Lassiter High School opens.  The baseball field was built as part of the original athletic & physical education facilities.  My first impressions on arriving to teach here in the fall of 1985; “besides the very nice school plant, it was unquestionably the most impressive thing on campus.  I felt it was placed in an ideal location, laid out correctly, and looked like a great place for a ball game.  Baseball people definitely had a hand in the creation.”

Jeff Guy hired as head coach.  Current facility began to take shape as Coach Guy began a cooperative & quite productive relationship with Russ Umphenour and Guerry Baldwin of East Cobb Baseball.  Adequate & nice wood/block concession/storage building and bleachers were replaced with those we have today.  East Cobb also provided the AA lighting system in 1988.

The asphalt roadway was built on top of a dirt path, making the facility much more assessable.  Lassiter principal, James Wilson, made this happen by steering it through the county.  Booster club vice president, Jim Schill, was project engineer as Mr. Umphenour and Coach Baldwin of East Cobb Baseball were willing partners.  The white block right field storage building replaced a collection of small wood frame huts.  Jim Schill was again the driving force as booster club volunteers actually provided much of the muscle for construction.  The screened-in east addition to the storage followed in 1994.

Small block & frame dugouts were razed & replaced by the spacious cantilevered concrete present structures.  Once again, Jim Schill was the mastermind & energy behind this project.  Funding was a 50-50 proposition between the booster club and East Cobb Baseball.  The appearance of the 60-foot long structures was dramatically improved for the 2003 season with a cardinal paint job & the beautiful stenciling & artwork on the first base dugout.  Lassiter art students Whitney Brenton & Maggie Herrick did a masterful job.

The indoor batting cage was constructed as one of the first of its kind in the area.  The 4,000 square foot facility was constructed where an old telephone pole & net structure used to be.  The project began as a discussion of a pole barn with walls to cut the northwest wind & evolved into the nice butler building we eventually got.  Booster club president, Steve Bachman, provided the leadership on this project.  Much begging & many generous donations provided the means to get something done at practice everyday.  In my estimation this has been the best money we have ever spent in the improvement of our field play.  All of our neighbors have these now, but for a time we were an exclusive club.

An old rusty traditional chain link backstop was replaced with the brick wall & net, dramatically improving sight lines for fans while offering a more pleasant esthetic effect.  Funding was done by the club & the construction was a combination volunteer & contractor venture.  Veteran Jim Schill was called out of retirement to pour concrete footings & sidewalks that completely connected all bleacher areas & dugouts, giving the facility more of a stadium appearance.

The varsity dressing room was occupied by the National Championship team during spring break of 1999.  Construction was initiated in the fall of 1998.  In addition to the dressing facility, sidewalks were poured, totally connecting all components of the facility.  The project was made possible by a very sizable & generous anonymous donation.  Much of the construction was contracted out.  Booster club members, Terry Dreger & John Hochkins were major players in the construction, with much of their time & expertise being donated.  Much of the locker room interior work was done by booster volunteers.

Scoreboard dedicated to Lassiter champions was conceived, funded, and constructed.  First game use was for the 2001 season.  Bob Prather was a key supporter in the infancy stage while former Lassiter star Blake Bearden of Fairplay Scoreboards was instrumental in helping us afford the board.  Funding was provided by the sponsors proudly displayed on the board.  As always, James Beavers and the East Cobb Yankees were cooperative partners on this as they are on most other recent facility upgrades.

The Trojan House & Deck overlooking the third base dugout was completed.  We were in the right place at the right time as this was the pet project of Dwight Brown & Cobb Energy.  This was a part of the construction that gave that gave to Lassiter Athletics the football field house & the Trojan House that in addition to the decks overlooking both the football & baseball fields, includes a large meeting room upstairs with a modern concession stand & soccer dressing rooms downstairs.  The building enabled our concession operation to move to more spacious quarters complete with closed circuit television to view the games.  Eventually the old concession stand behind home plate was remodeled into a practical & handy storage facility for uniforms & equipment in the spring of 2003.

Landscaping in the press box and bleacher areas was spearheaded by booster president, Chip Hyle.  Chip worked very closely with Pops Landscaping to greatly enhance the attractiveness of the park.

New wind screens (the 3^rd set since 1986), black fence, and refurbished bleachers really added an improved new look.

A new first base batting cage was added with the assistance of James Beavers.  The entry walkway also bears a new & welcoming look with the addition of the Ad Screens displaying some of our loyal Lassiter Baseball Sponsors.

 
A tremendous improvement was made to the playing surface with a total infield reconstruction project in the fall of 2005.  The infield had become unhealthy with poor grass quality, pockets of low spots, & a sharp drop from the infield to the outfield.  Eric Holland & his crew at Precision Turf, Inc. completely stripped the old surface, re-crowned the infield, & planted new Bermuda sod to give us a better quality playing field.  In addition a new state of the art irrigation system was installed Jeff Isenberg & Georgia Turf irrigation covering the entire field, replacing an aging, inefficient hydraulic system.  We also spent quiet a bit of time & energy on refurbishing the locker rooms.  New carpet was added in all three dressing rooms and the varsity locker room was given a fresh coat of paint.  Our scoreboard also has a new look; we had professionals come in to clean a faded surface & perform electrical surgery on malfunctioning lights to make our board the best in the area once again.  Faded windscreens were once again replaced that are more cardinal in color due to the increased technology of our supplier.
 

Fall 2007 was a busy time around the complex as several, important, necessary and overdue projects were accomplished, impacting and improving almost every building and area of the facility.  A splash of color was added as the right field storage building, press box and varsity dressing rooms were painted a nice earth tone cardinal and gold.  Our batting cage was improved both aesthetically and mechanically as fresh carpet replaced the dirty and worn while a new Iron Mike  pitching machine should make BP a more efficient and productive daily occurrence.  Every bulb was changed and every lens cleaned on each light pole, returning the illumination of the playing surface to its original quality.   The most visible and necessary improvement was made on the scoreboard.  The old board was scraped, repainted and renumbered while outdated bulb wiring and equipment was removed and replaced with state of the art LED technology, re-establishing our scoreboard as one of the finest in the state of Georgia.

A new plywood fence painted in Lassiter cardinal and gold was installed. significantly altering the appearance of the playing surface for the better while also improving play.  The 2' plus vertical addition to eight and a half feet should reduce the number of ground rule doubles while increasing the occurance of relay plays at the plate and has made the field play larger.  New region pennant hardware completed the fence upgrade which was largely the work of construction partners of Anthony Fusco. 

The complex has experienced updates and additions this year as the program begins a new chapter.  The outfield wall was repaired and repainted earlier this year.  The dugouts have received a new coat of paint; their first since the initial painting in 1994.  The backstop net had become extremely worn so our friends at Mauldin & Cook Fence installed a new heavy-duty netting that makes the view more safe and aesthetically pleasing.  Finally, new rails and nets were professionally installed  in front of each dugout by Tommy Barber and his netting company.  These rails were are lined by black foam pads that protect the dugouts from batted and thrown balls.  Once again, the turf and dirt of the playing surface is in tip-top shape as another season approaches.