2004 NW Indiana HS Baseball: "The Ballparks"

Baseball is more a product of where it is played than any other team sport. All ballparks are different. All of them. All playing fields are a different size. Even the ones that are similar face in different directions, deal with different winds and are surrounded by different types of neighborhoods.

While football and basketball facilities are a place where you play, baseball parks are a place where you live. A place where you spend days and nights. Sit in the sun and wait out the rain. Baseball fields aren't supposed to be functional, they're supposed to look like they belong to the game. Like that place was destined to be a ballpark. Like it shouldn't ever be anything else.

Part of the pleasure of covering baseball is to go to the ballpark. There are so many different ones at high schools in northwest Indiana. There are a lot of Babe Ruth and Little League fields that few, except players and parents, see. Then there's the pro fields that are built to be as aesthetically pleasant as money can buy.

Here's the first list of the top baseball fields in one person's travels. Let's start with the ones that won't ever change. And if I have a detail or two wrong, forgive me. I'm going totally from memory.

WHITING - It has fallen into some disrepair in recent years, but Whiting Park is timeless. A park within a park, you are surrounded by bike-riding and kids playing. I'm told the scene has changed little in decades. A cute, little park with a perfect region background, the oil refineries and the lake. The lake. Lake Michigan dominates Whiting Park, dropping temperatures 10-20 degrees when you approach the park. Gulls circle before and after the game. The hitting background, in some directions, is Lake Michigan. And the view of the water and the Chicago skyline in the distance is something that is always worth the trip. The field and stands are raggedy and tired. But I'd go to Whiting Park even if there was no game. And I'd take a camera.


Schreiber Field's scoreboard chronicles the Slicers' baseball history of winning 8 state championships.	LaPorte's beautifully maintained ballfield is a model other schools try to emulate.

LaPORTE - The perfect neighborhood ballpark, surrounded by the school on one side and the neighborhood on the other three. Lots of effort by the players makes the infield pool-table smooth. You know you're in the house of Indiana's eight-time state champions. The stands and concourse give the feel of a ballpark, and the every-game presence of a public address announcer and WCOE, the local radio station, adds to the importance. And the giant, old school scoreboard. Inning by inning. Like Fenway Park. Like Wrigley Field. This is the proving ground of prep baseball in northern Indiana. You're just a pretender as a high school player until you've won at Slicer Field.

UNION MILLS - A true country front lawn field. Some schools simply put the baseball field in the space next to the building. Just the land left over. Wide open spaces beyond right field are fitting of where this school is. The quirk to this park is the short right field... only 291 feet. But it's right field and most batters are right handed. The tease of the right field foul people is cruel and unusual for all comers. And the open area brings home the wind. On a cloudy day with the wind blowing, you can feel the season's change.

South Central's short right field is a tempting target for left-handed high school power hitters.

MERRILLVILLE - A new classic. Stuck as far in back of the school as it can possibly go, the home of the Pirates is still in very good condition over a decade after Merrillville's renovation. A big ballpark. Only the big boys hit it out to center field here. The old school acre of land behind home plate changes the game dramatically and put emphasis on the catcher. The trains go by in left and the I-65 embankment with the passing parade of travelers and truckers makes this a pure ball park with modern charm.

HAMMOND - Okay now, I didn't say these were the best ballparks. I said 'classic' and no one can deny that Clark high's baseball field has a 'charm' of its own. Widely considered the region's worst prep baseball field, I still enjoy going there. This is where you grew up. This is the field you walked to on Saturday afternoon with your friends and just fooled around. The field you sneaked into even though they tried to charge admission. A home run is defined by how fast you can run or how far you can hit the ball. You can't 'jump the fence' here because there is no fence. Except when they put up a little temporary plastic barrier to try to pretend that they have a fence. The infield is bad. The turf is bad and the stands are bad but the sun setting over Wolf Lake to the west of the ballpark is worth the trip.

GRIFFITH - A wonderful neighborhood field. Tucked in tight off Broad Street in the middle of a residential neighborhood. The press box/concession stand is so close that foul balls can bang the structure or clear it and bop a car on the street. A nice clay-looking infield and a true score-and-inning only electric scoreboard. The plate is so close to the screen that if you talk about the batter's hair style, she hears it. There's always a couple of dogs and babies. The junior varsity plays off in the distance beyond the left center field fence and boys from far and wide dribble on the popular Griffith blacktop basketball courts behind the right field foul line. A perfect community setting.

CEDAR LAKE - Another hometown set-up. 'Tucked away' isn't the half of it. Somebody has to tell you where this field is if you've never been there. The outfield slopes downward near the fence and there's a rise behind the visitors dugout that gives the illusion that the field is in a ravine. But here's another timeless setting. Foul balls behind home plate roll back on somebody's lawn. The Little League field is far beyond right field and the junior varsity field is near, beyond left. Beyond center field? An old dairy farm where cows can be seen wandering around. If you left and came back four years later, you would be hard-pressed to see anything had changed.

MERRILLVILLE - Unlike Griffith and Hanover, this field is on school grounds, although you wouldn't know it. After you slip behind the school, bypass the baseball diamond and the tennis courts, and slide along a gravel road back to a cute little 'softball city.' Andrean has done a lot of work to build this place up to where it's a pretty little torture chamber for teams visiting the state-ranked 59ers. Fans squeeze in close to the fence so they can see. Here's another place where the backstop is so close that if you question ball and strike calls in the press box, the umpire hears you clearly. The entire site is shrouded in trees and so far behind the old school that you can forget where you are. The essence of all ballparks is that you are close to the action and you really can't get much closer than you are at Andrean.

CROWN POINT - The biggest secret in Northwest Indiana baseball. A pro-sized field (over 400 feet to center field) with a large fence makes batters earn a home run. High school players, at first, can have trouble here because of the distances, to the fences and behind home plate. Unlike most prep fields, you shouldn't really play Babe Ruth or Senior Little League here. Giant light towers give this home of American Legion Post 20 the feel of baseball's professional minor leagues. A good amount of bleacher seating with an awning over the baseline seats to protect fans from sun and rain. From behind home plate you can see the rest of the world driving by beyond the Legion post building on Crown Point's Main Street. The sun setting behind first base creates a tough sun field in left but a vivid sunset behind the fans. A traditional town field for the town's traditional summer team.

LAFAYETTE - Okay, so Lafayette's not in Northwest Indiana. But this former minor league park is exactly what you imagine the minor leagues would be with concrete seating and billboards all around the outfield. A 70-year-old structure with a fine playing surface and a stadium walkway behind the stands. The home of Lafayette Post 11 is a pro ball park that you would travel to play in. A unique setting with a water park behind the first base stands and a baby animal zoo (I'm not kidding) behind the third base stands. An ice cream parlor behind the parking lot. Just a lovable place. There is no roof or awning on the concrete grandstand so fans love this park a lot more at night than they do during hot, sunny days. But here is a slice of baseball's past in a residential neighborhood.

Loeb Stadium in West Lafayette is a grand old stadium in the best traditions of baseball.

REMINGTON - Very few have seen this place. To most, Remington is a big green sign on I-65. But if you can find the park (about a half mile west of the highway) this is a country field. A smooth, well-kept field, truly in the middle of nowhere. The home of Remington Post 280, this is the kind of place where darkness falls like a tumbling wall once the sun dips below the surrounding trees and farmland. Home runs are available down the line but it's about 390 feet to center. Boys from a half dozen high schools play for Post 280, always 7 or 7:30 PM games and only on certain nights. This is the kind of park that glows like a space ship in the distance because there's just nothing else out here. When they turn out the lights, you can't even tell a ballpark's there. And the sun setting in the wide open field west of town creates the vivid orange hue of a country sunset.

Northwest Indiana H.S. Baseball

"The Ballparks"

5-15-2004

A USA-365.com Special Report By Mark Smith


Whiting Park with Lake Michigan beckoning in background.	You feel THIS CLOSE at Whiting Park ball games.


There's lots of hitting room at Teagle Field in Crown Point.	Giant light towers provide great illumination for American Legion night games in Crown Point.