There’s been some activity at the DeKalb County Tigers baseball field over the past week. No, it’s not time for Tigers baseball to start, but some local volunteers have been busy working on a new facility for the baseball program.

"We’re building a new 40x80 field house/dressing room for the baseball program," Jeff McMillen told the Review. McMillen is a member of the Tigers Baseball Booster Club, which is building the new facility. "It’s something they’ve been needing for a while. It will have two hitting cages, two pitching lanes, a conditioning area, equipment room, a restroom, and coach’s office."

The Booster Club says that the high school baseball season is practiced, trained, and played primarily during cold and inclement weather, with limited availability at other school facilities. The new building will provide the players the opportunity to train and excel in their sport, and help to instill the sense of pride in their school and program that is seen at other programs in their district and state.

"These kids deserve this facility," McMillen said. "In today’s world, to be competitive in any sport, training is a key. The Booster Club feels a responsibility to provide a facility for these kids to be able to excel. If the kids want to move on to the next level, we need to provide them with the tools to do it with. This facility will do that."

The building the Tigers currently use is located far from the baseball field, on the north end of the football field. McMillen said that the structure is outdated and too small for today’s use. "It was a good building. It was built probably in the late 80s, but it’s just not big enough. The kids this week practiced and did conditioning outside, because it was warmer outside than in that building. This will be a climate controlled building that we’re building here next to the baseball field."

"The current building is just inconvenient for them [the players]," he continued. "Plus, they don’t have a dressing room, and have never had a dressing room. We think having everything in one location will allow our coaches to do a better job."

The Tigers Baseball Booster Club funding the project, and McMillen said that there will be no school money used at all. "It will all be done through fundraisers, donations, and volunteer work."

"When Coach Tray Sloan came, he wanted to have a booster club, so we started that last year. With our fundraising last year, we put money back for this project. We knew we wanted to do this, but we didn’t realize we could do it as quick as we did. The people have the motivation, and we want to see it, because our seniors that we have this year, their parents are a lot of the ones that had the vision to do this. We want them to be able to use this building also."

If you want to donate or help with the construction of the field house, you can contact Jeff McMillen at 615-464-0700. "I’ll be happy to set up the donation. It doesn’t matter if it’s small or big, we’ll accept it and be happy to have it."