Our Fields
For years, Winchester Baseball has called Jim Barnett Park its home, and each year, from the T-ball Field to Rotary Field to Bridgeforth Field, teams take to the field to play our national pastime. Jim Barnett Park is located within the city limits of Winchester and provides fields and activities to area residents, but baseball fields and activities are at the heart and soul of the park.
Winchester Baseball, through its partnerships with the Parks and Recreation Division of the City of Winchester, Shenandoah University Hornets Baseball and Softball, Handley High School, and the Winchester Royals, has worked to make the park's fields some of the best in the state of Virginia. No matter if a player is T-ball age or high school age, the park has a field to fit all levels.
Winchester Baseball has supported the park and community fields by working with our partners to keep the fields in prime baseball condition. However, the league's efforts to make Winchester a great baseball destination have also led to press boxes being built at Henkle-Harris Field, Rotary Field, and Yost Field.
The league has built and maintains a seasonal concession stand that is solely operated by Winchester Baseball volunteers during the year, providing concessions for all activities in the park.
The quality of fields in Winchester has been a huge part of Babe Ruth baseball’s decisions to hold some of the top tournaments, including District, State, Regional, and World Series tournament play. In 2011 and 2014, the City of Winchester and Winchester Baseball hosted the Cal Ripken 10-Year-Old World Series, and most recently, Winchester Baseball hosted the Virginia Babe Ruth 9-Year-Old Cal Ripken State Tournament.
In addition to these prestigious tournaments, Winchester Baseball hosts one of the largest Memorial Day baseball tournaments in the region. The Showdown in the Valley Tournament has become one of the largest tournaments and best for teams from MD, WV, VA, and PA to come and showcase their teams as they prepare for a summer on the tournament trail. In 2015, over 60 teams took the field for three days of great baseball in what has become an annual event for many leagues.
In a continued effort to provide the best quality fields, the City of Winchester and Winchester Baseball have once again made efforts to improve the fields for the upcoming Spring 2016 season. During the early spring of 2015, the T-ball field underwent an overhaul that vastly improved the playing surface for our youngest players, and with that success, the decision to make improvements to Henkle Harris Field, Yost Field, and Bodie Grimm Field only made sense.
Some of the work performed in the fall of 2015 to prepare for the upcoming Spring 2016 season included:
Henkle Harris Field received a completely new infield that includes a new turface/clay mix to provide improved drainage, and the infield/outfield grass line was removed, with new sod introduced to better outline the infield play.
Yost Field was converted from an all-Bermuda grass infield consisting of individual base cutouts to a cool-weather grass infield with a traditional baseball infield design. A new larger surface area for the pitching mound was added, as well as an infield warning track.
Bodie Grimm Field is currently undergoing the same redesign as Yost Field to provide a better playing surface.
Over the course of the year, additional work will be performed by the Parks and Recreation staff to improve the dugouts on Bridgeforth Field. Again, all of this work could not be possible without the partnerships between users and the City of Winchester. An example is the work on Yost Field, which was performed by the Park Staff in coordination with the Shenandoah University Hornets Baseball players, who helped lay sod and build the new pitching mound.
Winchester Baseball utilizes fields throughout Jim Barnett Park, and in some cases, multiple age groups and divisions use the same fields. The following is a list of fields in the park, descriptions, and age groups/playing divisions associated with each field.
