By Todd Feathers, News Staff
A light rain pattered down on the McLaughlin Playground field Wednesday night, turning the baseball diamond’s dusty infield the dark brown of a well-worn mitt. At this time last year, a drizzle like this would have had Paul Spirn and his fellow Mission Hill Little League (MHLL) coaches scrambling to break out the bilge pumps.
The field, on Parker Hill Avenue, was notorious for flooding after the slightest rain, often delaying or cancelling games and practices while volunteer coaches fought losing battles to clear the water with hand-held pumps.
But thanks to $20,000 from Northeastern, the field underwent a dramatic renovation after the 2012 season ended and a new drainage system now rests below the freshly sodded diamond.
“Rain often put us out of commission and it didn’t take very much,” said Spirn, who has volunteered as a coach in the league for 12 years. “Sometimes after a couple hours of pumping, even if we removed the standing water there was still so much mud we couldn’t play safely.”
Spirn’s MHLL Red Sox, a group of 10- to 12-year-olds from the surrounding neighborhoods, missed nine of their 15 scheduled games last season because the field was too saturated to play on, he said.
It was even worse for other coaches in the league, 17 of whom are Northeastern students, said John Tobin, Northeastern’s vice president of city and community affairs.
Tobin said he isn’t sure when the relationship between the university and the league first blossomed, but in recent years he and other university officials have been in discussions with the league about how Northeastern could help with the drainage problems.
“These are the kinds of things [Northeastern] can do that are not just a sponsorship, a name on the back of a T-shirt … that can really just change a kid’s life,” he said.
The little league season officially kicks off April 22, but many coaches of the older teams have already begun holding practices at McLaughlin, said Suzanne Hauck, the league’s secretary.
“From what I’ve heard from the coaches, they’re so happy so far,” she said.
She’s looking forward to the first season since she began managing the league in which no games are cancelled due to flooding.
“It rained [Tuesday night] and there are kids out there right now playing,” she said. “This time last year, that wouldn’t have been possible.”
Spirn gave a sore chuckle when asked if he had ever had to send kids home before practice started because of the field’s condition. All the time, he said.
And unlike some other little leagues he’s heard of where parents are happy to volunteer their time to pick up maintenance duties when the coaches can’t cope, that’s not an option for many of Spirn’s kids’ parents.
“We have a lot of households where the parents are often holding down two to three jobs and they can’t leave work to do this stuff,” he said.
Every cent of Northeastern’s donation went towards hiring a contractor to install a drainage system under the field and give the park a cosmetic facelift, Tobin said.
He said he hopes the project, along with the many hours Northeastern volunteer coaches spend with the kids of the MHLL will stand out as an example of the university’s commitment to Mission Hill and other surrounding neighborhoods.
For years, the university has struggled to strike an amicable balance with residents of Mission Hill, many of whom are angry with the mass influx of college students into the neighborhood. Students, the long-time residents say, throw loud parties, trash the streets, and push out families who can’t afford the skyrocketing rents.
“The thing we really want to celebrate, not just the money, is the student’s who are out there coaching not for service hours but probably because they coached back where they come from,” Tobin said. “They are exemplary of the kind of students we have in Mission Hill.”
If you would like to volunteer with the Mission Hill Little League contact Suzanne Hauck at 617-989-0703.
