(Story by Marco Stoovelaar)
 Baseball & Softball seasons come to a halt
Nederlands
 NIEUWEGEIN (Neth.) -
The baseball- and softball-season 2020 has ended!
Unfortunately, there has come an untimely ending to the different national and regional competitions and leagues.
On Tuesday-evening (October 13), during a press conference, the Dutch Government announced stricter measures against the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19).
These new measures are necessary and needed to be taken to stop the raise of the amount of contaminations and to let it drop drastically.
One of the announced measures was that all amateur team-sports age 18 and older will end effective Wednesday, October 14, 10 PM, to reduce traffic movements and contacts.
This means that all remaining (make-up) games in the baseball- and softball-competitions have been cancelled.
This also means that the best-of-seven Holland Series (baseball) for the National Championship has ended after two games.
Defending champion L&D Amsterdam Pirates won these two played games on Sunday and Monday.
It also means that the competition in the Golden League (softbasl) has ended.
In this league, two make-up games were played on Tuesday-evening, which now have become the final games of the 2020 season.
In the highest softball-league, the season would not have been followed by Play-Offs and Holland Series.
The winner of the season would have been the Dutch champion.
KNBSB-Director Stefaan Eskes stated on Wednesday:
,,It is a pity that we have not been able to finish our already shortened 2020 season, but we understand the usefulness and necessity of these new corona measures.
In any case, we are happy that we have been able to play baseball and softball fully from July 1''.
The Royal Netherlands Baseball and Softball Association (KNBSB) issued the following statement on Wednesday:
,,On Tuesday-evening, October 13, 2020, the National Government announced new corona-measures.
As a result, the 2020 baseball and softball competitions will unfortunately come to an abrupt end.
All competitions, including the Baseball big league and the Fastpitch Softball Women's Golden League, will be shut down as of October 14 at 10 p.m.
During the press conference on Tuesday, October 13, additional measures were announced by Prime Minister Rutte and Minister De Jonge to attack the coronavirus head-on.
This has consequences for baseball and softball:
1. All competitions for seniors and youth are closed.
2. For 18 years and older, training is only allowed with a maximum group size of 4 people per field and with continuous observance of the 1.5 meter distance rule.
3. Youth teams up to the age of 18 can 'just' continue to train.
Head-to-head games against teams within the club are allowed.
The measures will be effective Wednesday 14 October at 10 p.m. and will apply for at least 4 weeks.
No exception Dutch Major League and Golden League
The new corona-measures are being taken to limit travel movements and social contacts.
During the press conference it was announced that in sports an exception applies only to top-athletes with a status and professional soccer ('Eredivisie' and 'Eerste divisie').
This means that the Baseball big league and the Fastpitch Softball Women's Golden League, like all other baseball and softball competitions at all other levels, will be shut down for the next 4 weeks.
Unfortunately, this brings the 2020 baseball and softball season to an abrupt end.
Conclusions season by Competition Affairs
The Competition/League Affairs department will now start 'earlier' with the final conclusions of the 2020 season.
All remaining baseball and softball games that were planned for coming days / weeks will be declared cancelled.
The final standings will be determined for each Pool/League and it then also will be decided which team(s) will be declared champion(s).''
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(October 14)
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