(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photos by RCH-Pinguïns & Jan Kruijdenberg)
 Nicky Heij new Head Coach of RCH-Pinguïns
Nederlands
 HEEMSTEDE (Neth.) -
Nicky Heij will lead the baseball-team of RCH-Pinguïns next year when it will make its comeback in the highest Dutch league, the club announced on Monday (November 22).
Heij succeeds Marlon Frolijk, who led the team in the past six seasons.
On November 20, the club announced that Frolijk had decided to step down and will not be back as Head Coach next season.
RCH-Pinguïns last played in the highest league in 2009.
...Nicky Heij...
(© Photo: RCH-Pinguïns) |
For Nicky Heij, this will mark the first time that he starts a big league-season as a Head Coach.
However, he was the Acting Co-Head Coach in one game (a loss) during the 2007 season when he played for the team in the highest league.
Back then, the club was still known as RCH (it later merged with Pinguïns).
The 2007 season was very tumultuous for RCH, which had seven different coaches in various combinations.
Initially, Guus van Dee was the Head Coach in 2007, but he stepped down during the exhibition season.
In the regular season, Marlon Fluonia was the Head Coach in 18 games and Ramses Meering led the team in 14 games.
Throughout the entire season, Jeroen Roozen was the 1B Coach and Dave Dusseau was the Pitching Coach.
While Meering was the Head Coach, he was absent in two games.
In one game, Roozen filled in for Meering.
In the other game, Heij shared the coaching duties with Ryan Murphy (both played for the team).
Hereafter, Fluonia took over, but Meering returned again later in the season.
RCH finished in last place, meaning it had to play the Promotion/Relegation Series against Robur '58.
However, that Series was dropped, as Robur '58 had no intention to play in the big league.
With that RCH remained in the highest division.
Heij has one full big league-season under his belt as an Assistant Coach.
In 2009, Heij was one of the two Assistants of then-Head Coach Bernie Beckman, the other being Ab de Boer.
The latter had finished the 2008 season as Head Coach after Robert Klaver had stepped down after having led the team in the majority of the season.
In 2009, RCH lost the best-of-five Promotion/Relegation Series (3-2) against Almere '90 and relegated.
The next year (2010), RCH played in the second highest league and in that season, Heij also was one of the coaches.
He then assisted Peter van 't Klooster, who had been the Hitting Instructor in the 2009 season.
Unfortunately, Van 't Klooster passed away last year.
The 45-year old Nicky Heij played in six big league-seasons for three clubs.
He made his debut in the highest league playing for RCH in 1998.
Heij then played for Xanthos in 2000 and for Almere '90 in 2001.
Thereafter, the infielder returned to RCH for whom he then played in the big league in two full seasons (2007-2008).
While being the Assistant Coach in 2009, Heij appeared in seven more games.
After the 2010 season, Heij stopped as coach at RCH and transfered to TIW-Survivors, for whom he played in a lower division.
He played one more season for RCH-Pinguïns in 2015, but then went back again to TIW-Survivors and played for the Diemen-based club throught this season.
Last year, RCH-Pinguïns captured the title in the second highest league.
However, due to the measures and restrictions due to the coronavirus (COVID-19), it was decided that there was no promotion and relegation in the abbreviated 2020 season.
This year, RCH-Pinguïns was in first place almost the entire season, but in the end, it finished in a tie with Amsterdam Pirates-2.
As RCH-Pinguïns was the highest varsity-team in the league, it qualified for the Promotion/Relegation Series.
On October 13, Pirates won 10-7 against RCH-Pinguïns to win the Championship-title.
Four days later (October 17), RCH-Pinguïns won the second game of the best-of-three Promotion/Relegation Series to record a 2-game sweep against Silicon Storks after having won the first game the day before.
By winning this Series, RCH-Pinguïns promoted to the Dutch big league, while Storks relegated.
However, twelve days later, the KNBSB announced a new multi-year league-structure for the highest league.
From 2022 on, the highest division becomes a closed league with no relegation, but also no team from the second highest league (First Division) will automatically promote.
Interested teams that want to play in the big league can apply, but have to comply with several requirements.
Only then, it is possible the expand the big league.
When the new structure was announced, it was also announced that the the KNBSB and the big league-clubs had agreed to maintain Storks in the highest league.
With that, the 'Hoofdklasse' will have nine teams in the league next season.
(November 23)
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