In the fall of 1929, the St. Stephen's College athletic department announced that baseball would supplant lacrosse as the spring sport.

At the time, it was felt that to be competitive, the school should promote sports that didn't require a steep learning curve.
About five years later, St. Stephen's College became Bard College. And a couple of years after that, baseball was voted out as a varsity sport as the result of a questionnaire distributed to the student body, which consisted of 106 men at the time.

Well … baseball is back.

A generous gift will allow the school to build a baseball facility on campus. The size of the gift, the name of the donor, and the site of field are to be announced.

A coach has been hired and the recruiting efforts have already begun. It is hoped that Bard's first varsity baseball season since 1937 will launch in the spring of 2013.

“I am super excited,” said Jim Chambers, the head coach. “Between my feelings about Bard and my love of baseball, I can't think of a more ideal situation to be in.”

Chambers, 26, was the founder of the club baseball team at Bard, as well as the manager and coach. A former Div. III baseball player himself, Chambers relishes the opportunity to start something new at Bard.

“In the first week of my official hiring, I contacted about 125 recruits directly by phone,” Chambers said. “We're trying to be very aggressive.”

A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., Chambers was raised in Brooklyn, and also has lived in and around the Boston, Mass., area. He is married and has three young children, and lives in nearby Tivoli, N.Y.

“What I'm looking for are really excellent students,” Chambers said, “and I'm also looking for leaders, and character guys, so we can found the program around them. The grades and the extracurriculars matter, but the attitude and having a team approach are important to me as well.”

Philosophically, Chambers said he doesn't have hard and fast beliefs about how to win baseball games, and is more likely to tailor his managing style to his personnel. The team will be fit, however.

Chambers, a fitness fanatic, recently opened a gym in nearby Hudson, N.Y. He has a CrossFit Movement and Mobility Certification.

“Fitness will be a huge part of what we do,” Chambers said. “I think that when guys are training in a functional way, and learning how to explode out of their hips … harvesting power from their bodies … those are the keys to hitting, running and throwing the ball.”

Chambers is focusing his efforts in the next month on recruiting, including hosting prospective student-athletes for campus visits.

Bard Athletics joined the Liberty League this fall. The schools that offer baseball are Clarkson, RIT, University of Rochester, RPI, Skidmore, St. Lawrence, Union and Vassar.

“In this first year, I want to build a foundation for the program,” Chambers said. “This wasn't created as an afterthought. We have the resources and the support of the growing athletic department. Between that and my level of dedication, there's no reason we can't become a force to be reckoned with.”