ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (WWSB) – Earlier this month Hurricane Milton made landfall on Siesta Key as a category three hurricane. The aftermath of the storm still has people around the Suncoast and Tampa Bay areas still cleaning up. This includes the Eckerd College Tritons in St. Pete.
The school’s baseball field suffered damages during both Milton and Hurricane Helene. The team has several players and coaches with ties to the Suncoast. As much as they don’t like to see the field in this condition, they know it could’ve been a lot worse.
“This takes us back to ground zero,” Logan Wells, a Suncoast resident and assistant baseball coach and recruiting coordinator at Eckerd College said. “It allows us to like really regroup and say hey in the grand scheme of things even with what’s going on we’re blessed.”
The start of the baseball season is still months away for the team at Eckerd College. Players are gearing up for opening day coming up in February.
Players can practice swings in the batting cages. However, the Tritons head coach, Josh Beauregard, says players aren’t able to do full practices on their actual field right now.
“When you come in, you see that the roofs aren’t on the dugouts,” Beauregard said. “Then you start seeing the batting cage and our turtle was in a tree in the parking lot. You look over at the softball field and you see that their scoreboard fell through the fence and their backstop was destroyed. It’s kind of like okay because there’s a lot of little wins out here.”
The guys are able to get their reps in due to Wells opening the doors to his facility in Palmetto, and the players are grateful. “Logan’s been a big part of my baseball career ever since my senior year of high school,” Kamron Gelwick, a junior and baseball player for the Tritons, said. “He’s always made sure that the guys that play here, they always have somewhere to go.”
Beauregard is filled with gratitude too. “Logan and Bay Area Pro, we’ve had a great partnership. He’s been a great partner and a good friend too.”
Wells says it’s very easy to have open doors right now because this moment is much bigger than the game.
“Sports aren’t everything right,” Wells said. “What I got in my hands means more than anything in the world. My family, my wife, my mother, my father. Having those things when it all came down to it, still having those things is the most important thing. I think our players are starting to realize that too.”
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