Marianas Batting Alley opens in Gualo Rai

A new business is hoping to hit a home run with the community as the only indoor batting cage facility in the CNMI—MC Marianas Batting Alley—held its grand opening last Saturday in Gualo Rai.

The event was attended by dignitaries, as well as family and friends of the owners, May Cabrera and Cat Dela Cruz.

Cabrera and Dela Cruz are local business owners who also own the clothing store 670 Rock Steady Shop, which is also located in Gualo Rai.

Born out of Dela Cruz’ love for the bat-and-ball sport, the batting alley is the first of its kind in the CNMI. It caters to people of all ages—individuals or groups of friends and family looking to try something new, baseball/softball enthusiasts, or teams in need of an indoor training facility.

The warehouse is located just off the dirt road leading down from the left of the U.S. District Court in Gualo Rai.

Their current hours of operation are from 11am to 9pm from Sunday through Thursday, and 9am to 11pm on Fridays and Saturdays. The alley features six cages—four with pitching machines, one for self-pitching, and one bullpen.

Cages two and three range from 20-80 mph, with a 30-minute round priced at $45. A one-hour session costs $65, and a token worth $8 allows for 15 hits.

Cages one and four are designated as junior/softball cages, with speeds ranging from 20-60 mph. The pricing is $25 for 30 minutes, $50 for one hour, and a token for 15 hits is $8. For the self-pitch and bullpen cages (cages five and six), the cost is $15 for 30 minutes and $25 for one hour.

Team packages are also available: $155 for two hours with the use of two cages, and $125 for two hours with access to both the junior/softball and bullpen cages.

A waiver of liability and release must be signed before using the facilities, and the QR code for this can be found at the reception area.

In an interview after the ribbon cutting ceremony, Cabrera said, “It’s our dream to help all the upcoming athletes. We want to help the kids and we want to give back to the community.” Along with that, they said that they wanted to fill a gap and provide a facility for the community—especially the youth, to train and have some fun in.

“This is something we were missing on the island and we really want the young kids to be able to practice and represent out there; and we needed a batting cage on Saipan,” she said.

Dela Cruz added, “the facility is not just for professional players. It’s an amusement area where anybody can come here and have fun and enjoy. You don’t have to be an experienced player; this place is to build, enhance, and basically to start on a new skill. Anybody is invited to come here and don’t be intimidated by players who are already here—it’s open to anybody… The batting cage is open to anybody regardless of their age because a lot of kids don’t have access to practice, or train, or to be in a team.”

Dela Cruz grew up in a baseball family with her brothers Richard and Ricardo and said that she started with baseball, played in little league, and went up to the junior and senior league. “I kept going because this sport is so fun… it’s not new to us. We know about the sport. The business part came later and was because of [May]. She’s been in the business side for 20 plus years—my idea and her talent, we put it together and we came up with this. We worked together with different people but in the beginning it was really just us. Starting out a new business, we were very careful on how we were going to do it because we want everybody to be happy… we were planning it for a few months because we didn’t want to open up right away and we weren’t ready for it.”

With that, Cabrera thanked the people who showed up for their grand opening ribbon cutting ceremony that morning. “We’re very blessed with the family and friends that we have. We’re just very excited to share this with everybody,” she said.

Angel Demapan made opening remarks during the ceremony in which he said, “The facility we have here is a vision from two esteemed business women… as you know, our economy is still experiencing challenges, but even in our difficult moments, businesses continue to give our community hope that we can still bounce back from our hardship.”

He added, “What we have here is a facility that does not exist anywhere in the CNMI to this day. This is going to be the only batting cage facility here that’s going to offer training opportunities and development opportunities to our seasoned athletes, and our up and coming athletes. We’re very excited to see this here because as much as baseball is the pastime of America, baseball is also the pastime of the Marianas.”