‘Stir it up with the Foresters

Turning to a local baseball team still playing this summer, the Santa Barbara Foresters are continuing their winning ways, closing out last weekend still in sole control of first place in the CCL South. The team, which has won an unprecedented 10 National Baseball Congress World Series titles, will be headed once again to the NBC tournament in Wichita after the regular season winds down on Sunday. 

Part of the fun of the Foresters, a team largely comprised of not-yet draft eligible collegians from around the country, is that they play with wood bats as part of the only league eschewing aluminum and other metals for the natural stuff used in MLB and the minors. But there’s even more charm to be found in these leagues. 

Among the attributes, most of the players are taken in by host families, a holdover tradition from the old lower minor leagues. Add to that the Foresters’ longtime fans and friends, such as sportswriter Jim Buckley (who wrote a recent book about the team), and SB-based actor Henry Brown, he of the numerous film and TV credits, including the first Ghostbusters movie. Hurlers who aren’t getting into the game sit behind the batting cage charting pitches and chatting, and sometimes even join in on leading the singing of “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” during the 7th inning stretch (giving the late Harry Caray a run for his off-key money). 

Players’ families come from far away to watch. Last weekend, pitcher Tyler Phenow’s family flew out from Minnesota to catch both a home and away game from the first-base stands, and a young man from Portland – who had neither skin nor family in the game – wanted to add seeing the Foresters to his collection of sports attendance memories. 

Fans can keep foul balls they retrieve, although many land in the brush of a house neighboring Eddie Mathews Field at Santa Barbara, where the Foresters have played since 2024. You’ll often find intrepid, foliage-scanning kids in this category playing catch in the walkway that leads to the portable bathrooms. One can also exchange these captured foul balls for a free smoothie from Blenders in the Grass.  

There’s a guy who almost always watches from Canon Perdido St., peering through the gaps in the banners lining the chain link fence and loudly cheering for the team with rhythmic, shouted schemes comprised of batters’ last names or jersey numbers. 

Admission is just $7, free after about six innings, and everything at the snack bar is $2 or less, including Gatorade, which is cheaper than any grocery store when it’s not on sale. 

And at the conclusion of the games the PA always plays Bob Marley’s “Stir It Up” because of the Foresters’ nickname, (Take that Bronx Bombers and your lame “New York, New York!”). 

All in all, a Foresters game is great fun even if you’re not watching the actual game and can’t tell the difference between a double and a double play. 

There are still four games left in the season, all at Santa Barbara High, July 17-20, before the team heads off to Wichita. Visit https://sbforesters.org.