Eye on the Ball: Rotary Sportsplex aims to be among premier ballparks in the country

The Ocala Rotary Reds team competes in the 2021 Florida State Rookie Ocala Qualifiers Tournament, Saturday, June 12, 2021, at Ocala Rotary Complex, in Ocala, Florida. [Cyndi Chambers/ Correspondent] 2021

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Posted September 24, 2021 | By James Blevins
james@ocalagazette.com

The Rotary Sportsplex of Marion County recently hosted the Cal Ripken 8-year-old Machine Pitch Invitational World Series.

It was the first of four Cal Ripken Rookie World Series scheduled at the sportsplex over the next three years, and organizers hope it’s the start of making the facility one of the premier complexes in the country.

“That’s our focus,” said Matt Fabian, president of the sportsplex.

The recent tournament was the biggest event the sportsplex has hosted, Fabian said.

Along with the park’s team, the Rotary Reds, the tournament included baseball clubs from Jacksonville, Tampa and West Palm Beach, as well as clubs from as far away as Missouri and the Bahamas.

“The World Series is a culmination of a year’s worth of work building up to that one week,” he said adding the facility is also open to the public from sunrise to sunset.

First opened in 1998, the facility hosts numerous local and regional tournaments, bringing in hundreds of thousands of dollars in economic impact, according to the park’s website.

In 1997, the Silver Springs Rotary Club helped put the plans together with the state. The organization has been involved ever since.

Located on 5220 S.E. Maricamp Road, the 80-acre facility is overseen by Marion County Parks and Recreation. It is the largest facility in the county, with eight youth baseball fields, three high school baseball fields, five soccer pitches and 12 batting cages.

The Sportsplex rests on state-owned land. The Rotary board partners with the county, which maintains the park. The board pays the county for the maintenance costs.

“Those guys are incredible,” said Fabian of parks and recreation. “It rained almost every day during the world series, and not once did they ever complain or say it was too much to do. Each field was ready when it needed to be.”

Jim Couillard, director of the county parks and recreation, recognizes the value of the facility.

“We definitely have a unique park with Rotary Sportsplex,” Couillard said. “From its inception 20-plus years ago, it was set up as a place where everybody can play baseball.”

The sportsplex brings teams together in one location.

“We’ve had a lot of success,” said Couillard. “Over the past few years, say since 2019, I think we’ve turned a $92,000 investment into $5.3 million of economic impact to our community, through sport and through sports tourism.”

Large tournaments like the Cal Ripken Rookie World Series are good for businesses and hotels, said Couillard. Even nearby bars, restaurants and gas stations can get some spillover business.

Harvey Vandeven is one of the founders of the sportsplex and is currently the Rotary board president.

“The county has done a great job of helping us,” he said. “It was the first time that the state and the county and private enterprise came together to build a park like the sportsplex. It was a big deal back in the day.”

The facility offers several divisions of baseball for children ages four to 12. They offer fall, spring and summer seasons.

Fabian said more than 300 kids are already signed up for the fall season.

The park hosts the Cal Ripken Rookie Qualifier over the summer, where 72 teams are divided into pools. The winner of each pool advances to a weekend tournament.

After that, teams travel to separate state and regional tournaments, then come back to the sportsplex for the world series.

Cal Ripken Baseball is under the umbrella of the Babe Ruth League, Inc. Initially called the Bambino Division, it was renamed Cal Ripken in 2007.

The Babe Ruth League traces its roots to 1951 when it was founded as the Little Bigger League in Hamilton, New Jersey. Today, the league has more than one million players on 56,000 teams in 9,000 leagues in eight countries and all 50 states, according to the league’s website.

Currently, the sportsplex only hosts the Rookie World Series but hopes to lure other divisions

Next year, the Rookie World Series is scheduled to start on July 29 and finish on Aug. 6. Fabian is already working on plans for next year’s tournament.

He wants as many kids who want to learn the game of baseball to come out and participate.

“We get a lot of parents calling me saying their son isn’t ready. He can’t do this or that,” said Fabian. “Well, bring him out here. These kids adapt to peer pressure. They start picking things up very quickly. Baseball may not be for everybody, but we teach more than just baseball out here.”

Couillard agreed.

“They’ve just created this culture out there where they try to be as professional as they can with these kids because they know they’re not just teaching them how to play a sport,” he said. “It’s more about teaching them respect and humility and humbleness and everything that so many of us need to learn.”