Lights Out for Rays

Facing a tough East Coast foe, the Marco Island Academy baseball team had its work cut out for them. Two complete banks of malfunctioning lights, 10 lights total, made their jobs downright dangerous Friday night at Tyler Beck Memorial Field, where they fell 14-2 to Boca Raton Christian.

Coaches from both teams questioned whether the teams should be playing as the first base line and much of right field was effectively dark and players were complaining of not being able to see fly balls hit to deep left field. And there were plenty of deep shots to left field, most of them by the visiting Blazers who scored all of their runs in the first two innings. But Rays third baseman Ariel Jimenez hit the deepest shot, a towering home run over the left field fence that head coach Jim Sweeney speculated “might have landed on the road.”  It was one of the hardest hit balls at Tyler Beck’s Memorial Ballpark in recent years.

It should be noted that someone attempted to fix the lights - and the scoreboard - during the week. A broken scoreboard is inconvenient but not dangerous. Not being able to see a sharply hit baseball is another story altogether. 

First-year Rays head coach Jim Sweeney is upset about the condition of Tyler Beck Memorial Ballpark, a facility named in honor of a Marco youth who was killed while riding his bicycle on the island on January 6, 1995.

"I think it's horrible,” Jim Sweeney said after the game. “You take over an agreement and say you're going to keep up this park. Was a study done to determine what we need to do to this park? Did they go back and look at what was promised?”

Suffice to say there’s enough blame to go around. Whether it’s Collier County Public Schools, the City of Marco Island, Collier County, or Marco Island Academy itself, someone has dropped the ball.

The Coastal Breeze News wrote about Tyler Beck Memorial Field in 2022 (Tyler Beck’s Field of Dreams Needs TLC, Cooperation from Local Leaders) after city staff said it didn’t have a use for the field anymore. A large contingent of Marco Island Academy leaders, faculty, students and supporters showed up in support of keeping the field. City Council was firmly in support of the field. An ensuing agreement was hammered out, but two years later things haven’t improved much - if at all - at the ballpark. 

“They just had somebody out here to fix that light pole, right?” Sweeney said. “It's kind of disappointing. Unfortunately, with some of the conditions here, balls weren't actually able to be seen very well tonight."

Sweeney wants to see more support for his team.

"I don't think the basketball team has to wax the floor,” he said. “We've got to come out here and rake the field. I don't think football lines their own field. Poor Laz (former Rays head coach Lazaro Ferro) comes out here still and lines the field. Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but it doesn't seem like baseball gets quite the attention it deserves.”

Ferro, who led the Rays to their only Paradise Coast Athletic Conference title last season, was the first to call attention to the sub-standard conditions at Tyler Beck Memorial Ballpark in 2022. He continues to volunteer his time to perform maintenance on the field.

The grass playing surface at the ballpark remains in poor condition. Coaches say the sprinkler system doesn’t work. Limited access to the field continues to be mentioned as a hindrance to getting work done at the ballpark. The facility still does not have a permanent bathroom. It's certainly not the type of facility one would expect to find on Marco Island, where the median listing home price is $1.2 million.

MIA Leadership Advisory Board member Mark Melvin made a beeline to the park Friday night after being alerted to the malfunctioning lighting system. He met with the Rays’ coaching staff after the game, listening to their concerns and promising that improvements to the ballpark are forthcoming. 

Rays coaches were encouraged by the fight in their team Friday night, even after digging themselves an early hole they couldn’t get out of.

“The boys showed a lot of fight,” Sweeney said. “Failure is an opportunity to learn, right? You learn from your failures, then you can achieve success. Boca Raton Christian (3-1) came out swinging. They have a good program over there on the East Coast. It was somebody to measure ourselves against. They’re better than most of the teams we face over here."

The Rays (2-3) have only 12 players on their roster, but coaches say they’re a good group to work with. They have had success in 16-2 and 17-2 wins against conference foes Mason Classical Academy and Donahue Catholic. They narrowly lost to First Baptist Academy, 5-3.

MIA hosted Mason Classical Academy on Tuesday, March 5, and Donahue Catholic Wednesday, March 6 after the Coastal Breeze News deadline. They travel to FBA on Tuesday, March 19 at 4:30.