The Futures Legue 2025 logo shows only six teams competing this season, the lowest since the legue's inaugural year when there were just four. (Graphic courtesy of FCBL)

There’s never a dull moment in the Futures Collegiate Baseball League, and as its 15thseason is set to open in a few days, those moments get even more important.

This year as has been well documented, the league will operate with just six teams, thanks in part to Brockton scrapping the collegiate model altogether and staying with its professional independent league team,the new Rox. And the othe other half of the downsizing is the fact Pittsfield is still taking its time moving on the renovation/rebuliding of historic Wahconah Park while the Suns owners still pay dues to remain in the league in spirit.

“It is what it is, we’re waiting for Pittsfield to still unfold,” FCBL Commissioner Joe Paolucci said. “We’re hoping they’ll be back for 2026 but we’re still uncertain about that. I know they will be back at some point.”

And Paolucci still holds out hope with Brockton and Campanelli Stadium, “that that situation could come around again next year. … The Futures League is always going to be interested in the Brockton market.”

Such is the always tenuous nature of independent minor league baseball in New England.

Meanwhile the league still has its eyes on Rockland, Mass. and, of course, nearby Lowell. Those talks are ongoing as meetings have been held in both areas recently with ballpark tours, etc.

“All this comes down to finding the right operators and timing,” Paolucci said, noting while there may be independent league baseball interest in the UMass-Lowell owned LeLacheur Park, the FCBL schedule fits better as does the business model.

But for now, it’s Nashua, Worcester, Norwich (Conn.), New Britain (Conn.), Vermont (Burlington) and Westfield (Mass.). The Silver Knights will open at Holman with Worcester this Wednesday, a 10:30 a.m. Education Day game.

But in the minds of Paolucci and the owners he works for, quantity does not necessarily mean quality.

“The number of teams never concerns me,” Paolucci said. “It’s not about how few teams you have, it’s about how strong those franchises are. We want to go out and get Rockland, we want to get Lowell, we’d love to get Brockton back. But it all comes down to the ownership groups, and havin the right operator in place. What good is the league if you’ve got 10 teams and four of them are poorly run? That brings the league down.”

The latest league issue is the future of Norwich, as city officials, feeling they can’t afford the necessary repairs and upkeep of Dodd Stadium, are exploring the idea of selling it to get a windfall profit plus a piece of property on the tax rolls. The proposal was tabled at a recent meeting until the city budget is passed. “We were well-represented there as a league,” Paolucci said. “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t somewhat concerned. To be honest I don’t know which way it’s going to fall.”

That’s because the Sea Unicorns are a solid league franchise, averaged 1,471 fans a game last season (about 50 per game ahead of Nashua) and are two-time defending champions. They were part of the FCBL bonanza that took place when Major League Baseball contracted the minors and that brought the FCBL former minor league franchises Norwich, New Britain and Vermont.

“We all understand business,” Paolucci said. “But that (stadium) has been a great piece of the community and has been for a long time, and that team their attendance has gone up every year, they’re back-to-back champions. I know the people there love Dodd Stadium, they love the team. … I hate to beat a dead horse, but we just have to play the waiting game.”

So that’s something the league has had to deal with. There was another surprise in the off-season, but this is a good one: the hiring of former Silver Knights manager Kyle Jackson as a special assistant to the commissioner.

“I’m excited about this one,” Paolucci said. “I think it’s a job we’ve kind of needed the last few years. There’s certainly a disconnect between the managers and my office. I think a part of this is they’re afraid to approach me or talk about certain issues because they think it’s going to come back to haunt them.

“I think Kyle is going to bridge that gap. Nobody knows the Futures League better than Kyle. He’s been champion of the league for a long time.”

Paolucci – who himself is a high school baseball head coach in Weymouth, Mass. – says Jackson will go to every ballpark at least once and meet with the managers before the games and report back to Paolucci. But there’s more.

“Another key function is for him to communicate with managers on who the top players in the league are,” Paolucci said. That, he said, is key for the All-Star game. It’s set for July 22 in Worcester, an event the league is putting a lot of resources into this year especially because while the Home Run Derby and Scout Day will be held at Hanover Insurance Park at Holy Cross, the game itself will be played at Polar Park, home of the Triple A WooSox.

“It’s going to be a tough year for the All-Star Game because we are down to six teams and I want to make sure the No. 1, we have enough players for the All-Star Game, and No. 2 we also don’t have players that are batting .210 that are making the All-Star Game. We need to do a really good job in selecting these guys.”

So Jackson will keep an eye on all of that, and be a big voice in determining who should be at Scout Day, who should be in the All-Star Game, etc. Paolucci said there’s talk of a ranking system for the players.

“He’s going to be a big part of the baseball side of things for this year,” Paolucci said.

In other points of interest:

There will still be three umpires per game, and the playoff format will remain the same, despite less teams. That means four of the six teams will make the playoffs, with two best-of-three semifinal series and then a best-of-three final. And the Home Run Derby will remain the same.

The other impact of just six teams? Better players, perhaps.

“This is going to be a real good year for talent because there are six teams,” Paolucci said, saying he gets calls from coaching friends who want to place players, “but at this stage of the game we just don’t have room for them.”

It wont’ be at the level of 2020 when the Futures League was the only league going in New England and was chock full of Division I/Cape Cod League types – two from that year are producing in the Majors, outfielder Sal Frelick with the Brewers and Ben Rice with the Yankees – but Paolucci says he has no doubt that “the next Ben Rice, the next Sal Frelick will be in our league this year, a few years away from their Major League debut. We’ll have some great talent in the league this year for sure.”

—- Paolucci says that the league will miss former longtime Worcester GM Dave Peterson, who parted ways with the Bravehearts. “If someone in the league wanted to hire him, I’d welcome that with open arms. I have all the respect in the world for him, he’s really good at what he does.” Peterson also did the schedule for the league, but that was a seperate gig so it’s possible he could still do that again, Paolucci said hypothetically.

—- The Commish has high praise for Nashua. “Cam (Knights GM Cook) is turning into a superstar as general manager,” Paolucci said. “Every year,more confident in himself and the job that he does. Just as an outsider looking at that team they just have to get off to a better start. It seems the first two or three weeks of the season always kills them.”

— Besides Nashua’s Nick Guarino, there are a couple of other new managers in the leauge: Luke Bencktein, a Kansas State assistant, is the new field boss in Worcester with longtime manager Alex Dion staying on as the Bravehearts team builder; Kyle Dembrowski is the new guy in Norwich. Like Dion, former skipper Kevin Murphy, with two rings, is running player personnel. So it’s half the league with newbies. Paolucci says a managerial job in the FCBL is perfect for a young manger “in the 25 to 35 range”.

“However, that being said, Matt Finch is incredible with Vermont,” he said. “It can’t be a ‘My way or the highway’ type of thing in summer collegiate ball … The younger managers tend to relate better to the college age player. But Finch flies in the face of that philosophy.”

—- The league will return to having a few games televised on NESN, as that string of four straight years was broken last summer. There will be three games, and the Silver Knights will be playing twice. One is at Holman, on Thursday, July 24 vs. Vermont, and will be the usual 6 p.m. start. The Knights game at Worcester the previous Thursday, July 17 and New Britain at Norwich on Aug. 7. All Thursday night games.

Former Silver Knights manager Kyle Jackson will be around the Futures League this summer as a special assistant to Commissioner Joe Paolucci. (Telegraph file photo by TOM KING)

—- The regular season ends later on August 9, as the league starts later, with the last playoff game potentially on August 16. A late finish by a few days in recent years, but the league opted to start later so more of the players who were involved in their schools’ postseasons might be done and able to play right away. “Teams didn’t have enough of their good players,” Paoulucci said. “We decided the give and take was worth it. In a six-team league, we can compete kids to stay to compete for a championship. It might be difficult for some teams; say teams are running away with the top four spots, you might lose some guys (from the remaining two) pretty early. But I don’t think it’s going to be much different than it’s been in the past.”

Except, of course, for the number of teams, the fewest in the league since the first year when there were four.

But not to worry, the FCBL says.

“The way I see the league right now,” Paolucci said, “is we’ve got six teams with six great ownership groups, six great general managers, six great managers. It’s perfect for summer collegiate ball.

“I think the league is as long as it’s ever been, and I don’t worry about how few teams we have.”