In a little more than a month and for the fifth time in as many years, several of the world’s top softball players will converge on tiny Roxana.
Reason being is that the Senior League Softball World Series is slated to kick off August 3 at the Lower Sussex Little League Complex.
During the event, 10 teams from various sections of the United States – including one host team from District III (Sussex County) and other countries across the globe – with girls ranging from 14- to 16-years old will battle it out to see just who is the best team in the world.
“It’s not too far away,” said District III Administrator Martin Donovan. “We’re working on getting everything ready.”
Getting everything ready for this particular Series may be even more imperative, because for the first time ever at Roxana ESPN will broadcast the championship game live.
A year ago, ESPN was at the event for the first time ever, but it broadcast the game on tape delay to an audience of nearly 250,000 viewers.
This year, with the Series going live on either ESPN or ESPN2, Donovan said he expects the number to be even larger.
“Last year, two weeks after [the Series’ conclusion] on tape delay and [broadcasted] on a Tuesday afternoon at [2 p.m.], we still had that many people watching,” Donovan said. “Hopefully with it live this year, we’ll have more.”
Of course, there will have to be changes made to host the live event, but Donovan explained none of them are major.
In fact, his main concern is one Series’ officials have no control over at all.
“The weather is our major concern, and we can’t do anything about that,” he said with a laugh. “It’s just something we have to hope for the best with.”
Other issues have cropped up with the Series this season as well, and at the top of that list is the downturn in the economy.
With oil prices seemingly reaching all-time highs on a daily basis, which affects nearly everything else as well, sponsors for the event are harder to come by.
That is not a good thing for the Series, which costs an estimated $250,000 a year to run.
Included in those costs is the housing, which is still being donated by Carl M. Freeman and food, which costs upwards of $30,000 for just breakfast and lunch.
This season, the Series has combined the two meals – dinners are donated as well – and a brunch will be served, because, as Donovan said, “We found most of the girls don’t want to wake up early enough to eat breakfast anyway.”
