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Pleasanton sports fields will be filled again today as the spring season for boys' Little League baseball and teams in the Pleasanton Girls Softball league moves toward the peak of the season.

Mark Spiller, Pleasanton's Community Services Manager who has charge of all sports programs in the city, said 1,700 boys turned out this month as the Little League season got under way.

Another 900 girls reported for play last weekend when the Girls Softball League started its season.

While those numbers aren't much higher than a year ago, they're record-high and there's no indication registration for youth sports is slowing down. In fact, with 3,000 high density apartments approved for construction in Pleasanton, Spiller said it's likely more will be signing up for both the boys and girls teams, which serve players from T-ball to 18-year-old senior baseball team categories and in other sports.

Besides continually growing numbers of youth players in city and school sports that now go year-round, the number and types of sports is also growing. Lacrosse, historically an East Coast/Ivy League sport until gaining strength here and other parts of California 10 years ago, now requires the sports fields at Hart Middle School (for boys teams) and Harvest Park Middle School (girls) part of the year. Soccer teams play in the spring and fall and the season is just staring for Pleasanton Junior Football, a league that's also setting new registration records.

Spiller said players here have the advantage of playing on some of the best-groomed and equipped fields in the Bay Area with the two new lighted baseball fields at Bernal Community Park, home to the Foothill Little League, fast-becoming a picture-perfect place to play and watch games.

Another lighted diamond is at the Upper Fields on Bernal Avenue where the girls' teams play, with the Girls Softball and the American and National boys Little League teams playing on 20 more fields at Sports Park.

Lighted adult fields at the Hopyard Road end of the park provide play now seven days a week for 185 businesses, churches and other teams that compete in adult softball, including fast-pitch and other tournaments on Saturdays.

Spiller said that about the only sport that hasn't yet caught on in Pleasanton is rugby, which has its dedicated players and fans but not yet the numbers to fill a field here. That is changing as more ethnic groups move to Pleasanton from countries where rugby and European-style football are favorites, so Spiller is taking note. As it is, he meets with the Pleasanton Sports Council, with representatives of all the sports clubs and with the school district to line up fields as each specific sports season gets under way.

By the end of summer, all of Pleasanton's sports fields are allocated for the following year. New fields planned for Bernal Community Park in 2014 won't come soon enough for a city that loves its sports.

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