The nearly 60-year-old Throgs Neck Little League is gearing up for the modern world.
Recently the Throgs Neck Little League went digital with its own website, and league officials plan to get on facebook and other social media sites to help connect the players and keep them informed of the latest news.
The league’s new web address is www.throgsnecklittleleague.com.
“It’s really great,” said Frank Eisele, secretary of the league. “Now nobody will need to wonder about what’s going on. They can check the site for themselves.”
According to Eisele, the league has been working on setting up a state-of-the-art website for more than four years. The league’s last website was created about three years ago and was never maintained or updated.
“We were looking around to make sure we got the right person to set it up,” Eisele said.
“We had one done, but it was pretty rag-tag and disappointing.”
The league found the right programmer in Derek Torres, a former player in the league.
Torres will work to keep the site updated with the latest pictures and news of the players and games.
Right now the site offers contact information, as well as game schedules, photos from last season, roster information, a complete history of the league, a list of the league’s board of directors and information helping prospective players to sign up.
Soon Eisele hopes to put videos of the games and season highlights on the site.
“Why not, it’s not that hard to do,” he said, adding that he hopes an increased web presence can help the league attract new members. “It can’t hurt.”
Eisele said he is most excited about the website’s ability to keep former players connected.
Currently there are about 350 play in the league, but there are thousands of league alumni, Eisele estimated.
The league began in 1952 and most of the players have lost track of one another.
Eisele wants all the former players to email the league so he can create a mailing list to keep those interested informed with a periodic electronic newsletter.
The address is tnll1952@yahoo.com.
With the database, Eisele plans to help reconnect old friends and bring them back to the league they grew up playing for.
“There have been some deaths of some of the former players in the past few years, and this way we could let people who have moved away know about stuff like that,” he said.
“We want to keep everybody in the loop; to let them know what the league is doing.”
Using the internet to spread the news will also save the league between $800 and $1,000 a year on paper and mailings, Eisele said.
“It’s getting costly now with the price of paper and the post office rate increases,” he said.
“Before you just hoped people would read the mailings. There was no guarantee. Now we can just email it right to them.”
