Cape Cod Baseball League: Building Upon a Hallowed Past as it Looks to an Ever Unpredictable Future

Lowell Park in Cotuit. (Courtesy of Cotuit Athletic Association)

 

At a time when financial and off-field issues often seem to overshadow, if not overwhelm, the on-field ones in the world of baseball, the Cape Cod Baseball League seems different. The nonprofit stands out as a shining example of an operation that has stayed true to its roots, keeping the focus on the game, the players, and the communities so central to the league’s current operations as well as the bedrock of its hallowed, century-long existence, one that can lay claim to being in the view of one writer who has followed the league closely, “the greatest amateur athletic organization in America.”1

But as admirable as the CCBL’s distinctive approach may be, and for all its laudable history, not to mention its long acknowledged reputation as the nation’s leading summer college baseball league, in recent years concerns have been raised about its future and whether it is in danger of losing its predominance.2 Indeed, when the call for an author for this piece was initially put out, it was framed as taking a look at the “changing economics” of the Cape Cod League.3 The assignment seemed to invite an investigation into the state of a historic institution at a time that has seen baseball, college athletics, and the sports word in general pummeled by outside forces – many of them financial over which they have no control. That is certainly the case for the CCBL, which, like almost anything related to college athletics, has seen immeasurable changes occur in the last few years. So the obvious question is where does all of this change leave the CCBL? How have the changes impacted the league? How has the league responded to the changes and challenges and what does it all foretell as it moves forward, advancing its historic mission into a second century of play.

With those questions in mind, and in the midst of the ever-changing landscape of baseball at all levels, especially at a time when money seems to be ever bigger concern, it is critically important to recognize the distinctive nature of the nonprofit model of the century-plus-old Cape Cod Baseball League. While the ongoing changes in college sports may well trigger doubts about the league’s future viability, a comprehensive look today must include consideration of the league’s distinctive nature and history, two factors critical to its current prospects as it seeks to continue to play an important role in baseball’s ever-changing landscape. At the same time, there is full recognition that such efforts must proceed with an understanding that not only is change inevitable, but that there are very real challenges to which the league must respond.

The 2025 CCBL season was a banner one. With the top-seeded Bourne Braves winning the championship, sweeping the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox in the best-of-three series, a victory capped by a resounding 19-2 win in the finale, the team earned its third title in the past four seasons. That accomplishment, coupled with ESPN choosing a game at the Chatham Anglers’ historic Veterans Field as the Massachusetts representative for its “50 States in 50 Days” tour, enabled the league to showcase both the top-flight quality of baseball that it offers and the distinctive community that combine to make the league the singular baseball entity that it is.4 And of course its reputation was only further enhanced when alumni of the league that bills itself as the place “where the stars of tomorrow shine tonight,” Aaron Judge, who played for Brewster in 2012 and Paul Skenes, who pitched for Wareham in 2019, were the winners, of the 2025 American League MVP and the National League Cy Young Awards, respectively.

But while the league can take great pride both in what it does now and what it has done over the course of its unparalleled history, it must still contend with the ever-changing baseball landscape and like so much below the major-league level it is impacted by what MLB does and that is not always a positive. MLB annually supports the league to the tune of $100,000 – an amount that has not changed in a number of years.5 But at the same time, its unilateral decision to change the date of the amateur draft, and the way that in the winter of 2008-2009, the money-hungry big boys in New York swooped down to the Cape and “presented each of the Cape League franchises boasting a big-league nickname with a big-league ultimatum: Buy MLB-licensed merch or get a new moniker,” a power play that explains how the Chatham Athletics became the Anglers, the Hyannis Mets became the Harbor Hawks, and Orleans Cardinals became the Firebirds, MLB wiping away decades of the nonprofit league’s history in a single greed-driven swoop, show the sometimes tenuous nature of the relationship.6 At the same time, the teams have adjusted and modern fans can easily buy and proudly wear the apparel that shows their allegiance to the current iterations of the historic franchises. But is it nevertheless a reminder of how some aspects important to the league’s operations are beyond its control.

In looking at the league’s financial prospects and its future in general, it is best to use the 2020 lost season and the truncated COVID-19-impacted 2021 campaigns as jumping-off points both for comparative purposes and for establishing some benchmarks. Like many things across the nation, the impact of COVID on the Cape League was real, but so too has been the way the league has bounced back, showing a resilience that says much about the communities at the heart of the league’s operations.

Shawn McBride, director of broadcasting and communications for the league, noted that it is on a “more positive trajectory than before COVID.”7 He says the league’s leadership “understands that things have changed” and is working to become more “organized and professional” in its approach to getting sponsors, while at the same time being determined to “stay true to their roots” in terms of the product it offers. They are also seeking sponsors who can “make for a more robust revenue stream.”8 Current Treasurer and former league President Paul Logan echoes McBride’s optimism, saying that “in general things are good.”9 He said the league has mirrored the revival of local tourism since COVID, adding that he believes attendance is up, sponsorships have grown, and there has been an increase in the fan base.10 Indeed, a look at the league’s basic financials show consistent revenue patterns since COVID, a change from some of the roller-coaster-like performances in the 2010s.11 The solid reports and the consistent revenue figures certainly bode well for the future. At the same time, fully cognizant of the various challenges they face, the league’s leadership has been working hard to improve the things they can control. Current CCBL President Andrew Lang recalls that when he assumed office the website was horrible but he further notes that in the aftermath of a focused effort it has been noticeably improved on his watch – with a major increase in visitors being a result.12 Recognizing that league sponsors are looking for more digital media, new efforts in that direction have been undertaken. As Lang puts it, the league has “worked to bring the CCBL into the twenty-first century,” recognizing that it cannot rest on its laurels. He is clear in his determination to maintain the league’s status as “the best college summer league.”13

Before beginning our look at the league’s prospects, it is critically important to remember that the league is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization. That very fact distinguishes it from so much of the rest of the baseball world and must be taken into account in any conversations, especially about finances. When you are talking about an operation that – because admission is free – cannot even give you a definitive attendance count, many of the standard measurements of success are irrelevant to discussions of financial viability – now and in the future. The other critical factor that must be recognized and is central to league operations is the incredible importance of the volunteers in making the CCBL a going concern. Too, no less important, but no easier to quantify, is the role of the community, both the broad CCBL community and the 10 individual communities directly supporting each team.

With a sense of the basic solid financial footing upon which the league currently sits, it makes sense to take at least a quick look at how the league operates financially. Quite simply, it operates on two levels. There are the across-the-board aspects that include support and financial arrangements with the league itself – like the MLB grant – and numerous league sponsorships, a pool that includes national and regional partners like Army National Guard, BaseballCloud, Dunkin’, and the Mass. State Lottery, to name just a few.14 They, like many of the more local, but team-specific ones, represent a wide range of businesses and industries including real estate, hospitality and food and drink, financial services, and healthcare, as well as an array of local businesses. At both the league and local levels, revenue from sponsorship is, according to league officials, growing, all tangible evidence, Andrew Lang notes, of “a lot of sponsors wanting to be a part” of the League.15

Meanwhile, at the team level with its significant autonomy, the approaches to funding are varied and often tied to the nature of the community, with some more ingrained communities, while others are more reliant on tourism, although the summer folks are a critical part of the equation for all. Overall, McBride notes that the CCBL has “professionalized their approach” while the critical foundation of companies that support the league has grown.16 He says the fact that games are free is important and something the league is determined to retain. It is, he added, a “Rockwellian aspect of a Cape game.”17 At the same time the league’s leadership has been working on creating the brand of the CCBL, with a greater focus on content creation getting the brand out there in order to deliver attractive demographics to companies and sponsors.18

The financial autonomy of the local teams is a longtime aspect of their operation. Lang commented that CCBL officials “will not walk down Main Street looking for team sponsors.”19 That is the purview of the individual teams. He did note that the league is willing to help teams, while adding that merchandise team themes choices are up to the individual teams while the CCBL-branded merchandise is produced by the league with a focus on the baseball brand.20 Video commercials are something that both the league and teams employ.21

Team approaches to merchandise and its marketing vary. Some online team store pages include a wide array of baseball equipment as well as team and league-based T-shirts and other items while others simply focus on an array of team shirts and team-branded items. Meanwhile, the sponsorship opportunities for local supporters are extensive and diverse. Many of the teams, but not all, have yearbooks in which businesses take out ads or simply offer supportive messages. Other team sponsorship opportunities run the gamut from gift cards that can be raffled off to banners that hang at the field.22 There can be online ads, “foul ball sponsorships,23 and team-sponsored voiceovers during games as well as website presence.”24 Some teams offer the opportunity to sponsor a “hitter or pitcher of the week” while others offer the opportunity to “buy” jersey patches.25 Too, the prestige of the League helps draw sponsorships from national companies with local ties, like Wendy’s and TruGreen.26 And there are of course the old tried-and-true fundraising approaches like concessions at every home game.27 One of the effects of NIL [Name, Image and Likeness] in college sports has been the limit, if not outright ban, on the sale of jerseys and other individual player-type merchandise.28

In all of these efforts there is a balance between wanting to get support for the team but not wanting to price local merchants out of being involved.29 There is a similar balance of a different sort among the sponsors themselves, some of whom see an ad buy or the association of their name or their business with the team as a marketing decision; but more often such decisions are based in a desire to support an organization they see as an integral part of the community.30 With teams regularly evaluating what does and does not work, they are always open to ideas that both help support the team while at the same time furthering the sense of community.31 Imaginative and innovative ideas are always welcome.

So, the question becomes what about the future? Discussions with the leadership of the CCBL make clear that financial problems are not the issues at the top of their list of concerns. But they are by no means sitting with their heads in the sand, taking comfort in the league’s well-earned reputation. The disruptive aspects of the changed draft date, the transfer portal and the impact, real and potential, of NIL, coupled with the range of college coach-imposed playing restrictions on individual players, are of far greater concern, and they are all interrelated in many respects.32 At the same time, the league’s leadership is not only working to protect it against the challenges imposed by these outside forces but also strengthening the aspects over which it has control, like enhancing sponsorships. But at the same time the major challenges are ones over which CCBL has little or no control short of making some major changes to their basic mode of operation.

In taking a hard look at the future – financial and otherwise – of the CCBL, there appear to be three major factors that threaten to upend the league but none are directly related to finances. These are the changes in the timing of the MLB draft, the transfer portal of college baseball – both its very existence as well as its timing – and NIL and the way it has altered the relationship between players and their schools. Related to that and in some respects intertwined is the ever-changing relationship between players and their college program with inning and pitch counts as determined by coaches often accompanying a player to their Cape team. Each of these, in their own way, has in the last few years proven disruptive, and combined they are, in the view of some observers, potentially devastating.33

It should be noted that some believe that the summer program of USA Baseball, which causes some players to leave their Cape team part way into the summer season, is another major problem. However, given the significantly smaller number of players it involves, not to mention that its program and timing have been the same for well over a decade and a half, its impact would seem far less of a factor than the others. Too, players who participate in the USA team camps and then use that as an excuse to fully depart their Cape teams are not being honest with themselves or the team as the calendar does not make that a necessity and USA Baseball not only encourages players to return but will cover the cost of a player’s return travel expenses.34

Indeed, in that case and overall, the decision is ultimately the player’s to make and that is something that cannot be overlooked. With as many organizational and institutional factors as there are at play, in looking at where things stand with the Cape League, for all the changes that the draft, the NIL opportunities, and the transfer portal, etc., may portend, in the end it comes down to the players. What do they want, what are their goals, where are their loyalties, what kind of commitment do they bring to the process, etc.? As one experienced baseball administrator observed, “They are a different kind of player, more spoiled and more entitled.”35 And given how things have changed, it is not a real surprise – and is certainly not limited to baseball. However, given all that and in an era marked by availability of previously unimagined money well before they reach professional baseball, some of the homier aspects of the CCBL, things like the home stay that an earlier generation remembers with great fondness, may not have the same allure.

The impact of all of these factors is most clearly evident in the changing nature of CCBL rosters. With the standard roster being composed of approximately 18 players, not too many seasons ago it was not unusual for a team to go through their 40-game season with only minimal changes. But those days are gone with recent seasons having seen significant turnover being the norm with some teams having upward of 70 players making appearances over the course of the summer campaign.36 This new reality has its biggest impact on one of the league’s longest-running and most distinctive traditions: the home stay. Over the years both players and families have spoken with great affection about the relationship that is born from that experience, but when the player stays for only a short period, it can not only be a logistical nightmare for the volunteer arranging the home stays, but it diminishes the distinctive human connection that a full summer stay engenders.

Then there is the draft. Unlike most sports drafts, the MLB draft is held in midseason, taking place in July since 2021. The change, which now has the draft as part of a broader tableau of all-star game festivities, was, in typical MLB fashion, designed to shine a brighter spotlight on an important but comparatively underpublicized event. While all agree that it is now getting more attention, the question has become one of at what cost? It has impacted the timeline for scouting with the scouts finding themselves scouting two different classes at once given the overlap with the summer leagues. Coming as close as it does to the trade deadline creates its own set of issues. To most observers, the impact on summer league baseball of the change in the timing of the draft has been nothing but disruptive – to all leagues – and yet as best as anyone can tell, if MLB gave any of that a thought it did not register.37

Indeed, the move was a painful reminder to Cape League fans of the often tenuous relationship they have with MLB, reflecting for not the first time the way in which, while MLB is supporting the league with its annual contribution on the one hand, it is undermining its core operations – the summer schedule – on the other, all with an eye to their own profits, an approach reminiscent of the earlier merchandise ultimatum. Indeed, the shift of the draft to July was a move that, as has been apparent from the beginning, “simply makes life harder for a lot of people in baseball.”38 But as one agent noted, “There’s 30 people that like it, and they all own a team.”39 They are also the ones to whom the commissioner reports. In addition, with altered signing deadlines for the newly drafted players the potential for disruption at a key competitive point in the summer season is only increased. But there is no evidence that MLB cares about any of that.

It is a cruel irony that the more successful the Cape League is in producing the top draft picks that it has long seen as the validation of all it does, the more the season itself will likely be disrupted. But there is little reason to think that will change. In contrast, but not for any reason relating to the best interests of the CCBL, there may be some hope for reform of arguably the other biggest threat to the future of the Cape League – indeed, all summer leagues – but especially a top-tier one like the CCBL, and that is the transfer portal.

While there is much broad discussion about the challenges that summer leagues are facing, with over 80 summer college baseball leagues spread across the country, there are probably as many leagues as there are opinions, and that makes it all the more difficult to assess where any league, Cape Cod or otherwise, really lies.40 An article in Baseball America, appearing after the 2025 summer seasons were over, painted a discouraging picture of the future of summer league baseball, with a special emphasis on the impact of the transfer portal.41 It laid out some of the various challenges being faced and the impact it has already started to have. And yet with the large number of leagues in existence, not a single one of the GMs and administrators sharing the discouraging, if perhaps realistic, messages were identified by name, making it awfully hard to know which of their warnings were applicable to any of the vastly different leagues that dot the landscape. And the lack of specifics coupled with an equally telling lack of context left any reader with rumors, speculation, and fears galore, but that will take one only so far.

And it certainly makes it difficult to know exactly how much it applies to any particular league, much less whether it is part of the picture that is the current Cape Cod Baseball League. And that context matters, for when a major point begins with the statement “Summer leagues are built on nightly gates,” right away you have moved away from a fundamental aspect of the Cape Cod League, for while it certainly wants and needs fans to attend, with no admissions charge and no formal head counts, the very idea of a standard gate makes the fundamental premise upon which the statement is based suspect, if not out-and-out inapplicable. But that does not mean that the portal has not had an impact on the league.

Indeed, the general consensus among the CCBL leadership is that for all the changes that have hit college baseball in the last half-dozen years, impacting to differing degrees the college summer leagues, NIL was not yet a major factor, although it is hard to totally separate it from the transfer portal. In contrast, the transfer portal, coming at the summer leagues from different directions, was in some ways wreaking havoc and, coupled with the impact of the midsummer date for the MLB draft, represented the biggest challenges facing the league.

Central to the problem is the way the portal has contributed to a drop in players participating in summer college leagues at all. As one summer league official observed, “We have successfully convinced baseball players that playing baseball is no longer good for them,” adding, “Kids come here looking to showcase themselves for the portal. They get the offer, the love, the NIL promise – and they go home.”42 An official from another league opined, “The carousel of players is pretty much unprecedented in the last few years. It’s a completely different product than it’s ever been.”43 The biggest apparent ramification of the transfer portal has been a drop in topflight players playing in a summer league, and a major impetus for that appears to be a fear on the part of their coaches that playing will lead less to development than to switching schools.44

While college coaches profess to still want their players to play in the summer, they increasingly want it done on their terms. And at the end of the day, in more cases than many feel is good for summer baseball, coaches now see a player staying home as the safest thing – working out rather than actually playing baseball.45 As one writer observed, “In a landscape where loyalty to programs can be fickle at best, summer ball has become less an opportunity to improve than it is a showcase for coaches looking to pluck talent from other teams to bolster their rosters.”46 As one summer league official, bemoaning the situation, observed, “College coaches want summer ball to exist as a place to find talent, not a place to send talent. To them, sending talent is a risk.”47

Indeed, many see the portal and the way it has changed the attitudes of college coaches as the biggest problem. It has, in the eyes of the many coaches who were once glad to have their players head to the Cape to develop their skills become a different situation. Where the coaches were once happy to have their players display their talents for the plethora of major-league scouts who spend massive amounts of time at Cape League games, now that same talent is on display for other coaches anxious to poach new talent.

Of course, for a college coach who is himself always looking for new talent, it is a process that works both ways, but one that leaves summer leagues stuck in the middle.48 While coaches would once send their players to the Cape to develop, now they themselves are watching what is happening more broadly and are often engaging in the very same act of poaching that they fear. Left in the middle is the athlete and possibly his CCBL team, which suddenly loses him when, after he enters the portal and makes a commitment to a new school, the original agreement he had with the league may switch. His new coach may want him to come to school or may have a different set of guidelines for the player. Loyalties and lines of responsibility have changed. And those changes have impacted another aspect of the college game and the league – to no good effect.

Beyond the movement induced by the portal, there is the equally problematic situation of players, especially pitchers, arriving on the Cape with strict pitch-count or innings-pitched limitations dictated by their coaches. Such dictates have an obvious effect on a player’s summer experience and his potential contribution to his team, and they have led some to question whether it might not ultimately lead to top-tier pitchers totally abandoning the summer leagues, leaving pitching the scarcest of commodities.49

While many of these observations are made by observers involved with a range of leagues in the far-flung summer league network, the article in Baseball America did offer evidence that not even the Cape League was immune to the impact of what has been termed the “protective mindset” of college coaches. Baseball America reported that “[t]he protective mindset has produced a squeeze … even in the Cape Cod League … long been considered the gold standard of collegiate summer wood bat leagues.”50 It reported that “In 2018, 53 players logged at least 100 at-bats on the Cape. That cratered to 25 in 2023 and ticked up only slightly to 29 in 2025. On the mound, the downturn has been even more severe: 58 pitchers reached 20 innings in 2018 while just 25 did the same this summer.”51 Indeed, by all accounts the portal has changed everything, and many coaches now see a player staying home as the safest thing. As noted, “In a landscape where loyalty to programs can be fickle at best, summer ball has become less an opportunity to improve than it is a showcase for coaches looking to pluck talent from other teams to bolster their rosters.”52

So what does this all mean? As one summer league official said, “When talent flees early – sometimes in waves – the quality of baseball drops, teams slump toward sub-.500 records with replacement players and crowds thin.”53 One official said that July of 2025 was the “quietest I can remember,” attributing it largely to recognizable names disappearing before the stretch run.”54 Another declared, “You take away the best players, you take away the draw.”55 But such an observation raises the highly debatable question of just how much a name player matters in the summer league – even one touted as a pipeline to the pros. For all of MLB’s efforts, not to mention ESPN’s coverage of the College World Series, amateur baseball is still a small market and one would be hard pressed to believe that the majority of the people who attend a Cape Cod League game are the kind of fan who will walk away because the star they had not even heard of anyway was not there. It is not like the NBA with its need to impact award eligibility with minimum participation levels during the regular season.

At the same time, given all the changes and the recent trends, one cannot discount the warnings of another unnamed official who said: “I think you are going to see some (leagues) say they can’t live like this because they have to put on a show every night. You need players to put on a show. And if you don’t have the players – you don’t have the quality of players – sooner or later someone is going to ask, ‘What are we doing this for?’”56

A disconcerting assessment, to be sure, but between a combination of its long history and its distinctive model, it is frankly hard to know to what degree these essentially anonymous doomsday scenarios apply to a league like the CCBL. But at the same time, there can be little doubt that when college coaches no longer see the summer leagues as places to develop talent, but rather as places where they can scout other players in advance of their own portal action, the baseball world has moved into uncharted territory.

And in the end, for the topflight prospects, especially those already profiting from the once unimaginable NIL money, the things that were once so attractive about the Cape, the historic value and the human dimension of the Cape’s experience from the home stay to the exposure, the ability of a prospect to stay at school, work out in school facilities, and eat all they want while getting guidance from coaches, all without worrying about money, is an option that can seem pretty enticing.57

In its own way that reality highlights the areas most directly impacted by the turmoil resulting from the draft-date change and the chaos of the transfer portal that have combined to lead to the increased roster turnover and as well as the disruption of the home-stay experience. While obviously a family that has volunteered to host a player for the whole summer can undoubtedly adapt to perhaps multiple short-term visitors, there can be no denying that it makes for a different experience and perhaps less attractive opportunity in the future. It certainly results in different relationships and a different psychological approach – less a member of the family than a couple or even a few shorter-term boarders; but either way it is a situation that ultimately, in almost all ways, undermines and detracts from one of the most positive human dimensions of a player’s Cape League experience as well as what the family gets out of in terms of a relationship and a trove of memories.

On the practical baseball side, there is the issue of roster turnover. While there are some who think it is overplayed, arguing that it has always existed, in one form or another, albeit to a lesser degree, in the eyes of most it has become a very real issue if only in terms of the numbers.58 The bigger question is whether it is an issue that truly impacts the game or is simply an irritant – is it a matter of simply replacing a bat in the lineup or plugging someone into the closer’s spot or does it upend a team’s culture and chemistry?59 These are not easy questions nor are they ones that are the same for the lengthier seasons of professional baseball and even college baseball that observers and those making the judgments are often coming from. Like many aspects of this issue, we are often left with more questions than answers.

Many place much of the blame for all of this on the NCAA, arguing that until it gets control of college baseball and especially the portal, the current chaos will continue to the detriment of the summer leagues – and the players who have for so long benefited from the experience.60 One can only hope that some portal reform can be achieved. For reasons that extend well beyond summer baseball, coaches and schools are calling for changes, and while nothing appears imminent, there is no doubt that the NCAA needs to get better control of the transfer portal in baseball as it has begun to do in other sports like football and basketball.61

Finally, in talking about the Cape Cod Baseball League – past, present, or future – you come back to the community aspect and the volunteers who by all accounts are at the heart of the league. The players come and go, but the volunteers, the sponsors, and very many of the fans come back season after season to enjoy baseball and the camaraderie and community that is so central to what the league offers. Quite simply, it is impossible to underestimate the importance of community, as well as the volunteers at the heart of the Cape Cod Baseball League. Some might argue that it is arguably easy to romanticize or sentimentalize that aspect of the CCBL, but it is real. Involvement with the league and its teams is a labor of love for countless people and that cannot be ignored. And no discussion of the league and its future can ignore it.

Talk with anyone involved with the Cape Cod Baseball League and you cannot help but come away with a clear understanding that its enduring success is rooted in its volunteers.62 And while often unspoken, but no less apparent is that their efforts, their motivation, is rooted in the sense of community that suffuses the league as a whole as well as each individual team, while also transcending the baseball operations of which they are all, in their own way, a part. And in any assessment of the state of the league or any discussions about its future, that reality cannot be forgotten.

While to the outside world the number of alums who have gone on to bigger and better things – even Hall of Fame induction and award-winning careers – it is at base the people that distinguish the league. There are certainly those who try to minimize that aspect of things, especially in the increasingly commerce-driven world of sports at all levels; but no investigation or look at the CCBL can avoid its importance or its centrality to what the league does.

Attending a Cape League game is a distinctive experience. With no admission fee there is no nightly gate and as those who come and plant their beach chair in their preferred spot don’t really know yet, the league’s slogan notwithstanding, which of the players they are watching will be the stars of the future, but especially in the close-knit communities that are central to the league’s very existence, they do know the other people sitting on the hill with them and those people are as important to their experience as are the ones pitching and hitting.

League President Andrew Lang observes that teams have different personalities – some are all about the local community – drawing the same fans game after game while others are more reliant on tourists for attendance but in the end it is a “community-based game,” with a down-home community.63 And Lang adds that he sees all the teams being “ingrained in the community.”64 Meanwhile, league Commissioner John Castleberry reminds people that the CCBL is different from other summer leagues.65 He says its attraction is based in its role as part of the summer, and while he and his fellow CCBL leaders recognize that they are operating in a competitive recreational landscape, they see themselves as a “fun family-based option,” one whose “pillars are so strong.”66 Castleberry observes that the teams are part of the community. They hold clinics for young players, and they go to the library and read to the kids. The specific activities vary from team to team but they all serve to make the teams a part of the community.67 Whether it is a First Responders Night where first responders are recognized and then throw out the ceremonial first pitch or a dozen players join a sponsor and his family in a community cleanup effort, the league and its teams recognize and celebrate their being a part of the community.68 Castleberry proudly declares that the “roots are so deep.”69

Most of the talk about the potential demise of the league is based, like so much of modern baseball, in numbers and not in the experience. The league leadership understands that and is working to add even more sponsors and encouraging even more website hits, but it also recognizes the human dimension that undergirds the list of first-round draft choices that the league can boast. While the experience and the ethos can be overplayed, it should not be under-appreciated.

Yes, some talk about the loss that comes from being unable to market a star player over the course of a whole season, and others see the draft results as a litmus test of the league’s effort.70 But in the end, it is for good reason that a central part of the league’s marketing efforts is focused on pushing the Cape Cod baseball experience and about getting people to see the CCBL as an integral part of a Cape Cod summer. As communications director Shawn McBride explained, the goal is to have people believe that if you are coming to the Cape for the summer there are certain things you need to do: ice cream, the beach, and a Cape Cod Baseball League game. He said a central goal is to have people believe, as he put it, that “summer is not complete without a Cape Code League game.”71 Two hours as the sun sets watching the stars of tomorrow. One does not need to be a huge baseball fan to see it as a pretty enticing vision. Indeed, in the words of one writer, “The Cape Cod Baseball League: [is] A Family Home Run.”72

In the end, in looking at the future of the Cape Cod Baseball League, whether from a financial, cultural, or competitive perspective, one must admit that while no one has a crystal ball, especially in the rapidly changing world of college athletics, it is particularly difficult, if not impossible, to predict the future. But at the same time, the league appears well situated, run by leaders who are cognizant of challenges that lie ahead and supported by a community deeply committed to its mission and what it brings to their lives. For at least this observer, talk of the potential demise of the Cape League brings to mind a reported quip from Mark Twain, who was in fact, a big baseball fan: “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.”73 May the CCBL enjoy a similarly long life!

BILL PRUDEN has recently retired after over 40 years as a teacher of American history and government. A SABR member for over two decades, he has contributed to SABR’s BioProject and Games Project, as well as to a number of book projects. He has also written on a range of American history subjects, an interest undoubtedly fueled by the fact that as a 7-year-old he was at Yankee Stadium to witness Roger Maris’s historic 61st home run.

 

SOURCES

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted the website of the Cape Cod Baseball League (https://www.capecodleague.com/ ) as well as the websites of the individual teams.

 

NOTES

1 Rich Maclone, “Author concerned for CCBL’s Future,” Bourne (Massachusetts) Enterprise, July 22, 2025; https://www.capenews.net/bourne/sports/author-concerned-for-ccbls-future/article_305374ca-9be8-43eb-8351-f4a0f8dcc987.html .

2 Ben Larsen, “10 Best College Baseball Summer Leagues,” Made Man, April 19, 2020; https://web.archive.org/web/20160301131503/ http://www.mademan.com/mm/10-best-college-baseball-summer-leagueleagueleagueleagues.html ; Maclone.

3 Email from SABR Committee on the Business of Baseball, July 21, 2025.

4 Erez Ben-Akiva, “ESPN’s Sports Center Broadcasts From Chatham Anglers Game,” Cape Cod Chronicle (Chatham, Massachusetts), July 30, 2025; https://www.capecodchronicle.com/articles/3128/view/espn-s-sportscenter-broadcasts-from-chatham-anglers-game .

5 Jane Leavy, Make Me Commissioner: I Know What’s Wrong with Baseball and How to Fix It (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2025), 11.

6 Leavy, 13.

7 Author telephone interview with Sean McBride, September 8, 2025.

8 McBride interview.

9 Author telephone interview with Paul Logan, August 11, 2025.

10 Logan interview.

11 “Cape Cod Baseball League Inc,” ProPublica, Nonprofit Explorer; https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/42687718 .

12 Author telephone interview with Andrew Lang, September 15, 2025.

13 Lang interview.

14 Mikayla Moskowitz, “65 days on Cape Cod,” CapeCodLeagueLeagueLeagueLeague.com , August 23, 2023; https://www.capecodleagueleagueleagueleague.com/news/65-days-on-cape-cod . Accessed January 14, 2026.

15 Lang interview.

16 McBride interview.

17 McBride interview.

18 McBride interview.

19 Lang interview.

20 Lang interview.

21 Author telephone interview with Austin DeCouta, September 26, 2025.

22 Author telephone interview with Russell Salamone, October 1, 2025.

23 Salamone interview.

24 Author telephone interview with Ned Chatelain, September 25, 2025.

25 DeCouta interview.

26 DeCouta interview.

27 DeCouta interview.

28 DeCouta interview.

29 DeCouta interview.

30 Email, Kathryn Bean to Bill Pruden, September 24, 2025; author telephone interview with Rod McCauley, September 29, 2025; Chatelain interview; Salamone interview.

31 DeCouta interview.

32 Brad Joyal, “The ‘Chaos’ of College Baseball Has Heads and Rosters Spinning in the Cape League,” Boston Globe, August 18, 2023: C1.

33 Jacob Rudner, “Summer Slide,” Baseball America, October 2025; Maclone.

34 Author telephone interview with Ashley Bratcher, October 15, 2025.

35 Bratcher interview.

36 Logan interview.

37 Zach Buchanan, “Why a Mid-July MLB Draft Creates Headaches Around Baseball: ‘A Very Careless Thing.’” The Athletic, July 29, 2022.

38 Buchanan.

39 Buchanan.

40 “Summer Collegiate League,” The Baseball Observer, February 2025; https://www.thebaseballobserver.com/summer-collegiate-leagueleagueleagueleagues .

41 Rudner.

42 Rudner.

43 Rudner.

44 Joyal.

45 Joyal.

46 Rudner.

47 Rudner.

48 Rudner; Joyal.

49 Joyal.

50 Rudner.

51 Rudner.

52 Rudner.

53 Rudner.

54 Rudner.

55 Rudner.

56 Rudner.

57 Bratcher interview.

58 Lang interview; Logan interview.

59 Maclone.

60 Joyal.

61 Max Olson, “NCAA Adopts Jan. 2-16 Transfer Portal Window for FBS, FCS in ’26,” ESPN, October 7, 2025; https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/46524004/ncaa-adopts-jan-2-16-transfer-portal-window-fbs-fcs-26 .

62 Maclone; Castleberry interview; Lang interview; McBride interview; DeCoute interview; McCauley interview; Chatelain interview; Salamone interview; Bean email.

63 Lang interview.

64 Lang interview.

65 Author telephone interview with John Castleberry, September 16, 2025.

66 Castleberry interview.

67 Castleberry interview.

68 Castleberry interview; Salamone interview.

69 Castleberry interview.

70 Castleberry interview.

71 McBride interview.

72 Shannon Brady, “The Cape Cod Baseball League Family Home Run,” Cape Cod Moms, July 15, 2025; https://capecodmoms.com/seasonal/summer/the-cape-cod-baseball-leagueleagueleagueleague-a-family-home-run/ .

73 Robert Deis, “Reports of Mark Twain’s Quip About His Death Are Greatly Misquoted …” This Day in Quotes, June 2, 2018; https://www.thisdayinquotes.com/2018/06/reports-of-mark-twains-quip-about-his-death-are-greatly-misquoted/ .