LOWELL — The Lowell Spinners have returned, bringing baseball back to a city that has mourned their absence for the last six years.
The team is holding its home opener on Friday, May 29, at 7 p.m. against the Nashua Silver Knights at the 4,700-seat LeLacheur Park, 450 Aiken Ave., which is on the UMass Lowell campus, touting a family-friendly atmosphere and a good brand of baseball.
The home opener marks the start of a new chapter for the Lowell Spinners as the newest franchise in the Futures Collegiate Baseball League, which serves as a lower-level feeder league for Major League Baseball, similar to the Cape Cod League. It will include some of the best local players from the Lowell area, and will celebrate the return of summer baseball to Lowell.
The team opened with a 11-5 loss Wednesday at the New Britain Bees. Designated hitter Cal Chance, coming off a terrific freshman season at UMass Lowell, blasted a home run. He went 3-for-5, drove in two runs and scored twice.
John Croteau, one of the principal owners of the Spinners, said he and fellow principal owner Marc Deschenes, and a raft of minority owners including former Red Sox players Johnny Damon and Jonathan Papelbon, are excited to get the games under way.
“When Marc and I decided to invest in the team we decided to bring it back in its full glory,” said Croteau. “We’ve fully invested, from the team, to the Kids’ Zone … to people running the bases after the game. We’ll have Major League-quality graphics and animation (inside the park and on TV). It’s everything people wanted and a lot more. From a fan engagement standpoint I think people are going to love it. You just can’t go anywhere for a more affordable, fun experience than LeLacheur Park.”
Croteau touted the low ticket prices, of either $12 or $10, and hot dogs at $3.
“You can pay as much for parking at Fenway as taking a family of four out to LeLacheur Park,” he said.
He said they hope to emulate the family-friendly experience that the Spinners had back in the day, and even surpass it.
“Affordable family fun, that’s what they were and that’s what we are,” he said.
“I keep telling people, I raised my family in Bedford, Mass., and my son played for the Junior Spinners. I had no clue that the Spinners were doing what they were doing. I could have had (my kids) running around the Kids’ Zone, bouncing around the bouncy room while I hung out and had a few beers with the guys,” Croteau said.
He said the team will play 30 home games, similar to the 36 games the Spinners played before. “Once you get into late August, the baseball interest fades, so we got it right in the sweet spot of when people want to go to baseball games,” Croteau said.
He noted that the Spinners, which were a single-A level team for the Boston Red Sox, were discontinued during a national decision by Major League Baseball to reduce the number of Minor League teams from 160 to 140 nationwide about six years ago.
Lowell was cut it because it was the only one of the Red Sox’s Minor League teams that was not owned by the Red Sox, he said. And the Major League draft was cut from 40 rounds to 20 rounds, “so literally half the number of players are playing in the minor leagues, so what they do is they’re playing … in college baseball, so the quality of college baseball is going up.”
Like in prior years with the Spinners, he said fans may wind up seeing future stars, even though the Spinners won’t be affiliated with a specific team. He mentioned how Mookie Betts played for the Spinners back in the day, and he wound up being a star for both the Red Sox and the Dodgers, as well as Red Sox players Andrew Benintendi, Kevin Youkilis, Justin Masterson, Damon and Papelbon, among others.
“When these guys came in you didn’t who they were,” but years later you could say you saw them in their early years, he said.
Croteau said the Spinners were in existence for 24 years, and they might have had one or two players during any one year who eventually make it big. “It wasn’t like the whole team was loaded with future major leaguers, it was low Single-A ball,” and this team will be at about that same level, he said.
But this team will have the added advantage of using some local players, he said.
“When it was a pro franchise, the players were from everywhere but Massachusetts, now the majority of them are from Chelmsford, Methuen, Lowell, people can go see the kids who before would go play elsewhere in the country. I think it will be a much more community feel and we want to play these kids up as local heroes.
“We got a couple kids on this team … who could go somewhere,” Croteau said, including some of the local talent. “They have all the DNA to play in the Major Leagues, we have no doubt we are going to put out a product people will enjoy.”
But the focus won’t all be on statistics and spin rates, Croteau said, noting that the philosophy is that for an evening out, “the experience will be 75% entertainment and 25% baseball … (with people coming) for the atmosphere, the family experience. But with Cape Cod baseball, there’s not that atmosphere, there (as they play on high school fields, as opposed to the nicer confines of LeLacheur Park). But you go to a Bruins game now and see the fan stuff they put on, (the Spinners will do similar promotions and activities). It’s just a fun night out and affordable, we joke that we’re going to holding a party every night and there’s going to be a baseball game to break out.”
“The recipe at LeLacheur, bring the kids in, we have an enclosed area with inflatables, bouncy houses, kids can bounce off the walls for two hours and parents can go socialize.
“You know what really got me fired up, we hosted the Lowell Little League (for a recent event), they did the parade … I enjoyed watching the parents, they were just socializing, they were so happy, that’s what’s going to turn me on (Friday),” Croteau said.
He also said the technology that the team will use inside the ballpark will be another reason to enjoy the game, with a camera and radar system that will treat fans to special camera angles of the game on the replay board, as well as seeing stats such as pitch velocity, though they will pause some of the stats until the referee makes a call, so as not to upstage the ump.
“I won’t call them gimmicks, but there will tech that people don’t normally see. Glasses, people could watch the first inning from the perspective of the starting pitcher,” which might be shown on the replay on the stadium screen.
Tim Bawmann will be the chief of baseball operations, and was the creator of “Spinnertainment” and he was there with the Spinners for 10 prior seasons, said Jackie Bruno of Newsmaker Marketing, who is working with the Spinners
She noted that the Spinners were pretty popular back in the day, and they hope to be every bit as popular moving forward.
“They were beloved” by the fans, she said.
“This is a huge opportunity for Lowell, and whether the players go on to the MLB or even just have a great experience and enjoy their outreach to the community, it will be well worth it. It is so expensive to keep kids entertained for the summer and these tickets are $10 and $12, and a $5 kids’ zone with stilt-walkers, inflatables, a slide, it will be a lot of fun,” Bruno said.
She also said the team paid to buy out the rights to the original Canaligator mascot, so that will be returning to cheer the team on. And Sea Dog Brewing is the sponsor for the brew pen.
“It’s affordable fun for the entire family, we’re encouraging people to just make this their new location for the summer, instead of having a barbecue. Encouraging people to come from all over the state to watch, without having to deal with Cape traffic,” if they were going to go to a comparable Cape Cod League game.
“Will create not only lifelong experiences for the players … but also for the families as well, it’s special,” said Bruno.
Also, June 6 will be Damon bobblehead night. Papelbon will also have a bobblehead night.
The former owner of the Spinners, Drew Weber, will be throwing out the first pitch Friday.
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