The Campesinos de Salem-Keizer are a baseball team located in

Keizer, Oregon Keizer () is a city located in Marion County, Oregon, United States, along the 45th parallel. As of the 2010 United States Census, its population was 36,478. It lies in the Willamette Valley, and is part of the Salem Metropolitan Statistical Ar ...

, who are charter members of the

Mavericks Independent Baseball League The Mavericks Independent Baseball League is an adult amateur baseball league based in the Salem Metropolitan Statistical Area, Oregon, United States, founded in January 2021 and set to begin its inaugural season that May. Each team in the Maveri ...

, a four-team league entirely based in the

Salem Metropolitan Statistical Area The Salem Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), as defined by the United States Census Bureau, is a Metropolitan Statistical Area consisting of two counties in western Oregon, Marion and Polk. The principal city is Salem, the state capital, which h ...

and playing all their home games at

Volcanoes Stadium Volcanoes Stadium is a Minor League Baseball, minor league baseball park in the Pacific Northwest, northwest United States, located in Keizer, Oregon. It is the home field of the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes, formerly the Minor League Baseball#Class A, ...

History

The Salem-Keizer Volcanoes in 2019 were selected by Minor League Baseball as one of 22 teams across the country to join their Copa de la Diversión program beginning with the 2020 season. the team was named the Campesinos de Salem-Keizer. The team was set to debut during Minor League Baseball’s Copa de la Diversion in 2020 before the season was canceled due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

. The Campesinos (farm laborers) pay tribute to the contributions of farm workers in the Willamette Valley and embrace the culture and values that resonate in the Latino community. Due to the

, the 2020 Minor League Baseball season was cancelled. Following the cancelled season,

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

took direct control of Minor League Baseball. The Northwest League was elevated to the

High-A High-A (officially Class High-A, formerly known as Class A-Advanced, and sometimes abbreviated "A+" in writing) is the third-highest level of play in Minor League Baseball in the United States and Canada, below Triple-A and Double-A, and abov ...

classification and contracted to six teams. The Volcanoes were not extended an invitation to continue as a franchise affiliated with a major league organization. The team, however, had plans to continue in some other form, such as

collegiate summer baseball Collegiate summer baseball leagues are amateur baseball leagues in the United States and Canada featuring players who have attended at least one year of college and have at least one year of athletic eligibility remaining. Generally, they operat ...

or independent baseball, in 2021. And that they did. On January 26, 2021, the team announced the formation of a new professional independent league called the Mavericks League. It is a four-team league consisting of the Volcanoes and Campesinos de Salem-Keiser (founding members), as well as two returning teams from the past, the Salem Senators (founded in the 1940's) and the Portland Mavericks (founded in the 1970's).

References

External links

* Baseball teams established in 2021 Keizer, Oregon

Volcanoes A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates are ...

2021 establishments in Oregon Professional baseball teams in Oregon {{Oregon-baseball-team-stub