It has not been a quiet winter for the members of the Executive of the Valley East Minor Baseball Association. They have been busily preparing for the beginning of the 2001 baseball season and are now in the middle of registrations.

The Board took a break from one of their recent meetings to introduce themselves by way of this photo: Seated, from the left: Christine Wadge (Director of Operations), Larry Furmanic (President), Lorraine Furmanic (Secretary), and Debbie St. Jean (Vice-President).

Standing: Gary Shyminsky (Director of Player/Coach Development), Frank Mueck (Umpire in Chief) and Bob Winfield (Director of Baseball).

Missing from the photo were: Lesley Kay (Director of Marketing & Public Relations), Rob Spieran (Director of Facilities) and Serge Parenteau (Treasurer).

One of the new features being promoted this year is the “Bring a Buddie” program. Any member of the Valley East Minor Baseball Association can bring along a buddy who has never played before and the two will be placed on the same team.

Something else which is certain to maintain the excellent quality of play in the league is the Coaching Development Program which is designed to provide coaches with certification so that they can coach travelling teams. It is also being made available to non-travelling team coaches who wish to improve their coaching skills.

Final registration will be held on April 21 and 22 at the Elmview Playground. Names of registrants will be entered into a special  draw on 10 pairs of Blue Jays tickets and five adult passes to the Howard Johnson Recreation Complex. It should be noted that there will be no softball division offered this summer. Baseball will be played at T-ball, Rookie Ball, Mosquito, Peewee, Bantam, Midget and Junior levels. Travelling teams from Mosquito, Peewee, Bantam and Midget will play in the North Central Baseball Association with teams from Valley East, Sudbury, North Bay, Elliot Lake and Garson. The Juniors will once again belong to the Northern Elite League and compete with clubs from Sudbury, Sault Ste. Marie and Timmins.

When the fields are dry, the first two weeks of play will be devoted to practices as the result of a survey which was done last summer among parents. In that survey, 91% of respondents indicted that they would like to see the first practices scheduled for the first two weeks.