Major League Baseball’s “London Series” Opens with Help from BrightView’s Sports Turf Division

BrightView Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: BV) (“BrightView”), the nation’s leading commercial landscaping services company, today announced that its Sports Turf Division has completed another important project for Major League Baseball (MLB).

BrightView is the Official Field Consultant to Major League Baseball, providing field design and construction for games outside the league’s 30 existing ballparks. Past projects include MLB’s Little League Classic in Williamsport, Pa., the 2016 Cuba Game, a two-game series in Puerto Rico’s Hiram Bithorn Stadium, a 2017 game honoring America’s Armed Forces at Ft. Bragg, N.C., MLB’s 2019 Mexico Series in Monterrey, and MLB’s 2019 season opening series at the Tokyo Dome in Japan.

And now, for the first time, MLB games will be played in England at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. On June 29 and 30, the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees will compete in a two-game American League series.

“People in the U.K. and all over Europe are already going crazy about the games,” said Murray Cook, President of BrightView Sports Turf. “Back in 1993, they had two minor league teams play at the London Oval, but never an MLB team.”

Jim Small, MLB Senior Vice President, International said, “Through our relationship with BrightView and Murray Cook, Major League Baseball has expanded our efforts to play games in different parts of the world on big league-caliber baseball fields.”

BrightView Sports Turf, together with its partners, sent in a crew of more than 100 workers to build a baseball field in just 23 days inside the main venue from the London 2012 Summer Olympic Games and the home of the West Ham United Football Club (West Ham) of England’s Premier League. With the short turnaround, and having just five days following the MLB series to tear it all down, BrightView chose a unique route to build the field.

“Sod is extremely expensive, so we decided to look at going with synthetic turf built on top of the concert venue,” Cook said. “It’s sustainable and we can roll it up after the second game and put it away for next year’s series.”

Not only will the use of synthetic turf prevent the waste of two full fields of sod, but once the two games in London are over, MLB and the MLBPA will be able to use the field somewhere else or offer it to another team or league.

The ballfield went in first, including the normal, all-natural infield clay, and was followed by the changes needed to the stadium, such as the additions of dugouts, fencing, padding, the outfield wall, the batter’s eye, and more. All of these installations were supervised by the BrightView Sports Turf team.

“BrightView is proud to have been a part of yet another big league-caliber ballpark and field build for the players and fans to enjoy.” Cook said.