Travs front office passing on high-school playoffs at Dickey-Stephens Park is giant mistake

The Arkansas high-school baseball finals are being held on May 20-21, but not at two venues where they maybe belong.

UCA's tiny Bear Stadium -- with a whopping seating capacity of less than 1,000 and an artificial turf that even includes fake dirt -- will host four games in those seven days as players and fans of 14 high schools descend on the Conway campus.

So why aren't the high school baseball finals being played in Dickey-Stephens Park, the best baseball facility in the state that as a bonus is in a prime central location with the highest population?

The Arkansas Activities Association asked. The front office at Dickey-Stephens Park said no thanks.

That's right, after years of the baseball finals being held way up in northwest Arkansas, we finally had a chance to land it thanks to a conflict at both Baum Stadium in Fayetteville and Arvest Ballpark in Springdale... and Dickey-Stephens people TURNED IT DOWN???

It's an insult that the Arkansas Activities Association would even have those two stadiums as preferred sites over Dickey-Stephens in the first place, and the Travelers organization said no thanks when finally offered???

May I remind some that Dickey-Stephens Park was made possible thanks to a generous grant from North Little Rock taxpayers, many of them business owners who would appreciate a return on their investment from the extra revenue generated by all the people coming to town for the games.

Yes, the Arkansas Activities Association (and they are a whole other problem) demands all the gate revenue, but the Travelers organization still could have made money off SEVEN games from concessions even without beer sales.

The high-school baseball finals should be in a showplace of a stadium with a beautiful backdrop of downtown Little Rock on a field with real grass and real dirt where real baseball is played.

So where is the other venue the baseball finals might have worked?

Oh yeah, Ray Winder Field.

-- Travelerocity reporter

Comments

[Trav fan]

Conway will be happy to accept the ancillary revenue in the form of hotel nights, restaurant fare, gas purchases, and general shopping which occurs secondary to events such as this. Little Rock, in their obvious wisdom, doesn't need or want baseball revenue of any kind -- we all know that another UAMS parking lot is a far better land use than preserving Ray Winder Field.

Given Little Rock's well known apathy about baseball, it is disappointing that the tournament couldn't have been played in the one remaining central Arkansas baseball venue - North Little Rock's Dickey Stephens ballpark.

[Voice of Reason]

Yeah just go ahead and kill the field a little bit during the only 4 day break the DSP field gets over a 2 week stretch.

Do you really think the Travelers would pass on this "awesome event" without a reason? They've hosted high school games before, but this field first and foremost was built for the Travelers to play on. And playing high school baseball on that field during the only four day break the field gets during a two week stretch is NOT a good idea.

Kudos to the Travs front office for doing what's best for the ballpark.

[Someone in the Know]

Hardly think the grass had anything to do with it. That's two days of a five-day break that is followed by an eight-day break after the next homestand. If they could sell beer, the finals would be at Dickey-Stephens.

[Hawkeye Pierce]

Hosting the games would be great for the Travs -- it would give them another excuse why the grass doesn't look perfect! Travelerocity should start a master list of excuses the organization has given for bad grass since moving to DSP.

[Dumb and dumfounded]

Apparently the grass at DSP is different than the grass in northwest Arkansas. Or, perhaps the DSP leadership just has a different priority??