Newton County baseball and softball teams will have a new place to get extra swings in by the start of the 2024-25 school year.
In a meeting held on Feb. 27, the Newton County Board of Education unanimously approved a motion for Alcovy, Eastside and Newton high schools to receive new batting cages.
The plan was given to S.H. Creel Constructing, Inc. of Marietta, who won the bid for the construction at a price of $1,589,265.
Construction on the new batting cages began in April in the latter month of the baseball season.
The new cages are expected to feature three lanes as well as retractable netting and a turf base.
For the coaches of the county teams, the cages will provide many benefits.
Newton Rams head baseball coach, Delvin Jordan, shared a sentiment that was similar among all the coaches — the opportunity to still get swings in during the rain.
“The new batting cages can really help the team next year because we will have a place to hit when it rains. We will be protected from the rain — the baseballs won’t get wet or waterlogged. It can really help us with development. Some of those days it rained this year we had to go inside and do stuff in the gym or just eliminate practice for the whole day.
“It will be big for us with developing and getting more swings in,” Jordan said.
Alcovy head softball coach Miranda Lamb, whose team has used the same batting cages since the school opened in 2006, was happy when she heard the official announcement.
“We are excited about it,” Lamb said. “It is going to be a lot bigger than the old batting cage. The old batting cage has been there as long as I’ve been there. It was time for a renovation and I am glad the county realized that.”
Lamb shared that former Alcovy baseball coach Kareem Hayes and herself pushed for the renovations to include spaces for the players to change as well as to stay clear from rain.
“When they talked to us about tearing down the old batting cage and building a new one, they came to coach Hayes and I and asked, ‘What would you guys like to see in this,’” Lamb said. “We both requested a room — when you look down there, there is nowhere for our kids to change or to go for the weather or anything like that.”
For the Eastside coaches, the addition of new batting cages is long overdue.
Prior to the new ones, the Eagles did not have any batting cages for their baseball and softball teams. This led to baseball coach Cody Walker and softball coach Heather Wood having their players take swings from the field or off-campus.
“It is tough to get swings in when you don’t have a batting cage. Or when it is raining — we are having to go off-site to get swings in,” Walker said. “We were able to put a temporary cage up this year but with no covering, [it is] the same story if it is raining. To say the least — when we get the batting cages, it will be a good day.
“[It is going to] definitely help us next year.”
Wood sees the new cages as a stepping stone for her program to get to the next level with an opportunity to maximize practice time.
