Adelaide Giants' 2023 and 2024 Australian Baseball League titles revive South Australia's solid status in the sport
The Adelaide Giants baseball squad celebrating its Australian Baseball League championship wins in 2023 and 2024 at a reception hosted by South Australian premier Peter Malinauskas and then-government sport minister Katrine Hildyard.
Image courtesy South Australia government
Adelaide Giants ended a 43-year drought by winning the Claxton Shield as Australian Baseball League championships in 2022-23 and 2023-24, restoring South Australia’s statue as a strong pioneer baseball state.
The Claxton Shield itself originated with South Australian Baseball League’s first president Norrie Claxton donating it in 1934 to be permanently held by the state that won the competition between all states for three successive years. When South Australia, from 1934, won the first three years of the competition, all states agreed that it become a permanent trophy for the Claxton Shield competition between the states.
The Claxton Shield remained the premier trophy for the Australian national baseball competition in its various forms. In the competition between states, South Australia had wins in 1957, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1964, 1966, 1967, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1976, 1980.
South Australia had a strong baseball era from the 1950s with its switch to summer night baseball at Norwood Oval (before the move to West Beach in 2016). Replacing the states competition, the Australian Baseball Federation started the first Australian Baseball League between clubs national between in 1989. The league competition started on October 17, 1989, in Perth at Parry Field between Adelaide Giants and Perth Heat. The competition developed into eight teams from around Australia 56 games competitor.
The first Australian Baseball League was recognised and sanctioned by bodies such as the International Baseball Association, Japan Amateur Baseball Association and Major League Baseball in the United States of America. This led to Major League teams generally sending Minor League prospects to play in Australia during the North American off season. Adelaide Giants were affiliated with the famed Los Angeles Dodgers and remained the only Australian Baseball League team to stay with the same USA team throughout league’s history. Minor League prospects to play for the Giants included catcher Paul Lo Duca (1995-96) who went on to make his Major League debut for the Dodgers in 1998 and appeared in four All-Star Games (2003–2006).
The Australian Baseball League was a big success with spectator attendances but proved not financially viable and collapsed in 1999. What followed was the short-lived International Baseball League (ILBA) in Australia, with the the Australian Baseball Federation handing the reins of national league baseball in Australia over to David Nilsson Nilcorp. Seventeen Major League Babeball organizations, one Korean professional organisation and three Taiwanese professionals combined with amateur players from the Australian and Taiwanese baseball federations took part In the ILBA,
After the ILBA disbanded, the Claxton Shield’s national title competition continued between states in the 2000s until the new Australian Baseball League started in 2010-11.
Although it didn’t enjoy a championship until 2023, Adelaide Giants (with an interim name of Adelaide Bite) had more than 26 of its players move on to United States’ Major League Baseball, including Australians Luke Prokopec, Shayne Bennett and Aaron Whitefield. Adelaide also produced Helms award winners (most value player): Andrew Scott (1997), Jamie McOwen (2011), Aaron Miller (2015), Markus Solbach (2018) and Aaron Whitefield (2020).
Giants infielder and Australian representative at the 1996 summer Olympics, Andrew Scott held the Australian Baseball League and club record for 469 games. The Giants also had many players who played for Team Australia in an international level, including Angus Roeger, Stefan Welch, Steven Chambers, Josh Tiols, Matthew Williams, Rom Brice, Wilson Lee, Mitch Edwards, Curtis Mead, Mixon Wingrove, Ton Van Steensel and Mitch Neunborn.
