The Parksville Royals Baseball Club is hosting tryouts for bantam-age players, March 6 and 7 at the Highland Secondary field in Comox. The bantam age group is 13 and 14 years.
The club plans to field one senior and two bantam teams in the spring. Rosters will be finalized late March. There are only two to four spots remaining on the senior roster. The bantams, however, require more time as coaches decide on the best fit for the organization and each player’s individual development path.
The Royals — a founding member of the BC Premier Baseball League — have been fielding youth teams for 27 years. In 2019, seven of eight graduating players went on to play college baseball. Over the course of the club’s history, 88 players have used the team as a platform to professional and college baseball.
This season, the Royals are not able to form a junior team.
“There just wasn’t enough interest in that junior program, that’s the Grade 10s. With this COVID, we just saw a whole age group basically disappear,” said Carl Bitonti, general manager of the bantam Royals.
“We’re limited to Vancouver Island as it sits right now in our cohort,” he added.
This season, the Royals’ opposition will include the Mid-Island Pirates in Nanaimo, the Victoria Eagles and the Victoria Mariners.
Bantam tryouts run from 11:30 a.m. — 2 p.m. at Highland, Saturday, March 6 and Sunday, March 7.
For more details, visit bit.ly/3aXksxd
For more club information, contact Bitonti at 778-912-2066, or Mike Parlow, GM senior and junior Royals, at (250) 954-7850.
