In the triad for the championship: baseball players aim high with community and sponsors
Created: 01/27/2022, 07:08
By: Günter Hiel
The advertising board already shows a problem: the main sponsor MSD has jumped off - and above all the pharmaceutical company has left the community as the largest trade tax payer, which means loss of income for Haar in the millions.
© Archive photo: Dieter Michalek
The Haar Disciples baseball team wants to be champions in five years.
They are striving for a “triad of community, association and sponsors”.
They just lost their main sponsor.
Haar
- In five years, Haar will experience a title celebration, then the Bundesliga team of the "Munich-Haar Disciples" will be German champions in baseball.
Not with a legionnaire troop, but with homegrown talent.
Board member Tom Wolf and Johannes Penzkofer presented this vision to the municipal council.
The Disciples are striving for a "triad of community, club and sponsors," said Tom Wolf.
All factions signaled their willingness to support, see the Disciples as a figurehead for Haar - but pointed out the financially tense situation.
The community and the club are already in harmony.
With the move of the pharmaceutical company MSD to Munich, Haar has lost its largest trade taxpayer - and the Disciples its main sponsor.
Cultivate Disciples training areas with a partner
In terms of sport, the club, which has almost 300 members, is in a very good position, and the youth work in particular is excellent and has won awards.
A kind of star of the south in baseball, recognized in the scene, in competition with teams from Stuttgart, Hamburg, Cologne, Regensburg or Dortmund.
So far in the Bundesliga it was over in the quarter-finals - now the Disciples want to take the next step.
To make the club more attractive to sponsors, the municipality could lease the baseball field in the Eglfing sports park directly to the Disciples. Proceeds from perimeter advertising would then flow directly to them. The municipality could move away from considerations of relocating the club and using the baseball field as a commercial space. Instead, Mayor Andreas Bukowski (CSU) outlined another way: to build on the Disciples' training areas with a partner. Disciples could move to the ground floor, with commercial space above it and the training ground on the roof.
However, the Disciples also need rapid infrastructure improvements to meet licensing requirements;
a powerful floodlight system would have been necessary for two years;
a better safety fence, toilets, comprehensive catering.
So far, the Disciples have saved their talent for improvisation and the enormous volunteer effort.
The spectator capacity should be increased to 500, of which 200 are seated, but at least no covered stands.
The Disciples already have the approval for the next season, and they are again operating with a special regulation for the floodlights.
The association doesn't want to lose her either, says Tom Wolf.
The council will discuss and seek support.
Until the championship title, however, it must be called "Disciples Haar-Munich" and not Munich-Haar, joked CSU councilor Thomas Reichel.
More news from Haar and the district of Munich can be found here.
