On Friday, May 19, 2022, the Ohio Valley Baseball League will begin its season with the same five clubs that competed in 2022. This means that the Boys of Summer will play again.
Among those five teams are the defending champion Maynard Indians, as well as their rivals from Belmont County, the Barton Braves, and Martins Ferry River Dawgs. The Moundsville Expos and the Wheeling Pirates will both field teams once more on the portion of West Virginia that is adjacent to the Ohio River that is in Ohio.
The statement was made by the league president Laney Simone Sr. on Monday night. “It should be a really good season,” he said. The summer before last was a tremendously competitive season all the way up and down the ladder, and all five teams are coming back for more.
For the 2023 season, five teams will return to the OVBL.
Maynard will play its home games on the diamond located in Community Park, while Barton’s games will be played on Henning Field, which is located inside Pramesa Park in Crescent. Moundsville’s home diamond is Monarch Field at John Marshall High School in Glen Dale, while Martins Ferry will play on the high school diamond atop the Purple City.
Martins Ferry’s home game will be played against Moundsville. Wheeling will play their home games at Kovalick Field, which is located on the West Liberty University campus.
For a total of 20 games throughout the regular season, each of the five teams will compete against the other four teams four times. Unless alternative arrangements are made, games are played at six o’clock in the evening during the week and at one o’clock in the afternoon on Sundays.
The first game of the playoffs will take place on either Friday, July 7 or Sunday, July 9 and will pit the No. 4 seed against the No. 5 seed in a single-game playoff to discover who advances to the semifinals to face the No. 1 seed.
Billy Timko, a seasoned manager, is in charge of the Barton team, while David Vicker is in charge of the Maynard club. Wheeling is managed by Jeff Shaw, while Martins Ferry is overseen by Andy Sutak, and Moundsville is in charge of things over at John Santimarino.
The following are some additional guidelines for the year 2023:
The first of June serves as the cutoff date for players to swap teams. The receiving team is obligated to get in touch with the previous team in order to settle any outstanding debts to the previous team. Before a player can start playing for a new team, the receiving team is required to get final consent from either the league president or the vice president of the league.
To be eligible for the playoffs, a player needs to have a total of four appearances. A single pitch throughout a game constitutes a single appearance;
The designated hitter can only bat for the starting pitcher; all other players are off limits.
– A game that is suspended because of the weather and/or darkness and does not last four and a half innings will be resumed at a later date from the point in time when the game was stopped and will be played to completion;
When a game is canceled, it must be rescheduled to take place within seven days of the original cancellation date.