After winning the Santa Clara Baseball League title last week, the Portage Padres have put in a bid to host the 2023 Senior Men's AA Provincial Baseball Championship.

Despite being crowned champions of the league this year, the Padres missed out on the provincial tournament due to a rule that invites the first-place team from each league in the regular season. Portage's head coach Shane Moffatt says they just barely missed out on the opportunity this season.

"Unfortunately, we lost back-to-back games at the end of the regular season, which put us out of the provincials," Moffatt explains. "Now, we've put in a host bid to Baseball Manitoba to try and become the host for the 2023 Senior AA Provincials next year."

Moffatt says if their bid is successful, the Padres would have a spot locked in for the tournament regardless of where they finish in the regular season standings. He outlines why they take the top regular season teams instead of the champions of each league.

"I think it's hard to get these leagues finished. I'm always a fan of whoever wins it goes, but the way it is all summer long, with rain delays, makes it tough. I think we only played seven games in the season this year, and it's hard to get playoffs in."

The head coach notes this would be the first time Portage has held a Senior AA Baseball Provincial Championship.

"I think this would be huge for our community. We would host it at the same time that the Portage Potato Festival would be on," Moffatt continues. "They bring in a pile of people, and we would be bringing in a whole pile of people all weekend. So the community would be very busy. It would be huge for both events since they would be side-by-side at Republic Park."

Moffatt believes that Republic Park is one of the nicest facilities in the province for baseball, and he hopes this bid is successful so they can show that off to more communities. The head coach already knows one of the other towns making a bid to host the tournament as well.

"There will be a few communities putting in a bid. I know Morden has been trying to get the Senior AA Provincials, so we'll be up against them for sure," says Moffatt. "When I filled out the application, I had to have everything in line. You have to have a committee, a chairperson, and corporate sponsors in place because it's quite expensive to bring in 8-10 teams. I have two corporate sponsors on board right now."

Moffatt is looking for one more corporate sponsor to push his bid over the top. Any business looking to help our the Padres' efforts can get in contact with the head coach.

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