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Whole new ballgame: Frontier League releases schedule

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If the Frontier League baseball season is played this summer – there are still COVID-19 pandemic-related hurdles to clear for that to happen – longtime Wild Things fans might be asking plenty of questions when they venture to the ballpark. Such as, what happened to the Windy City Thunderbolts and the Schaumburg Boomers? Who are the Sussex County Miners? Weren’t the Miners the team in Southern Illinois?

The Frontier League released its schedule and divisional alignments for the upcoming season Wednesday and it might leave those Wild Things followers feeling like their team has left the Frontier League and joined a new independent league. Many of the opponents Washington’s fans have become familiar with in the Wild Things’ 19 years in the Frontier League are no longer on the schedule.

Each Frontier League team will again play a 96-game schedule running from late May to mid-September, which is later at both ends than in recent seasons. The 16 teams will be divided into four divisions.

Washington will play in the Can-Am Conference, which is split into the Atlantic Division and Northeast Division. The Atlantic Division is comprised of the Quebec Capitales, Trois-Rivières Aigles, Tri-City ValleyCats and New York Boulders. The Wild Things will be joined in the Northeast Division by the Ottawa Titans, Sussex County Miners and New Jersey Jackals. Quebec, Trois-Rivières, New York, Sussex County and New Jersey are former members of the Can-Am League. Ottawa is an expansion franchise and Tri-City had a franchise in the now-defunct New York-Penn League.

The Gateway Grizzlies, Florence Y’alls, Evansville Otters and Southern Illinois Miners make up the West Division of the Midwestern Conference while the Lake Erie Crushers, Joliet Slammers, Schaumburg Boomers and Windy City Thunderbolts will play in the Central Division of the Midwestern Conference.

Opening day will be May 27 and Washington begins with an eight-game road trip. The Wild Things will play two games to start the season at New York, move on to New Jersey for three games, then return to New York for three more games. Twenty-three of Washington’s first 35 games will be on the road.

Washington’s home opener will be June 4 against New Jersey. It is first time Washington has had a home opener in June.

The schedule is unbalanced and based on geography to reduce travel. Washington will play 43 games against division rivals – 16 against Sussex County, 15 against New Jersey and 12 against Ottawa.

The Wild Things will play 24 games against Midwestern Conference opponents – 12 against Lake Erie, nine against Florence and a three-game home series against Joliet.

“Those series are purely travel-related,” said Steve Tahsler, the league’s deputy commissioner and scheduling coordinator. “The closest teams to Washington are teams from the other conference, Lake Erie and Florence, so we wanted to have them play to cut down on travel. … One of the problems in scheduling is, if you have one interconference series, then you need to have two going at the same time to balance the schedule.”

That has created some odd series, such as Quebec at Gateway, and Trois-Rivières at Windy City and Schaumburg.

“That is a case of those teams can easily fly non-stop to Chicago or St. Louis,” Tahsler pointed out.

Not all teams are scheduled to play interconference games and some teams play the same opponent as many as 18 times.

“The schedule was made, if we can play at all, with less travel in mind,” Tahsler explained. “If something would happen and things would have to be canceled, then by having less travel it would be easier to make adjustments.”

Washington will not play five teams – Gateway, Evansville, Southern Illinois, Schaumburg and Windy City.

Each division winner will advance to the playoffs beginning Sept. 14.

Tahsler said there are still problems to overcome for the Frontier League to get its season underway. The biggest is with the Canadian teams. The U.S.-Canada border remains closed to nonessential travelers who are not Canadian citizens. Canada requires those entering the country to isolate for 14 days, which wouldn’t be feasible for professional baseball teams. The Canadian government has strongly discouraged nonessential travel. The NBA’s Toronto Raptors recently cited those as reasons they will play the remainder of their home games in Tampa.

“Our Canadian teams are optimistic that within the next 60 days restrictions will lessen,” Tahsler said. “By the end of April, we’re hopeful that professional teams entering Canada will be met by private charter and taken to their destinations.”

Tahsler added that there will not be an all-star game this year. Washington was to have hosted the 2020 all-star game but the season was canceled because of the pandemic.

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