Attention to details vital for infield maintenance
19 Jun, 2011 By: Ron Hall Athletic Turf NewsKNOXVILLE, TN — There are three kinds of people that take care of the dirt on a baseball or softball field — those that “have to,” those that “like to” and those that “love to.” So says Darrell Denny, sports turf manager at the University of Tennessee.
Denny says one of his goals is to take the student interns who “like to” manage baseball fields and help them progress to the “love to” level. Sometimes he can, sometimes he can’t. This year he has eight interns helping him care for the university’s Lee Softball Stadium and Regal Soccer Stadium fields. Some of them show promise, he says.
Denny brought 30 years experience maintaining baseball fields to his job at the university. For more than 25 years he taught as well as coached baseball. He also served as the head groundskeeper for several Minor League baseball teams before taking the job at Tennessee.
Denny’s real love as a grounds manager (and his biggest challenge as a grounds manager) at the university is preparing the skin infield at Lee Stadium. He wants it just right for Tennessee's women’s softball team.
“Dirt is an art, it’s not a science,” says Denny. “You have to pay attention to details. That’s what matters.”
Denny says that every baseball or softball field has a unique personality. That's the reason why a particular management practice may work on one field and not another. Grounds managers have to learn to work with the unique characteristics of their fields. The personalities are determined, in large part, by the composition of each field's dirt.
That’s the best place to start when attempting to improve an infield — finding out what it’s made of, says Denny.
The Lee Stadium field, for example, has a composition of 40% clay, 49% sand and 11% silt. A typical softball infield at a city park might have 60% or more sand, which would require less maintenance than the Lee Stadium field, says Denny.
Also, taking care of a women’s softball field — a new experience for Denny — is different than a men’s baseball field. The wear patterns are different. In preparing the field, he works very closely with the team’s coaches, he says.
Denny was one of the presenters at the recent STMA Regional Conference at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. About 200 sports field managers and vendors participated in the seminar. In next month's enewsletter we'll share some of the other great information from the regional conference.
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