Oxford, AL – Oxford could get its first professional team if City Council OKs bringing softball’s Vipers to Choccolocco Park
By Al Muskewitz
Rick Schiffhauer made a trip to Choccolocco Park a couple months ago. He fell in love with the facility and liked the people he was dealing with enough to know he wanted to be partners with them. Through it all he thought it was a nice place to bring his pro softball team.
Pending the expected approval of the City Council Tuesday night, Oxford will have its first professional sports team when the Smash It Sports Vipers of the Women’s Professional Fast-Pitch league relocate from Florida to Choccolocco Park for the 2023 season and beyond. “I understand the vote is tomorrow and I expect the vote to be favorable,” Schiffhauer said Monday. “We’re excited to come down there and be part of the community and bring a first-rate professional team to the area and really, really blow up fast-pitch softball in the area.”
Oxford city officials involved in the project deferred comment until after Tuesday’s vote. The WPF also has franchises in Florida, Dallas (owned by former MLB All-Star Brandon Phillips) and Oklahoma City, with plans to steadily expand in “the next couple years,” said Schiffhauer, a co-founder and part-owner of the league. Local fans will remember the league’s Pride team that played an exhibition series with Team USA, Japan and Australia at Choccolocco Park last July in the run up to the World Games in Birmingham.
The league will play a 36-game schedule (12 against each team, six home and six away) from late May to August. The season will run concurrent with the Choccolocco Monsters wood-bat college team’s season on the adjacent Signature baseball field. [read more …]
