of the summer, if you're not thinking of affiliated baseball, you think of the Cape League."
That's certainly true for New Englanders like Abramson, who grew up going to Chatham Anglers games. Lang jumped at the idea.
"Hartford, they could put on a game upside-down, in their sleep," Wareham's GM said. "It's real easy for them, and for us, it's just kind of logistics. Hartford is grabbing a bus for everybody. We'll head over there. They're feeding us after the game, making sure everything's all set. For us, it's just promoting it on our end and making sure everyone wakes up in time to get on the bus to get there."
The game provided myriad marketing opportunities for both the Goats and the Cape League.
"If the people in Hartford or in Connecticut enjoy it, come to Wareham," Lang said. "People in Connecticut can make it a day trip if they want. Western Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, get in your car, come on down, catch a game, and if not, we'll bring a game to you maybe once a year, maybe once every couple of years."
The Yard Goats were eager to capitalize on a different baseball element in their home confines.
"Our president, Tim Restall, that is a huge focus of his job -- finding outside events that are open and of interest to the general public like our Brewfest and our movie nights where we play movies and it's open to folks in the city," Abramson said. "I think people hold the Cape League in such high regard, that's the type of stuff we want in the ballpark. Those are the types of things that continue to reinforce the perception that this is a world-class ballpark, something that is thought of so highly that they want to bring their product here to showcase it."
From a practical standpoint, Dunkin' Donuts Park will open its gates, sell tickets and concessions and welcome a crowd on July 24, but there's much more to the game than just business.
"We have 70-some games," Abramson said of his team's Eastern League schedule. "We do essentially the same thing day-in and day-out, so when you get these younger guys to come out and get to play on the field, and you get to watch them react for the day, everybody pays attention. It's pretty cool, and not to mention that there's going to be a lot of press. We're going to know the names to watch. We're going to see a lot of guys out there who are probably going to be big stars in several years. I mean, [Boston Red Sox ace] Chris Sale played for the Yarmouth-Dennis team not long ago, and a guy from around here who everybody knows, [Houston Astros outfielder and 2017 World Series MVP] George Springer, he played for Wareham.
"For us, I think that we get to attach ourselves to their long and storied and respected name, and they get to bring their guys out there to play in this beautiful ballpark. And by the way, almost all of these guys are going to go on to Minor League Baseball teams, and a lot of them are going to go on to Major League Baseball teams. It's the first look at a park like this for them, as well."

Garrett Hampson played in the Cape League in 2015. (Terrance Williams/MiLB.com)
Like Abramson, Lang is enthusiastic about seeing a group of soon-to-be professionals playing in a Minor League park.
"Everybody's excited," said Lang, who toured Dunkin' Donuts Park last year with then-Hartford manager Jerry Weinstein, who piloted Wareham in 2016. "A lot of our guys do go on to play [in the Minors], but they all don't get to play at Double-A stadiums.
"They might not get out of [Class] A ball, some of the kids. You never know. And they've been playing on high school fields all summer, so what better way to get them off a high school field and get them onto a Double-A field and let them go out there and have some fun."
Since it opened its gates in 2017, Dunkin' Donuts Park has emerged as one of the Minors' crown jewel ballparks -- and one of the busiest. After a tumultuous construction process that included legal hurdles, work stoppages and lengthy delays led to an Opening Day a year later than anticipated, the Yard Goats have made sure to show the Hartford community that the ballpark is theirs, not the team's.
"The very first hashtag that we ever used when we announced that baseball was coming to Hartford was '#MoreThanBaseball' so I can say confidently that the plan was for it to always be a public venue that was used for events aside from [Yard Goats] baseball," Abramson said. "Obviously, Yard Goats baseball was always going to be the showpiece of what we do, but from Day 1, that was always the plan. We would love to be doing more events like this. I think each year that we do these things, we build a tradition, and hopefully these events become annual events. Once you build a base of those, you can build on top."
"We're in a state that is book-ended by major sports markets. When all of our folks who came out and consulted on this project came and met with folks in the general public in Hartford and met with the business community, the one thing that they found is that the folks here in Connecticut were hungry to have something that was their own. We are a Minor League Baseball team, and I know that, but we market like we're a Major League team. We market like we're Connecticut's Major League team."
The Cape League has crossed paths with big-time baseball before -- including all-star games at Fenway Park -- but Lang hopes this next step is one of many to come.
"I'm just one team, and luckily I had a partner with Yarmouth-Dennis, who was more than willing and really eager to do something like this," he said. "If it were really up to me, we'd play one game a year in Hartford, we'd play one game a year up in Portland, [Maine], maybe one game a year up in Pawtucket and just try to go around New England and play one game. The work to get it done really isn't too much, because you're dealing with a group, whether it's Hartford or Portland or Pawtucket, who can put these games on in their sleep. It's not the legwork. It's getting everybody on the same page as far as the logistics of everything for us to get there and do stuff like that. We'll see. It's definitely something that I'd like to explore."
"We'll play a game anywhere. I'll go anywhere. If anyone wants to get in contact with me, I'll go play anywhere if I'm allowed to."