Massachusetts District 2 baseball and softball
Meeting minutes
January 12, 2021
Call to order at 6:34 PM
In attendance:
Ernest Fitzell, Marc Winer, Steve DePalma, Steve Elliot, Mike Bonfitto, Mike Raposo, Mara Breen,
Shawn Schrager, Roger Constant, Paul Poreda, Steve Schiffman, Mike D, Dan Szostek
Umpires update
Junior umpire clinics scheduled for March 6 and 13 in Agawam (location TBA) or at Batter’s Box in
Westfield
Staff umpires for District play will be started this year and continue to grow each year.
Pre-requisite for staff umpires will be a 5 year minimum experience in Little League.
Staff umpires will not be “paid” for games, but receive compensation for travel only.
Staff umpires will go through training before district play to ensure continuity among all umpires.
Covid-19 update
As of now, all coaches, infielders and the catcher, and all players on offense will wear masks. It will (at
the very least) be strongly recommended that all players, coaches and spectators wear masks at all
times while on or near the field.
Westfield Starfires
Chris Thompson from the Starfires was at the meeting to discuss what is happening with the Futures
baseball league this upcoming season. They managed to play an almost full season last summer, and
intend to have a full season this year. They were privileged to be able to play a game on NESN last year
at New Britain stadium and hope to be able to expand this year to more televised games. They will be
sending information about packages available to leagues and teams soon via email. They also will be
looking for some host families to house a player for the season.
Softball update
Marc and Shawn will be making another attempt to speak to East Longmeadow and Wilbraham about
joining D2 Little League.
USA softball is offering a travel league for the Spring and also for the Summer. They informed us that it
will be available to all players. You can play any other league at the same time as this one. Games in
the Spring will be played on Sundays, and games in the summer will be one evening during the week.
There will be playoffs, with the possibility of going on to State Championships.
There will be three informational zoom meetings:
Thursday, 1/21 at 7:00 PM
Wednesday, 1/27 at 7:00 PM
Sunday, 1/32 at 7:00 PM
An email was sent out to all heads of softball with contact information. If you need more, please
contact Marc Winer
Signups
Most towns have started signups online. Reports are that numbers are slow to get started, but hopes
are that they will pick up as Covid numbers improve and we get closer to Spring.
Tryouts/Evaluations are a concern for this year. Most towns do theirs inside a facility somewhere, and