Battle Creek Bombers Announce 2021 Schedule

There are great things to expect this season for the Battle Creek Bombers as they return to the friendly confines of C.O. Brown Stadium in 2021.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, several teams in the Northwoods League either opted to make their own "pods", play against teams regionally with limited travel, or opting to take the year off due to limited-to-no attendance at games.

For the league-owned Battle Creek Bombers and Kalamazoo Growlers, the two teams took the field with a third team, the previously one-game promotion Kalamazoo Mac Daddies, to form the Southwest Michigan Pod in the Northwoods. The Mac Daddies eventually won the pod and defeated the Traverse City Pit Spitters from the Northern Michigan pod to win the Michigan title.

All the games in the 2020 season took place at Homer Stryker Field in Kalamazoo, with up to 100 spectators on hand per game. Due to health restrictions in Calhoun County, the Bombers were unable to play an official home game. That will soon change for 2021 barring any other health hurdles.

Like the rest of the league, the Bombers will return in 2021 with a full 72-game slate, split evenly with 36 home and away games. In a nice return, the schedule has the Bombers with 15 home games in the first month including opening day with the Growlers on Memorial Day night. It also includes the only scheduled home double-header with the Kenosha Kingfish.

The schedule has also returned to it's divisional format from 2019. The Bombers will play 12 games (six home, six away) with the other five teams in the Great Lakes East - the Growlers, the Pit Spitters, the Kokomo Jackrabbits (who were off in 2020), the Kingfish (who hosted their own pod with another team) and the Rockford Rivets (part of the Wisconsin-Illinois pod's East Division).

The remaining 12 games on regular season schedule are four games each against three teams from the Great Lakes West with two home and two away. The Bombers will have the Green Bay Booyah, Wisconsin Woodchucks and Wisconsin Rapids Rafters in 2021.

The longest road trip for the Bombers once again comes in August. The Bomb Squad hit the road to Wisconsin from August 2^nd to August 8^th with games in Green Bay, the Major League Dreams Showcase in La Crosse, Wisconsin, followed by Wausau to play the Woodchucks and concluding in Wisconsin Rapids. C.O. Brown Stadium is once again host to the National Amateur Baseball Federation (NABF) World Series in 2021, being held from August 4^th to August 8^th.

Game times for home games will be at 6:35 p.m. Monday through Saturday with a 1:35 p.m. first pitch on Sunday.

The promotional schedule has not been announced by the Bombers. The Northwoods League 2021 All-Star Game will take place in July at ISG Field in Mankato, Minnesota, home to the Moondogs.

As for the postseason, it will use the same format in 2019. The champions of each half in their respective divisions will play a best-of-three series. The winners will place for the conference (Great Lakes) title in a one-game playoff. The conference champs will then play a one-game playoff to determine the league's champion.

Without further ado, the 2021 Battle Creek Bombers schedule is below. Red-shaded dates are home and white are away contests.