Baseball in the Netherlands: Not always a story about heroics, part 2
A few months ago I wrote about a small club in the Netherlands that was forced to dissolve because the town it was situated tore down it’s ball field.
Today I read a tweet from the Dutch hoofdklasse club AdoLakers from The Hague, about an upcoming special members meeting. The tweet said the following:
Invitation to special members meeting
Dear members of baseball- and softball club AdoLakers,
The financial situation of the club is the reason for this invitation. During this meeting the members must decide about the future of our ball club.
In the invitation talks about dissolving the club for which 3/4 of the members need to be present. Of that number of members 2/3 needs to vote in favour of dissolving. A decision for a go-around or second beginning will only need a majority of the votes of 3/4 of the members.
In March 2014 a similar meeting was called to decide if the club would step back from hoofdklasse baseball to assure the existence or to continue with hoofdklasse baseball. The members voted in favour of hoofdklasse baseball with 136 against 111 votes. Many decided to leave the club because they had the opinion that it was not responsible to continue with hoofdklasse with the financial situation of that moment. In fact the club is in a similar situation now.
The invitation also states that if not enough members will be available, a new special members meeting will be organized.
AdoLakers is the result of a merger between ADO and softball club Lakers, both from the Hague. Long before the merger (which took place in 2012), the club won the Dutch championship in 1992 and one year later the club won also the European title.
A planned New Year reception was cancelled due to the poor financial situation. It is not up to me to tell what the members should vote for, but I rather see the club live on without hoofdklasse baseball. If the members decide to discontinue, it will be the fifth hoofdklasse club in the Netherlands that I see disappear since 1986.
The special meeting will be held on February 2nd.