Blair Field, the Long Beach State baseball team’s home for the past 23 years, is undergoing a facelift after the program secured funds to kickstart renovations to the stadium.
The project is estimated to cost $17 million in total and about $2.8 million has been raised so far.
“It’s going to take some time,” head coach Troy Buckley said. “It’s not cheap, so I think overall it’s exciting and you’ve been to Blair Field and you’ve been talking about this thing for six years and you walk into the park; you’re going to see something and that is huge for the momentum for what we’re doing.”
Phase one is currently underway, which includes the new outfield fence. According to the Blair Field Campaign website, there will be a total of four phases throughout the renovation.
“I think it’s a long time coming,” Buckley said. “We’ve been talking about this since I [became] head coach and we’ve been extremely fortunate to have some really generous donors.”
Senior Associate Athletic Director of Major Gifts Wayne Stickney said this project will be made possible by spreading the word everywhere and letting people know that LBSU is looking for donors.
“We’re using a shotgun approach,” Stickney said. “We’re hitting the masses and we launched a marketing campaign around Blair Field and distributing the information. We’ve been very intentional about getting the word out.”
Stickney said that Cal State Long Beach students won’t pay an athletics fee for the Blair Field upgrades, all the renovations will be funded 100 percent by donations.
The new renovations are the first since the city of Long Beach invested $1.4 million to upgrade the stadium in 1992. Those renovations included new seats, a new roof, new paint, a new backstop and Triple A-standard lighting. The Dirtbags moved into the stadium the following year.
The donations this time around have come largely from Marilyn Bohl and former Dirtbag Troy Tulowitzki, who donated $1 million each. Former Dirtbag and current Angels’ pitcher Jered Weaver donated $500,000 and Tampa Bay Rays’ Evan Longoria donated $100,000. Another former player, who chose to remain anonymous, donated an additional $100,000.
“I’m extremely humbled and grateful,” Buckley said. “They have a lot of buckets to fill. They’ve given a huge amount of money back to a program I believe they had a good time at and they respected and that they want to see do well. We are extremely fortunate.”
This is the largest donation the athletic program has received since the Bickerstaff family donated $2 million to help upgrade facilities in the Walter Pyramid in 2012.
“[Former players] have wanted to do it instead of being pushed in to do it,” Buckley said. “That’s what I feel good about. I never once asked them for this, that or the other. They know what we’re doing and they’ve graciously gave us money.”
Along with the cosmetics of the renovations, junior shortstop Garrett Hampson is excited that ex-players that walked the same field are giving back.
“It’s special,” Hampson said. “When you’re part of a program that people, who aren’t part of it this year, want to give back is pretty cool. It makes us want to win for them.”
Stickney said LBSU is still looking for donations to complete the Blair Field renovations. He said the six and seven-figure donations have been helpful, but any amount is welcome.
