Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 1

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1 Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 1

2 About Jim Reiner and Baseball Field Maintenance My name is Jim Reiner. I'm a sports turf manager and author / publisher of many articles and handbooks on sports field maintenance. I developed the baseball field maintenance handbook, Transforming Your Baseball Field into a Winning Field, which was designed to help those who care for youth sports fields to get professional results with the least amount of time and cost. My efforts -- both in groups and one-on-one -- transform ball fields to give your athletes the opportunity to perform at their highest levels. I have completed projects from minor upgrades to major renovations for all levels of baseball and softball from T-Ball to College and everything in between. Prior to working in the corporate setting, I was a groundskeeper for the Texas Rangers AAA team. A quality baseball experience is possible. I believe in giving back to make a difference for others. Creating great ball fields is just one way I invest in our youth and to help create lifelong habits for success. With this information, you not only have the power to create a great baseball experience... you have the power to make a difference. How about using that power to make a difference? This information in the Special Report is for education purposes only. It is not professional advice and is not intended to replace the advice or attention of sports field professionals. Consult your local sports groundskeepers before beginning or making changes in your field or maintenance program, for diagnosis and treatment of diseases and problems, and for advice regarding solutions. Jim Reiner, Groundskeeper, Publisher, Editor, Author, Transforming Your Baseball Field into a Winning Field Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 2

3 Disclaimer: This is a copyrighted work and the Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide (the Guide) reserves all rights in and to the work. Use of this work is subject to these terms. Except as permitted under the Copyright Act of 1976 and the right to store and retrieve one copy of the work, you may not decompile, disassemble, reverse engineer, reproduce, modify, create derivative works based upon, transmit, distribute, disseminate, sell, publish or sublicense the work or any part of it without the prior consent of the Guide. You may use the work for our own personal use; any other use of the work is strictly prohibited. Your right to use the work may be terminated if you fail to comply with these terms. The work is provided as is. The Guide makes no guarantees or warranties as the accuracy, adequacy, or completeness of or results to be obtained from using the work, including any information that can be accessed through the work via hyperlink or otherwise, and expressly disclaims any warranty, express or implied, including but not limited to implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. The Guide shall not be liable to you or anyone else for an inaccuracy, error, or omission, regardless of cause, in the work or for any damages resulting there from. The Guide has no responsibility for the content of any information accessed through the work. Under no circumstances shall the Guide be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, punitive, consequential or similar damages that result form the use of or inability to use the work. This limitation of liability shall apply to any claim or cause whatsoever whether such claim or cause arises in contract, tort or otherwise. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 3

4 KEEPING THE MOMENTUM GOING The Secret To Keeping The Momentum Going Stay Focused This handbook gives you knowledge and instruction. You have to put in the effort to apply what you learn. But how do you keep going during the dry times? The offseason? What are 2 habits for successful field maintenance? #1 Acquire and. #2 what you. The following articles show you how to make maximum use of what you learn. That s right. You have to 1) - acquire knowledge and instruction, but 2) - you also have to apply what you learn. Stay focused. Focused on the investment you are making in your community the youth and the families. Not only a better baseball experience, but also an investment in your future. There is both satisfaction and fulfillment in knowing this. Trying Hard is Not Good Enough. The difference between success and disappointment often lies in what each person knows and how he or she makes use of that knowledge. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 4

5 How I Cut Field Maintenance Time By More Than 50% Yes, I really did cut my spring and fall field maintenance time by more than 50%. Sounds outrageous doesn't it? Here's what I did. First, a little background. The baseball field I'm referring to is a multi-use field. It's shared by college, high school, and PONY league. And the field is used from March to November with only a break in August. Every February and September it really needs a complete field maintenance overhaul... just before the spring baseball season and just before the fall season. Here's the baseball field maintenance work that needed to be done on this full sized field twice a year on a large scale: mow the field edge all the grass lines including the bullpen area aerate the turf fertilize fix the lip buildup all around the grass/dirt edges level out the infield skin - especially around the bases rebuild the infield mound and the bullpens remove weeds growing in the infield skin (dirt) level out the lumps and bumps that developed in the infield turf over seed and spot seed thin areas in the turf water, water, water and more water for the turf - a hot August always stressed out the grass tamp batter boxes, catcher areas, and mounds The first time I did all this baseball field maintenance work it took four days. Four long days working from 6am to 8pm. And I had five players helping. By the third time I did all this work, I was able to complete it all by myself in two days working from 8am to 4pm. Much more reasonable. Field Layout Mistakes on Just About Every Ball Field Second base is not in the right spot. The center of the bag should be at the apex of the measurements from first and third. For example on a 60 foot little league field, the center of second base (the base peg) should be 60 feet from first and third base. The infield mound is not the right height. Well, I'm sure you've seen plenty of infield mounds that just don't quite look right. They are often too high. The last one I surveyed was 14 inches instead of 10 inches above home plate. The pitcher rubber is out of line with home plate and it probably is not level either. Stand on the pitching rubber and look at home plate. Does it look crooked? If so, measure from the back point of the plate to each side of the pitching rubber. I've found these to be off by as much as 2 inches. That creates a big angle off line. This is common on fast pitch softball fields due to the pressure the pitcher puts Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 5

6 So, here's how I did it. on the rubber. I got smarter about sequencing the field maintenance work, taking notes about the locations of sprinklers, using proper power equipment, and showing up with the right tools and supplies by anticipating the problems I needed to fix. I also made sure I had plenty of food and water to keep myself hydrated and energized. (sidebar: I live 150 miles from this field, so I had to get pretty good at planning a two day work trip) OK. Let's start with that list of work and I'll tell you how I got the field maintenance work done a lot quicker. mow the field - The park and rec guys mow on Thursdays. So, I timed my work for Friday and Saturday. That way I didn't have to mow. And freshly mowed turf is easier to aerate, edge, fertilize and water. Timing helped. mark the sprinklers - I learned where all the sprinklers were so I could mark them without turning them on. I could just walk the baseball field and place the sprinkler flags on the dirt side of the sprinkler. No guessing needed about exactly where the sprinkler is. No need to cycle the sprinklers on and then run around and flag them. (I did have to do this the first couple times till I got it down.) water the grass areas that were dry; this also helped the aerating process later. aerate the turf - I used a rental. It was a walk behind, mechanically driven, core aerator. I learned that the baseball infield could be done in 30 minutes. The side foul grass areas took another 20 minutes. I ran the machine full throttle. line the cutouts and the grass edges - I learned the idiosyncrasies of this field. Base paths are supposed to be 3 feet on either side of the line. But this field had one that was four feet and one that was 3 and 1/2 feet. Once I knew where the sprinklers were and knew the exact measurements for a straight line, it was easy to just measure once, string it, and use white field spray paint to draw the line. Knowing the exact measurements for the cutouts helped too. I didn't have to stop and look anything up. Just measure, make the Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 6

7 arc and paint it. This also saved some wear and tear on my knees by not having to bend down so often. edge all the grass lines including the bullpen area - I ended up with lots of grass scraps. I mean lots. I used a tractor with a scoop to haul these off the field to a dumping area. This alone speeded up the clean up process by several hours rather than wheel barrowing the scraps off the field. The best time improvement I made with field maintenance is right here. I used a sod cutter with four wheels. The type with two wheels and a roller didn't work well at all - hard to stay straight and I always felt like I was fighting it. So, once I got a light weight machine with the four pneumatic tires, the job time and effort was more than cut in half. get a tractor with a scoop and a rear tiller. The rear tiller comes in handy for fixing the infield skin later and getting rid of all the small weeds on the skin and base paths. Sometimes the bullpens down the foul lines are so messed up, it's easier to just cut off the overgrown sod with the sod cutter and use the rear tiller to churn up the dirt. Then use a field rake to reshape it. Packing comes later with the steam roller. Over seed and spot seed thin areas in the turf - this is easy to do with the large walk behind cyclone spreader. One 50 pound bag of sports turf seed does the job - a mix of blue grass and rye grass for this field fertilize - the home variety of spreaders take way too long on 12,000 square feet of turf. Use a cyclone spreader that sends fertilizer out 15 feet on either side. Two 50 pound bags will do the job. fix the lips all around the grass/dirt edges - some of this is removed by using the sod cutter to edge. The rest I removed by aerating the edge back and forth times and raking the cores away to the infield grass. Then I used a shovel to dig a small 2-3 inch trench along the grass line - I just slid the shovel along digging it out. The lip and any lumps and bumps in the turf are leveled out by running a 1 1/2 ton steam roller over it. Instant flat surface. Just don't roll Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 7

8 over a sprinkler. level out the infield skin - especially around the bases; I did this quickly by first running the tractor tiller over the infield keeping the depth at 3 inches. The tiller has a leveling bar on the back that levels behind it. Run the tiller around a few times and then hook a metal mesh drag with a leveling bar on the back and drag that. Instant level playing field. Then lightly water and roll it with the steam roller after running it along the lips. rebuild the infield mound and the bullpens - I learned to stop at the nearby rock and landscape supply store and get 2 five gallon buckets of clay. I'd use this to fill in the holes on the mound and the bullpens if they had degraded drastically. I mentioned earlier that I'd use the sod cutter around these mounds to shape them and then use the rear tiller if needed on the bullpens to churn and form the mound. Then I'd run the steamroller up the incline and the top. Perfect mound that is very firm. remove weeds growing in the infield skin (dirt) - I did this with the tractor tiller and got a few of them out by hand with a hula hoe. The tilling and dragging pretty much got rid of all weeds. level out the lumps and bumps that developed in the infield turf - I did this by running the steam roller across the turf back and forth. One pass each way. No more bumps. Do this after aerating and definitely not if the field is wet and soggy. The goal is to level the field, not put ruts in it. water, water, water and more water for the turf - a hot August always stressed out the grass. I did this at the end of each day with a combination of hand watering the areas that were stressed as well as just letting the rain bird sprinklers run. tamp batter boxes, catcher areas, and mounds. I covered this by using the roller over these areas. Whew! Summary: Cut your field maintenance time by as much as half by Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 8

9 knowing your field, anticipating problems you'll be facing, sequencing the work, and using power equipment. I know this sounded like a lot, because it is. But the before and after is just incredible. People who don't see the field maintenance work done are amazed at how much better a field looks in just a couple days or a week. Sidebar: I used rental equipment for the field maintenance work. The first couple times I had to call ahead, reserve it, and have it delivered. By the third time I overhauled this field, I was using a rental place two blocks from the field. I walked over, checked out what I needed, and drove it down the street to the field. So, I'd use the aerator, sod cutter, and steam roller each for less than an hour. I'd use the tractor for about three hours. Very cheap and easy and fast. Field maintenance at its best! Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 9

10 Turf Management - What The Dog Taught Me A couple years ago I needed to have some electrical work done in a shed out back. As the electrician entered my back yard, he looked at the grass and said, "you must have a female dog." (Oh, no! Did I have a turf management problem right here in my own back yard?) I looked at the dead yellow spots along the edge of what otherwise is a great looking back yard. I have two female dogs. A big dog and a little dog. They both tend to go on the grass right near the patio edge. Sometimes the grass seemed to take off and grow more green and longer on the dog spots. And sometimes the grass would be dead in a couple days. Now fast forward a couple years. I set all my sprinkler timers for 20 minutes at a time and watered three times a week. No more dead dog spots on my lawn. Why? This is really similar to the ammonia nitrate in fertilizer. A couple years ago my brother used on his lawn. He put on too much and didn't water enough. He burned his entire lawn. Dog urine is like strong liquid fertilizer. Water the dog areas often enough and long enough and dog doesn't kill the grass when he is out doing his duty. Lessons learned 1. Fertilizer is a necessary part of baseball field turf management. Just make sure you follow application directions. Don't put out too much. Make sure you water enough regularly after putting it out. 2. If the dog does indeed kill a spot, rake the dead grass out and let the rest grow back over the bare spot. So, now I enjoy my dogs and a good looking lawn. No more dog markings on my lawn. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 10

11 Sports Field Care - The Most Important Skill You'll Ever Learn Sports Field Care. It can be simple... Just put out the bases and play. Or it can be more complex... Lots of activity using all sorts of equipment, tools, materials, and checklists. So, what's it all about? What really is the most important skill I've learned while taking care of a sports field? It's this. Stay focused. Stay focused on the one and only reason for sports field care. And on a baseball field, this is what it's all about==>: A true bounce and firm footing. Think about it. We want the turf and dirt areas to give the players a true and consistence bounce. We don't want surprises on hard hit grounders. It's bad enough when a poor bounce results in an error or a cheap hit. But, I've seen many a player miss half a season due to a bad hop off the end of a finger - breaking it. I've seen an infielder take one in the throat because a ball popped up off the grass edge. And we want players to have firm footing. No slipping while running, pitching, or stealing. Poor footing can lead to player injuries. I've seen a pitcher stretch a leg muscle because he slipped on landing. And I've seen base runners and fielders slip. They can't make the play when they can't get good footing. So, the most important skill to learn as we care for our sports field is to focus. Focus our time and energy first on true and consistent Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 11

12 bounces and firm footing. The rest of sports field care - baseball field maintenance is just to make it look pretty. My goal in providing you information is that you increase the safety and playability of your sports field Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 12

13 What Players Never Tell You It was a typical senior league baseball practice. The 15 and 16 year old players stretched and played catch. They took their positions and went through some game situation drills. Then they took batting practice and set up a few stations for batting drills. This concluded with some baserunning. Then the players and the coaches huddled up and talked about the next game and where they needed to improve. Just before they broke to head home, a coach asked them a question rarely asked of players, "How was the field to play on?" It was silent for a moment. Was this a dumb question? Or what? Suddenly there was a flood of responses: "the infield skin has a horrible lip at the outfield grass edge; I stumbled over it." "the dirt at third is too loose; grounders didn't bounce like I expected; they died and skipped by me." "the dirt on the basepath to first is too loose. I slipped in it." "doesn't anyone ever drag this field? The shortstop area is full of lumps and holes that make bounces go all over." "the loose dirt at second was actually easier to slide into today." "there's patchy grass at the edge along third and short; I don't trust the bounces in this area." Interesting responses, aren't they? A few good comments, but mostly criticism. Can this be corrected? Sure. And it starts by knowing what the players need in a field. It's pretty simple - they need true and consistent bounces. And they need good footing as a fielder and as a runner. This site has solutions to all of these problem areas. Dig through and find tips and hints as well as common problems to avoid. You and your players will be much happier and have a better baseball experience. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 13

14 How to Conquer Your Greatest Time Killer Why you'll never get it all done... Why you're overlooking essentials... What you must do NOW to get ahead I get so anxious sometimes to work on a ballfield that I don't take time to plan. After all, I've worked on so many baseball fields and softball fields that I should know what I'm doing by now. What I'm talking about here is your pre-season effort or the work you do before hosting tournaments. Unfortunately, I've learned the hard way that it s better to do 15 minutes of planning before you start these major projects. That way you'll incorporate the right materials, the right equipment, and the right labor to get the job done. A little time up front will save you a lot of headaches later that just eat up your time. What eats up your time? Things like extra trips to the store for parts, running out of chalk, a flat tire on your tractor, dull mower blade, bend base peg, broken field equipment, missing field drag, faulty sprinklers, etc. Here's how to get on top of this. Use a ballpark audit checklist. Go through the checklist and think about the condition of your ballpark. Some of the audit can be done right at your desk. Other items require that you get out and walk the area. When you are done, you'll know exactly what your ballfield condition is and exactly what you need to do to fix problem areas or prevent something from becoming a problem. Here's what your audit checklist should cover: Playing Surface Infield Dirt Area Playing Surface Grass Playing Surface General Areas Bases & Anchoring Fencing Spectator Areas General Safety of the Ball Park Dugouts Lighting Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 14

15 Other hazards I've found that a checklist is the way to go. It also shows me where the priority areas area: safety. I'm sure you could make up your own checklist, or just go out and walk your entire field and take notes. If you want a starter checklist that I've used, try this: Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 15

16 The Single Most Important Thing You Can Do For Your Turf Core Aerify Aerification is the most important turf maintenance practice. It helps loosen compacted soils so air and water can get to your root zone. The holes left by a core aerator can be filled in with the topdressing, seed, and fertilizer in other turf maintenance steps. Aerification alone is still a big plus for your turf. Tips and hints for the job 1. It is best to run an aerator in an X pattern across your turf. It takes about 30 minutes to do this in one direction on a full size baseball infield. So if you can get two players and two aerators, you can do the X pattern in 30 minutes. 2. I prefer the walk-behind machines that mechanically drive the tines into the ground. This approach provides a more even distribution of aeration and allows the depth of the tines to remain constant. 3. Don't remove the core plugs. Let them dry out. They'll get ground up when mowing and slowly dissolve back into the subsurface as a type of topdressing. 4. Be careful in the heat. Aerating lets air in and moisture out. If you're going to aerate on a hot day, be sure to run the sprinklers earlier in the day and be prepared to run them mid day to keep the grass from drying out. I aerated once in August on a 95 degree day. It's surprising how fast the grass dries out. You're trying to improve it, not kill it. 5. When to aerate? I do this preseason (early February) mid season (late April or early May) and late in the fall (October or November). Have fun! Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 16

17 My Favorite Sod Cutter After a winter of rains and no baseball, we finally are ready to start practices and games. But, look at how the grass has overgrown the basepaths and the the warning track. It's even grown out into the infield dirt! Enter the magic of the sod cutter. I'm sure you have cleanup days to get ready for the season. We just had our cleanup day at the park. Lots of people doing lots of things. But the magic was the sod cutter. With this tool I edged three baseball fields and removed lips and lumps faster than anyone believed possible. I used my all time favorite - the Kiss Cutter from Turfco. It's a light weight, four wheel model. If you want to cut straight lines, then this is the machine to do the job. There are several edging tools and machines you can use. The three wheel versions are very hard to cut straight especially if you are not on perfectly level ground. Well, using the sod cutter to edge can be a bit tricky if your ground is not level. But with the 4 wheel model it's a straight cut whether going over lumps and bumps or flat ground. It helps if you or someone can draw straight lines by laying a stringer using the right measurements for your field. Follow the links above and you'll see how to draw the lines on your field, select the right equipment for the job, and edge your baseball field. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 17

18 Trials and Triumphs of a Young Pitcher Today I want to talk about a common problem young pitchers face. Not about their mechanics. Not about their fitness. And not about their mental focus. The problem is the mound itself and the pitching rubber. Because so many mounds (and fields as well) are not kept up, the mound begins to look like a bump with this white rubber thing sticking up at the top and a drop off behind it. So, here comes a young man who wants to pitch. He doesn't know where he is supposed stand up there or how this is supposed to work. Neither does his dad. First he finds out he is supposed to put the foot of his balance leg in front of, and against, the rubber. But at the age where pitchers use the full windup, he actually steps down when he steps behind the rubber. This is very awkward and makes him look goofy. A couple of dads and coaches have seen so many mounds like this that they actually think this is the way it is supposed to be... the rubber sticks up about three inches and there's a steep drop off behind it. Yikes! Who will save this young man from messing up his pitching career? With a mound like that, he can't even begin to work on proper mechanics and mental focus. He's fighting the very thing that is supposed to be helping him. I bet most bullpens end up looking like this too... if not worse. Let's say you want to fix this. Obviously it needs more dirt. A clay mixture is best. But even some infield dirt mix dumped on the mound will help. How about putting a couple wheelbarrow loads on the mound? If you do this, do it in layers. Water the dirt between layers to get it to pack down and stick. Keep doing this till the dirt is level with the rubber and the mound includes a small table top area all around the rubber. Pack it with a tamper or with the back of the field rake. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 18

19 Turn what has been a trial for the pitcher into something he can triumph with. A decent mound. Am I obsessed with the mound? Yes. And the batter box too. These two areas get the most use and require the most maintenance for competitive play. By the way, that boy and his dad who didn't know how to use the mound... that was me and my son back when he was 11. We figured it out. He's a college pitcher now. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 19

20 The Coach Thinks in Terms of Results Now here's a high school coach who has it down. When it's time for practice to start, his players are in the dugout, cleats on, and ready to go. He works them hard. Sets up multiple stations for hitters, fielders, and runners... works them for two and half hours. And they love it. But he doesn't do anything to prep the field before practice starts. Why? Because he ends practice with prep work so thorough and disciplined that he can start the next practice without being concerned about playing field conditions. The pitchers rake, wet, and pack the foot holes on the mound. The catchers rake, wet, and pack the batter boxes and the catcher's area. Outfielders drag the field dirt with a mat drag. Infielders use plastic rakes to rake out all loose dirt along the infield grass edge. All garbage is picked up. All tools are put away. All baseball equipment is put away. Every player knows what he is supposed to do when practice ends. They work together. They might horseplay a bit, but it gets done quick. And it gets done right. And a couple times a week a few players use their 6th period free time to help mow the infield and the outfield with a riding mower. But, practice time is just that - intense practice time. This coach thinks in terms of results. And the result he is pursuing is championship baseball and players of character. The baseball program is helping young men develop lifelong habits for success. Proper field maintenance can be a significant part of the result we are all hoping for - productive, responsible young men and women in America. And they get to play a game in the process too. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 20

21 The Art of the Quick Fix I admit it. Sometimes I use shortcuts... a quick fix that works for a while. Occasionally I find myself in a situation where I need to do a 'patch job' to get by until I can do a better, more permanent fix. Sometimes I can wait a couple years before I need to go back. Here's a few problems I've run into that can be solved with a quick fix:: Not enough mound dirt. During spring maintenance, you might find that the mound seems to have lost some of its dirt during the rains. I've had to scrape a couple wheelbarrows full of infield dirt from deep short or second or the coach s boxes to beef up the mound. I realize it isn't exactly the same composition, but it works until I can get more mound clay. Flat tire on my tractor. Last spring I was all ready to start on a field when I found that one of the tires was flat. I really needed that tractor to help haul materials and drag the field. Fix-a-flat to the rescue. Same stuff that is advertised to fix a flat on a car, although I've never used it like that. Just make sure you use the small can for a small tractor tire. I keep one in the trunk. Massive mound holes and lots of loose dirt. You probably know the best way to fix the mound is to alternate between moistening, adding dirt back in, tamping, then moistening, adding, tamping, and so on. If conditions are right - very hot, sunny weather and you don't need to use the mound for at least a day, here's a way to firm up the holes. Rake the loose dirt away from the holes and spread it out. Soak the hole and the dirt you spread. Let the water puddle in the hole. Then push the wet dirt into the hole. This will be muddy. Smooth as best you can. Soak it all again. Soak till it puddles or runs off. Let it bake for day in the hot sun. It will be hard. Just rough it up a bit and moisten before game time. Another way to fix mound and batter box holes. This works only on hot, sunny days. I'm assuming you use the field in the late afternoon or early evening for practice or games. This requires that your sprinklers go on at night and cover the mound or home plate area. I mean cover it with lots of water. Just rake all the loose, powdery dirt into the holes and level Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 21

22 it out. During the night the sprinklers soak it. The hot sun in the day bakes it. It will be nice and firm by the time you need to use it. Little weeds growing all over the infield skin. Most of the time we try to get rid of these in the spring by dragging the field a lot. Spike drag or metal mesh drag. And sometimes we spray weed killer. But sometimes that doesn't work, or it isn't allowed. A surprisingly easy way to totally get rid of the weeds if it isn't as thick as a lawn is to run the thatcher over it. First lower the thatcher almost as low as it can go. Lower than you'd ever run it on the turf. Then run the thatcher on your infield skin, the base paths, and the warning track for a quick fix. No more weeds! None. Not even any loose debris. Well, there's just a few of the things I've done in a pinch. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 22

23 Five Ways To Level Your Lumpy, Bumpy Baseball Field 1. Big holes or ruts in the outfield: fill them in with reclaimed sand and cover with topsoil. I get tons of free reclaimed sand from a local cement plant. They wash out the cement trucks when they come back and 'reclaim' the small sand and aggregate. This stuff is not fine sand. It has some very small pebbles. They give it away. But, this is perfect for filling in big areas in the outfield or the warning track. 2. Uneven infield turf: best thing to do is several applications of topdressing. Depending on your size of your baseball field - little league or high school size you have more work. I put out five tons of top soil / compost on a high school infield and dragged it with a metal mesh drag to level it out. (Mowed it short first.) I did this in April and again in August. It is perfectly smooth now. 3. Infield turf with major ruts and undulations: on a senior little league baseball field I spread out 10 tons of top soil / compost and dragged it level. This field had big problems so I went with lots of topdressing dirt. I do not recommend doing that much at once unless you have a major, major problem to fix. Now the nice thing about this is that you can water it in and play on it in a day. I did this in the fall. 4. Infield skin (dirt) not level: One of the easiest ways to fix this is to add about 3-5 tons on a little league baseball field or tons on a high school baseball field and spread, till with a tractor and rear tiller, then level with a box or leveler device, and drag. Water it in to help settle it. Drag or rake to fine tune the surface. Done. I just did this with 25 tons on a high school field. 5. Major infield turf problems: scrape with a tractor and smooth bucket and start over. This is a lot of work. You need to put down a good topsoil and level it. Sod takes 3-4 weeks to grow in before you can use it. Seed takes 6-8 weeks to grow in enough for competitive play. I did this kind of field renovation for a baseball field at a park and rec department. It was so bad, there was no other real way to fix it. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 23

24 Bonus: there is one more thing you could do. It works best after it has rained a couple days, but then you have a day or two of sun. Use a 3-5 ton steam roller on the infield turf and the outfield turf. Mark your sprinklers first so you do not hit them. Roll the turf. It will be very flat. You should also mow first. And it would be a good idea to aerate after you roll it. Rolling the turf is often done on multiuse fields where football or soccer tears up the out field and puts in lots of ruts when playing on the wet ground. I have done this on several fields. Works great. Alternative is to use the water filled lawn roller, but this is slower and harder to do. Put those football players to work pushing it around. P.S. in general I find it easier and better to work with what you have - add top dressing and level it - versus doing major tilling and new seed. But it just depends how bad it is and how much time you can afford to not be using the field. Copyright 2013 The Ultimate Baseball Field Renovation Guide 24

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