In the Spring of 2022, Poly Prep introduced the Matt Roventini Baseball Field in honor of Matt Roventini, a Poly Prep alum, parent, and longtime baseball coach. This renovation included dugouts, scoreboards, batting cages, bullpens, new bleachers, and a press box. This year, the Poly Prep baseball team gained another facility or rather an update to an old one: the Barn. The Barn, previously known as the bubble because of its rounded top, is located next to Poly’s softball field. Prior to the renovation, which finished this winter, it only had three cages. Now, it includes indoor batting cages, an arm care center, an office for the baseball coaches, and a HitTrax system, which is a baseball simulator that analyzes players’ swings and pitches. Although the Barn is used for both baseball and softball, its renovations, specifically the new arm care center and offices for the baseball coaches, are used mainly by the baseball team. 

 The bubble’s renovations added space, better equipment, central heating, and improved lighting. Arguably, the most important part of the renovations was a new office for Coach Roventini and Coach Matt Santamauro, which became necessary and convenient simultaneously due to Interim Head of School John Rankin’s new rule that there must be a coach present in the barn when students use it. After relative disorganization within the original bubble, this new rule, along with an increased emphasis on cleanliness, is part of the effort to show more respect to the space and its new equipment. 

The bubble’s renovations also included a recovery center in the arm care station. The station helps address a general uptick in arm injuries among the baseball community over the past several years. It provides access to resistance bands, weighted balls, shoulder tubes, and more, all with the idea of arm care and recovery in mind. Poly student John Zaremba ’29 attests part of his recovery from several arm injuries to the many tools for rehabilitation found in the bubble, citing “better equipment, especially in the arm care station” as one of his favorite additions to the new bubble. 

Additionally, the old baseballs were replaced with fresh ones and new foam “smash” balls that help simulate the movement of certain pitches and the high velocity of others. This newly lit bubble is beneficial for a sport with such a small margin for error, which is largely based on vision. The new lighting specifically allows pitchers to throw safely indoors in the winter without any worry of visual issues for the catchers who receive their pitches. The bubble is also heated, making the outside temperatures and wind obsolete. This proves to be highly useful in the winter, as the harsh conditions can pose many challenges for training. The bubble, with its improved features, will be a tool that helps foster and grow new talent to maintain the success of the Poly baseball team for years to come.