DuPage Hounds to play season in Lisle
The DuPage County Hounds, a summer collegiate wood bat team, will play its home games at the Village of Lisle-Benedictine University Sports Complex baseball stadium starting June 1.
It’s the same place where another collegiate team, the DuPage Dragons, played until it folded after a few seasons. And with the failures of some area minor league teams, what makes the Hounds’ owners — Joe Stefani, 30, and Josh VanSwol, 24, — think this one will work?
During a team kickoff event Monday at Benedictine, they pointed to their first and only other foray into sports ownership: the Rockford Foresters, which is entering its third season in the Midwest Collegiate League — the same league in which the Hounds will play.
“We’ve experienced what works and what doesn’t. It’s working in Rockford,” said Stefani, noting the rough economic conditions there.
And he added, team owners have to be “willing to pull their sleeves up.”
That’s why he says he and VanSwol — with the help of only one other office person — are on the phones making sales calls themselves, targeting their marketing to prospective fans and sponsors in DuPage County. Already, they have about three dozen sponsors. They plan to send mailings to homes in Lisle and surrounding towns, along with newspaper inserts.
Ten of the Hounds’ 24 home games already are sold out, Stefani says, thanks to an effort in group ticket sales.
He’s hoping to get about 85 percent capacity per game at the sports complex, which can seat up to 1,600, including lawn seating.
Tickets will be $8 for general admission.
The Hounds, with a 28-player roster, are one of four new teams in the eight-team league, which was established in fall 2010. The league features players ages 18 to 22, all with college eligibility. Some have played on the junior college level, while others have experience in NCAA Division I. They don’t get a salary or any other financial incentives.
The league’s purpose, Stefani says, is to get their players “in front of major league scouts.”
They will play a 56-game season in June and July, with playoffs in August.
Other teams in the league include the Northwest Indiana Oilmen (co-owned by former Chicago White Sox player Ron Kittle) and the Will County Crackerjacks (with associate head coach Bob Dernier, formerly of the Chicago Cubs).
Village President Joseph Broda said the Hounds will help promote tourism in the village, and bring fans that want “a cold beer and a hot dog.”