WOTS: Baseball Big10 Tourney back to OSU

Submitted by formerlyanonymous on
Word on the street is the BigTen wants to make playing the BigTen tournament in baseball in OSU every year. They messed up on scheduling it at the minor league park in Columbus, so they want to just put it at OSU's college field. From here on out, they supposedly are working on a 3-6 year contract with the minor league park in Columbus to keep it there semi-permanently. They're basing this off one year where they had a good turn out. This is stupid as it gives OSU a much bigger semi-home field advantage. It means Michigan has to play in a more hostile environment than any of the other visiting teams the next time we make a tournament. If they're going to go with a pre-planned site, they should be making it either neutral or rotating around. If not, go back to the team that wins the regular season hosting the tournament. There's no reason to reward the Buckeyes home town advantage. I'm fairly unhappy about this, and it's not even official yet. I hear it's just a little over a week away from being announced. Just wanted to vent.
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Seth9

October 21st, 2009 at 10:56 PM ^

No team should get home field advantage every year for the tournament. If they want a permanent location at a nice Minor League stadium, put the game in Toledo. That's more centrally located than Columbus and doesn't give anyone true home field advantage. Furthermore, fans from MSU, OSU, Michigan, Northwestern, and possibly Indiana and Purdue could reasonably drive there for a game and back home on the same day.

Joined: 04/01/2009

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TomW09

October 21st, 2009 at 10:57 PM ^

This is such a joke, and has been since it started. How Rich Maloney was the only coach that opposed it to start is beyond me. I would suggest trying to play it in Battle Creek, which is home to a Yankees A team, a fairly centralized location, and not extremely close to one particular school.

Joined: 12/18/2008

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formerlyanonymous

October 21st, 2009 at 11:02 PM ^

To be clear, it's not about being a neutral site so much as a pre-planned site. I'm fine with it being in Columbus at their minor league park once every few years. It means one less team has to travel and everyone is familiar with hotels. That said, one site permanently in my rivals backyard, I don't like it. Honestly, I'm all for it being held at Wisconsin every year, but that's also because they don't have a baseball team. Madison has a nice minor league stadium, too. That said, that's a bit of a drive for most of the better baseball schools (OSU, Indiana, Michigan, and Purdue would have longer drives while Minnesota would be close).

Joined: 06/30/2008

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BlueinLansing

October 22nd, 2009 at 1:22 AM ^

for anyone not living in Columbus. I used to love it when the Big 10 tournament was at Fisher Stadium for the entire 1980's it seemed. This is pretty crazy, it should be moved around, there are plenty of great minor league parks around the midwest if they really want a 'neutral' field. I'm old school, the regular season champ should get to host.

Joined: 09/01/2009

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