Local fans of baseball were denied their chance to sit in the 7,000-seat venue known as The Corn Crib last year due to the Coronavirus, and although as fall approached, there was a collegiate league, the Kernels Fall League, which left fans with a lingering reminder baseball was still around and would, hopefully, return the following spring. Well, we have arrived at spring, and for our patience, we baseball fans will get an opportunity to see the game played again by not just one league, but two, as the Normal CornBelters will rejoin the Prospect League this season, and a summer collegiate league will play at The Corn Crib as well.

Prospect League: The Normal CornBelters will be rejoining the Prospect League this season after the league suspended operations as a whole due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But upon their return this season, they will find a league which has expanded, had teams move, and will face some opponents in new places as they prepare to play a 60-game schedule divided between home and away contests.

There are now two conferences in the league with two divisions per conference, each with four teams in a division. The CornBelters are now members of the league’s Great River Division in the league’s Western Conference. That division will be home to some familiar foes for the CornBelters: Quincy Gems, Burlington Bees, and Clinton LumberKings. The other conference in the division is the Prairie Land Division, where the Cape Girardeau Catfish, Springfield Sliders, Alton River Dragons, and O’Fallon Hoots reside. If Burlington and Clinton sound familiar, they should because they are both former members of the Midwest League.

Game times are 6:35p.m. for single games and 5:35p.m. for doubleheaders. The opening week for the CornBelters will see the team play a different team over three nights, with Illinois Valley Pistol Shrimp at The Corn Crib opening night Thursday, May 27, Quincy Gems on Friday, May 28, and Burlington Bees Saturday, May 29.

“We’re just excited to be back in the Prospect League,” said the CornBelters new general manager, Matt Durkin. “As a result of having more teams, we’ll play a lot games with the teams from our division such as Quincy as well as Burlington and Clinton. We’re just excited to have both of those teams in our league and go back to traveling and have a much broader scale across the Midwest.”

“Ticket sales for the Prospect League team started in January and they have been good the last few months, and they have really picked up here in early May and late April,” Durkin said. “We’ll be excited to see everyone back at The Corn Crib.”

At the time I interviewed Durkin, the league rosters were not being released but he did say there would be some Illinois State University baseball players on the team roster.

Kernels Collegiate League: As took place last fall, the Kernels Collegiate League will feature a quartet of teams with only nicknames and high school players looking to get some playing time in. The team names are: Bobcats, Bluecaps, Ground Sloths, and Howlers. The league will play a season running from May 30-Aug. 8. The Kernels Fall League will be back later this year, too.

Social Distancing To Be Employed: Durkin said The Corn Crib will abide by regulations established by the Center for Disease Control and the State of Illinois to keep folks as safe as possible with COVID-19 still a part of how we go about our everyday lives. To start, The Corn Crib will be at 25 percent capacity, Durkin said, but added he has heard both the Chicago Cubs and Chicago White Sox will increase their stadium capacities to 60 percent which means that number could go up here, too. He said when CDC and State announce changes, The Corn Crib will change its attendance levels to match them.

New Ownership Group: The CornBelters now have new owners. The ownership group operated by Steve Malliet which operated the team since it began play during its first season in 2010 has sold the team to Play 9 Sports. That group is owned by Matt Stembridge, Rick DeStafane, and Jimmie Louthan. Stembridge serves as the team’s President of Operations.

As I get more information about players and other team-related items, I will pass them along. In the meantime, here’s hoping for nice warm nights, nice crowds, and plenty of success for both leagues’ teams this summer. Having missed it last year, we could all use a night (or two or three or several) out at the ol’ ball park.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 17th, 2021 at 10:02 pm and is filed under Normal Cornbelters, The Normalite. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.