Greg Kigar knew he and the Lansing Lugnuts needed to explore other avenues.
As the uncertainty surrounding the minor league baseball season continued to grow in May, the newly hired Lugnuts director of stadium events started thinking about how the organization could serve the community in other ways with the coronavirus pandemic wiping out numerous scheduled events.
And that led to Kigar, who formerly worked as an assistant athletic director at Central Michigan and served as a director of stadium events for the Great Lakes Loons, reaching out to past connections about the possibility of a summer wood-bat college baseball league taking place in Lansing.
"I knew a lot of coaches," Kigar said. "I reached out to (Jake) Boss at Michigan State and (Steve) Jaksa, who was at Central Michigan when I was there and he's now at Saginaw Valley. I was touching base and saying we're thinking of doing this, are there kids out there right now? Are there enough kids to think about having two teams instead of one team? I got some really good feedback."
That input led Kigar on a two-month project that came to life Thursday with the Lemonade League beginning play at Cooley Law School Stadium. Thursday's game was the first of a 17-game slate that will continue Wednesday and take place over the next four weeks featuring the Collegiate Locos and Collegiate Lugnuts.
Seeing things come together, hearing the crack of a bat hitting a ball and even having a crowd of 100 in attendance taking in the action beyond the outfield wall made Thursday rewarding for Kigar, who drove the bus in the league's formation and spent plenty of time connecting with prospective college players.
"It was so nice to see two months’ worth of work come to fruition, knowing that at any point somebody could have said we can't do it," Kigar said. "I just kept on waiting for (general manager Tyler Parsons) to tell me to stop because I was going to keep pushing until somebody told me we couldn't do it.
"I figured if we would wait until we knew for sure (there was no minor league baseball), it was going to be too late because these guys were going to get picked up by something else. It just seemed to work out."
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The Lugnuts unveiled the Lemonade League on June 30 — the same day Major League Baseball announced there would be no season in the minors. In the weeks since, Kigar and staff secured roster commitments from college players in the state. The Lugnuts also worked with health officials such as Ingham County Health Officer Linda Vail — who was in attendance Thursday — to make sure they were following proper protocols with players and around the stadium. That meant limiting the crowd to 100 for the time being and having players following guidelines.
"(What we told the players) is that every thought and dream about how you've played baseball and what you've grown up with — and the same with us — goes out the window," Kigar said. "There's not going to be those big team celebrations and lots of high fives. It's really a mindset frame you've got to change. It's going to be difficult. It's not going to be easy.
"As of now, it's a way for us to continue and really mitigate all the risks. It's just the way we are going to have to do things. It was nice to get day one over."
The hope for Kigar is that Thursday's opener is part of a successful remainder of the summer. At some point when games return next week, Cooley could feature fan cardboard cutouts in the seating bowl. And Kigar is hopeful the Lugnuts will get a clearance to allow more fans before the season ends Aug. 20.
But the early returns and having sold-out games through the end of the month have Kigar encouraged. So has the feedback from players such as Michigan State’s Andrew Morrow and Jesse Heikkinen (Holt) and Concordia Ann Arbor's Vann Acker (Eaton Rapids), who have appreciated having an opportunity to return to the field after a lengthy layoff.
"From a personal aspect, I would love to be able to keep this going and find a way for this to co-exist with the Lugnuts in future years," Kigar said. "I think it's a nice mix of having an affiliated minor league team of kids trying to make the bigs and then having these college athletes that want to get to their level. It will be so nice to find that mix. We'll approach that as we finish up here and get into next season. Outside of that, it was just really nice to have baseball back at the ballpark."
Contact Brian Calloway at bcalloway@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @brian_calloway.
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