The New England Collegiate Baseball League (NECBL) is returning to the North Shore and Fraser Field.
After a nine-year hiatus, the North Shore Navigators — a charter member of the New England League’s inaugural season dating back to 1994 — will rejoin the NECBL this summer. The return of the Navs will boost the New England League’s membership to a record-high 14 organizations in 2021, as the league has now added an expansion team in three straight seasons (Bristol in 2020; Martha’s Vineyard in 2019).
The New England Collegiate Baseball League is a wooden bat college summer league that fields teams in all six New England states. Partially funded by Major League Baseball, the New England League started play in 1994 and has sent over 150 alumni to the Major Leagues and has had nearly 100 alumni drafted in each of the last 10 Major League Baseball Drafts. The league is now made up of 14 teams — the Bristol Blues, the Danbury Westerners, the Keene Swamp Bats, the Mystic Schooners, the Martha’s Vineyard Sharks, the Newport Gulls, the North Adams SteepleCats, the North Shore Navigators, the Ocean State Waves, the Sanford Mainers, the Upper Valley Nighthawks, the Valley Blue Sox, the Vermont Mountaineers and the Winnipesaukee Muskrats.
“The New England League is delighted to welcome back the North Shore Navigators,” said NECBL Commissioner Sean McGrath. “We are all excited to return to the North Shore region of Massachusetts, the city of Lynn, and beautiful Fraser Field, where the Navigators won the 2010 NECBL Championship. It’s truly a great day for our league.”
The Navigators began their NECBL tenure nearly 30 years ago as a charter member based out of Middletown, Conn. The organization enjoyed remarkable success throughout its time in the New England League, most notably when it won three straight NECBL titles as the Middletown Giants from 1997-99 — which still is the only time an NECBL team has three-peated in the league’s history.
Following a three-year stint as the Holyoke (Mass.) Giants, the team relocated to the North Shore in Lynn, Massachusetts, where they have called Fraser Field home since 2008. The Navigators qualified for the NECBL postseason in four straight seasons, highlighted by their winning a fourth Fay Vincent Sr. Cup in 2010.
From 2012-2020, the Navigators competed in the nine-team Futures Collegiate Baseball League (FCBL). The Navs made it all the way to the FCBL championship game in 2012 before losing to the Nashua Silver Knights.
North Shore will represent the fourth NECBL team located in the Bay State, joining the North Adams SteepleCats, Martha’s Vineyard Sharks and the Valley Blue Sox.
“We are excited to rejoin this great league,” said Navigators President and General Manager Derek January. “With 14 teams in the league, our fans will have an opportunity to see how good the college baseball talent is across the country. The league’s not-for-profit status is aligned with our desire to give back to the community, and we have many promotions planned to do just that. We think being in the NECBL is a home run for our players, fans and sponsors. We have been working behind the scenes to get ready for June 4. It has been a long time since we have had Navs Nation at Fraser Field, and we look forward to them watching us compete for an NECBL championship.”
“The NECBL is rated among the top-three summer collegiate leagues in the country for a reason, and we are very confident the January family will take the Navigators to the next level by recruiting professional-caliber players from some of the top tier collegiate programs from around the country,” said McGrath.
Opening Day for the NECBL is currently slated for June 3.
