The most successful and influential amateur summer baseball league, the Cape Cod League, announced on Friday, April 24th that the 2020 Cape Cod baseball season is cancelled due to growing concerns of the coronavirus pandemic.
The Cape Cod League is the #1 ranked league in amateur baseball and yearly sports the largest number of future Major League Baseball players on its 10 teams located in the Cape Cod area of Massachusetts.
According to a report in the Cape Cod Times, the Cape League’s Executive Committee voted unanimously on Friday to cancel its 2020 summer season, citing the CDC and its own medical team’s recommendations concerning the potential spread of the coronavirus. The vote came a day after the Cape Cod League’s general managers voted 6-4 in favor of canceling.
The Cape League Board of Directors had initially planned to vote on May 6, which would’ve followed meetings by Major League Baseball and the National Alliance of College Summer Baseball, of which the CCBL is a member. League president Chuck Sturtevant stated that Massachusetts governor Charlie Baker’s decision earlier this week to keep schools closed for the remainder of the academic year, plus the medical team’s push to cancel the year, prompted the early vote and decision.
Sturtevant stated, “All of them sent letters begging us to not have the season, and I think that really helped us make a decision medically,” Sturtevant said. “We’re the No. 1 league in the country, and people look to us, and now they don’t have to worry about trying to get here to play. … When we talked to the Alliance prior to the meeting and said what could happen, everyone else in the alliance said, ’By you guys taking the first step, they’re going to probably make some decisions a lot faster.”
The Cape League’s previous summer without a season was 1945, due to World War II. The league, which formed in 1923, had operated continuously since 1946, a stretch of 74 straight years.
Alaska Baseball League
The Alaska Baseball League has held-out hope for a 2020 ABL season. With the decision by the most influential league, the lack of collegiate baseball and the continued restrictions due to the COVID-19 virus; the Alaska League should release a statement soon on the status of ABL baseball for 2020.