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Campanelli Stadium | |||||||
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Brockton, MA
| Team: Brockton Rox | League: Futures Collegiate Baseball League |
| Opening Day: May 31, 2002 | Capacity: 6,000 |
| Surface: grass | Dimensions: LF 320 CF 403 RF 320 |
Memorable Moments:
The best thing about this stadium is you could call in an order on your cell phone to the concessions booth and they would bring it to you. The worst thing was if the big bad wolf came to Brockton, this place would be blown down. It felt like a cheap stadium. The layout was generic with the luxury boxes on top of the open concourse. Also the scoreboard was a little too small to read clearly from my seat. See picture below.
The Northeast league formed in 1995 and was based entirely in New York state. After a successful year they started expanding a little south and into New England. As they continued to prosper, they wanted to reach out to areas where they had not been so they merged with the Northern League in 1999. In 2003 they split from the Northern League to reform the Northeast League (now CanAm League) because they felt like they were loosing their identity as a league.
Why did I type all this crap? Well, it is my opinion that in 2002 the Northeast League decided to split from the Northern League. When Wahconah Park in Pittsfield, MA, became available a team moved there in 2002 and Brockton became an expansion team. That is why Campanelli Stadium was built, to bring the total number of teams to eight, as six is a bit small for an independent league. The final moves that allowed the Northeast League to split was the moving of one of the weaker franchises to a new stadium in Bangor, ME and the folding of a weak franchise and opening a new one in Lynn, MA.
With the Boston Red Sox having the highest priced tickets in the game, and New England being a hot bed for baseball, I think it is great that so many alternatives to Fenway exist, especially close to Boston.
The Brockton Rox retired numbers are:
How can a franchise that is this new have retired numbers you may ask? Well, these guys didn't play baseball, both of them were boxers. Brockton has a great boxing history, part of which is that both of these fellas are from Brockton. Rocky Marciano retired as the only undefeated heavyweight champion in history. He was the champ from 1952 until 1955. He died in a plane crash in 1969. "Marvelous" Marvin Hagler was the middleweight champion from 1980 to 1987. He liked the nickname "Marvelous" so much he had his name legally changed. Marciano went 49-0-0 with 43 KO's and Hagler went 62-3-2 with 52 KO's. The numbers retired were both the fighter's win totals.
© 2003-17 Paul Healey.