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"I expect most high school sales this year to be fill-ins, but I remain optimistic that sales will be better," says Claussen. Meanwhile, in southern Indiana the situation was much the same Kratz Sporting Goods, Clarksville, IN. "Baseball was good in 2020 until mid-March," reports salesman Jim Brown, who says that the state boys' high school basketball tournament was cancelled and everything followed suit in high school and rec sports and travel ball. Later in the summer, some baseball was played, but it was hit or miss. "Local Little Leagues played a limited sched- ule in late summer," recalls Brown. "And travel baseball teams played where and when they could. It was sort of like the wild, wild West." Because many baseball teams didn't use the product and gear that was purchased last year, it unfortunately should have a negative trickle-down effect with team dealers. "Spring 2021 will be our black hole for sales," predicts Brown. "I do expect we will sell some baseball practice products this spring, but because athletic departments have limited attendance at games they have less revenues, which impacts their ability to buy gear for their teams. High school booster clubs may have to step up and supply the necessary funding." Cool In Sunny Florida In south Florida, Joel Dunn, a salesman at Pro Performance Sports in Miami, expects baseball sales in 2021 will be meager, at best. Under normal circumstances at this time of year Dunn is selling custom uniforms, cleats, turf shoes for practice, batting cage jackets, player packs and roughly 30-50 dozen baseballs to each team. But like other dealers around the country he is concerned that product ordered for last year's cancelled seasons will negate the need for new product sales. "So much of what was ordered for last year was hardly used, so there's no need to order more gear," says Dunn. "Teams only used a few dozen balls, but I might get some fill-in orders on baseballs." According to Dunn, because many of the custom uniforms come from China, to avoid delays caused by the Chinese New Year custom uniform orders needed to be submitted by mid-November. But because the uniforms were hardly worn in 2020, many teams didn't bother placing new orders for the 2021 season. In Vero Beach, FL – the location of the Los Angeles Dodgers' former spring training home known as Dodgertown – baseball managed to still fare well during COVID-19 for Dave's Sporting Goods. "Everything shut down for about six weeks, but baseball was the first sport to return," says sportstylemag.com

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