Santa Barbara is No. 1 in the nation when it comes to weather, according to U.S. News & World Report, which researched the variations in temperature and counted the cloudy days. The media outlet could have surveyed the Santa Barbara Foresters and come up with the same ranking.
“The weather’s so nice,” said Logan Allen, one of 26 college baseball players who have come from out of state to play for the Foresters this summer. Their hometowns are in the states of Texas, Oklahoma, Ohio, Arkansas, Kansas, Nebraska, Tennessee, Georgia, West Virginia, Colorado, Arizona, and Hawai‘i. There also are nine California players on the roster.
Besides the temperate climate, the players are lured by the opportunity to swing wooden bats — such a glorious “crack” at solid contact compared to the “ping” of the metal models — and the club’s winning tradition.