Midland Explorers men's fastpitch team takes 'hiatus,' seeks new funding sources and influx of young players

January 1, 2014

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ORIGINAL ARTICLE By Dan Chalk chalk@mdn.net

 

For the first time since the late 1980s, the Midland Explorers will not field a men’s Major fastpitch team next summer in what longtime Explorers’ player Kyle Beane calls a “hiatus.”

Beane said that the difficulty of raising funds and securing sponsors each year, and the aging of the current team, have led the Midland Explorers Booster Club to decide not to have a Major-level team that will compete in the International Softball Congress World Tournament and Amateur Softball Association National Tournament.

“The men’s team is on temporary hiatus,” Beane told the Daily News on Monday. “I hope it will be back within the next couple of years. I’ve got a good feeling it could. But there are going to need to be some changes.”

For one, the Explorers — who were formed in 1986 and have several high finishes at the ASA and ISC — hope to draw young players from the area to form a new nucleus.

“We need to identify the best young players in the Midland area and in Michigan and get them excited and interested in playing for the Explorers,” said Beane. “There are a lot of young players out there that you could build a team with. The current team has kind of run its course. We need to get younger.”

The 2013 Explorers team included, among others, 21-year veteran Steve Horning, 18-year veteran Beane, 15-year veteran Steve Roberts, and 13-year veteran Doug Gillis.

“I think everybody from the 2013 team is going to end up with another team somewhere (in 2014),” Beane said.

In addition, the booster club hopes to secure a couple of major sponsors for a future men’s team. The costs of team uniforms, tournament entry fees, hotel rooms, and other expenses associated with the operation of the team have been difficult for the non-profit booster club to cover, Beane said.

“Fundraising is a really difficult thing to do,” he said. “The community of Midland has been great to us for 27 years. ... The booster club has done things like golf outings and euchre tournaments. But it would be easier on the entire program to find a couple of major sponsors.”

Beane added that, depending on the monetary amount of the sponsorship, the Explorers might be willing to put a sponsor’s name on their jerseys and possibly include it in the team name.

Beane said it wasn’t an easy decision to not field a team for 2014, but one that felt like the right choice.

“Until I get to June and realize we’re not going to put a team on the field, it’s not going to really hit me,” he said. “But to be fair to the players, we wanted to make a decision well in advance of the season.”

While the booster club works to get a men’s Major team back on the field, Beane is proud of the product that it has put on the field over the years.

“We took care of the team and ran it as a professional organization,” he said. “We were proud of the fact that players wanted to come play for us.”

And in the meantime, Beane emphasized that the Explorers Booster Club will continue to administer the Lady Explorers program and the Junior Explorers team (men 21 and under), and will add a 50-and-over Explorers Legends team made up largely of former Explorers’ players.

Eric Isenhart of Dearborn Heights, a member of the first Explorers team and son of the late longtime Explorers’ booster Lee Isenhart, will serve as player/manager for the Legends team, which will also include former Explorers Dave Ganton, Steve Lashuay, Pete Finn, Steve Bohn, Doug Sleep, and Rick Engle, among others. They will compete in four tournaments, beginning with the Explorers Booster Club-sponsored Lefty Bartos/Lee Isenhart Memorial Tournament June 13-15 at Emerson Park.

“It’s really neat to get them all back together,” said Isenhart, who is managing the team partly as a tribute to his father. “We’ll see how everybody can play and stay healthy at our age. ... We’re excited about starting the season. I just got the uniforms ordered today.”

The Legends team will also compete in a Petoskey tournament in late June, the ASA Tournament in Ashland, Ohio, in late July, and the ISC Legends Tournament in Kitchener, Ont., in mid-August.