Panther baseball team looks forward to game at Busch Stadium

By Andy Krutsinger, Mt. Pleasant News

During the early summer months, the Mt. Pleasant baseball team can usually be found fighting for a victory at Mapleleaf Athletic Complex, but on June 30, the battle field will be quite a bit larger.

The Panthers are just over two weeks away from taking their talents to St. Louis for their game at Busch Stadium.

Mt. Pleasant will be taking on Ottumwa in the game, which will take place after the Cardinals? regular-season game against the Atlanta Braves. The Bulldogs approached Mt. Pleasant about the plan last season.

?Ottumwa kind of talked to us about it last year, and we really couldn?t get it to work,? explained Mt. Pleasant head coach Brent Broeker. ?They?ve got a bunch of seniors and one of the boys on the team works at Press Box.?

Ottumwa got ahold of MPCHS Athletic Director Scott Lamm and the two schools went on pursuing the potential matchup.

It will likely be a very late night for the Panthers and Bulldogs. The Cardinals-Braves game will begin at 6:05 p.m., which means the high school game will begin around 10 p.m. That is, if there aren?t extra innings.

The two teams had to sell a number of tickets to the Cardinals game in order for it to all work out financially. The tickets that Mt. Pleasant players have been selling around the community get fans into the Cardinals game for cheap and double as tickets for the high school games.

?It?s a good deal even if you don?t want to watch us,? says Broeker. ?You?re getting cheap tickets, and they?re pretty good seats.?

The seats are in the left field terrace area, but after the MLB game, which will be broadcast on Fox, fans can move down behind the dugouts so they can sit directly behind the players.

The high school game should be pretty competitive. Mt. Pleasant is currently 10-7 and Ottumwa sits at 13-6. The Bulldogs defeated the Panthers by two or fewer runs the last two times the schools met.