Prose & Comments: Step up for your team this summer

Now that we’ve all relaxed, completely content in the knowledge that, yes, the Bucks are back and that we do have a baseball team on Shelter Island after all, guess what? We have to house them!

Twenty-nine players and coaches have to live somewhere on-Island during the June-July season. We have located spots for 11 so far. But that leaves 18 to find!

So how about it, everybody? Who’s stepping up to the plate?

I’ve housed a Buck every season since the team originally began, so I have some experience to speak from. First of all, it’s fun. It puts you close to what’s happening on the field any time you go to a game.

You get to hear all the gossip, always amusing, and then practically speaking, if you’re on in years as I am and live alone as I do, there’s someone on hand to change a light bulb! It’s true you have to ask three times, but that’s just because they’re teenage — for the most part — young men.

If you have a future baseball player in the family, then housing a Buck might really be a way to go. Not only does that child and/or grandchild get a free week of baseball camp in East Hampton, ($950 to non-host families) but he/she has an interesting older brother, at least for a while.

And that “a while,” is worth noting. It’s not really a major commitment; if it turns out you don’t like it, for whatever reason, it’s over in a matter of weeks. And split scheduling is possible. If you can only do a month, let us know; the likelihood is we can find a family to do the rest.

Please note, as well, that with new leadership in the Hampton Collegiate Baseball League hierarchy, there are new benefits. Families who house players will receive $200 a month as a stipend; the League is a nonprofit entity, so there will be a tax deduction as well, should the host family choose to take it. Four hundred dollars may not be a world shaking sum, but it’s not peanuts, either.

So, that’s where we stand, people. Now’s the time to pitch in, Island-wide. We can only have a team if we can house that team. So please, step forward. Call Frank Emmett at (631) 749-4251, or me at (631) 749-0802 if you have any questions at all.

And let’s talk. Let’s get this done. It’s not rocket science. We just have to do it.

And we can!

— Carol Galligan is part of The Shelter Island Bucks management team.