Snowhawks set to take flight again this summer

Another snowshoe baseball season has started. The Snowhawks are sticking to what they know best while adding a few new faces to the squad.

The Lake Tomahawk Snowhawks kicked off their season with a mixed game against Newswatch 12. Fans came and packed the park for the opener as the rain held off. Player-coach Jeff Smith is happy the season is here.

“We’re pretty excited,” he said. “As everyone knows, it’s a long winter and June can be kind of a long month, too, waiting for that opening day. And when it happens, it’s like everybody shows up. It’s all the hard work through the winter, getting plans made, new players, new teams or just getting the existing teams going all comes to life now. It’s a lot of fun, and we’re all looking forward to it. (I) just hope we don’t have a lot of rainy Mondays, we have to keep those clear.”

Here are five things to know about this year’s season:

Schedule highlights

The Snowhawks are set to take on 10 teams this season, not counting the mixed game against Newswatch 12. All games start at 7:30 p.m. at Snowshoe Park in Lake Tomahawk.

One game to watch out for is the traditional Fourth of July game against the Chicago All-Stars. This year’s game takes place on a Friday night.

“It’s always going to be exciting, especially under the lights like that and just before the fireworks,” Smith said. “It’s a game that we get amped up and worked up as the season goes, which is kind of a short time now from the opener to the Fourth (of July). It happens pretty fast. We just hope that we have good weather, and that’s the only thing that holds us back and kind of holds everything back is weather. If the weather is fine, it could be a spectacular Friday night, really. The players are really looking forward to it, and I know the Chicago team, I’ve been in contact with them, and they’re always ready to play and can’t wait. It’s always fun.”

Last year, the Snowhawks’ game against The Lakeland Times got rained out. They’re hoping the weather holds off for that game, as well as all the Mondays for the rest of the summer. This year’s Snowhawks vs. Times game is scheduled for July 21.

“We missed that last year,” Smith said. “That’s one of the things for so many years we had no rainouts on Mondays. I think we got spoiled. It’s now you just don’t know. The weather is so unpredictable as it always is, but you could almost predict a good Monday. It’s weird how that happened for so many years.”

New to the schedule is Fricken Restaurants. That game takes place Aug. 11.

“We have one new team, which we couldn’t play last year, but they are going to be on our schedule we’re playing this year,” Smith said. “That’s Bill Fricke from Fricken Restaurants. (We’re) kind of excited to play, see what that’s all about.”

The season wraps up Aug. 25 against WPS Local 420.

Who’s gone

Tod Niemuth, who had played on the Snowhawks for many years, has retired. He played first base on Monday nights.

“Tod, our first baseman that we had for well over 15 years, he retired this year,” Smith said. “Tod moved out of the state, and I know he’s playing senior ball with another Northwoods league.”

Former Snowhawks Dustin and Ryan Schowalter won’t be at all the games. They’ll play if they’re needed.

“(They’re) a couple of guys that really that were staples on our team,” Smith said. “They have other stuff going on. They couldn’t commit to every Monday. Dustin said he would fill in on and off if we really needed players. Ryan’s got his team. He’s with the police and fire departments team so he heads up that. He’s got other commitments now on Mondays, but he is available for us on and off.”

Who’s new

There are four new players on the Snowhawks this season — Marc Seils, Nick Pitterle, Zach Wachter and Martin Jaramillo.

“Two out of the four have played before,” Smith said. “The other two haven’t. We’ve got quite a few practices in with them, and they are going to be maybe not as fast on snowshoes, but they know how to play ball.”

The Snowhawks are hoping to get some youth on the team to help sustain them for future years.

“We’re trying to get a younger team,” Smith said. “We’re so used to ... the players that have been on our team for so many years. All the 20 years I’ve been on there, plus, it’s really been about the same players. And they are now, a lot of those guys are getting in their 40s, and so we have to start looking down the road to getting some younger people in there, you know, guys that are in their 20s and interested in playing every Monday, not just one here or there, but it’s tough to find that commitment, but we’re managing. We’re kind of a mixed team of ages anyway, or anywhere from 60 down to 20. That’s pretty good because then we can teach the younger guys and eventually phase ourselves out a little bit.”

Jaramillo has played against the Snowhawks in the past.

“That’s going to be a solid guy for us,” Smith said. “He’s played for Black Bear (Bar) in the past, but he’s decided to be a Snowhawk now, so we got him full time.”

New bleachers

There isn’t a whole lot of new items for this year’s snowshoe season. Of note, they’ve ordered new bleachers which will come later this summer.

“I know we should be having some new section of the bleachers being sent in,” Smith said. “I just don’t know what … day that’s going to be or even what week. They’re ordered. We just have to wait. It’s a five tier. It’s going to be a section that’s going to be out in left field, kind of replacing the wooden bleachers that are out there now. We have one section ordered. We’re just waiting for it to come in. That’s about the only thing new as far as things at the ballpark.”

One thing that’s staying the same is concessions, including their famous pies.

“We get enough people to get all those different types of pies in there,” Smith said. “If anybody wants to make a pie and bring it to snowshoe baseball, they are more than welcome to show up on Monday and drop it off for us. We really, really appreciate it.”

Season opener

Newswatch 12 opened the season on Monday. They combined teams with the Snowhawks for a competitive game. The final score came to 9-8.

Up next, the Snowhawks will play Pukall Lumber Studs on Monday, June 30 right back at Snowshoe Park. First pitch is at 7:30 p.m.

Brett LaBore may be reached at [email protected] or [email protected].

TEAM SCHEDULE

Date    Opponent

6/30    Pukall Lumber Studs

7/4    Chicago All-Stars

7/7    Local Police/Fire Departments

7/14    Zimmy’s All-Stars

7/21    The Lakeland Times

7/28    Black Bear Bar

8/4    Wickman Construction    

8/11    Fricken Restaurants    

8/18    Bucketheads/Dazzle’s Demons

8/25    WPS Local 420            

All games start at 7:30 p.m.