Above: the groundbreaking last week (BIS Photo)

By the Caribbean Journal staff

The Bahamas has officially broken ground on a national baseball stadium.

The Andre Rodgers National Baseball stadium, named for the first Bahamian to make the Major Leagues, will be completed in 2015.

The stadium, designed by architect Michael Foster, will “support the nation’s current energies to fully develop its sports tourism,” according to a government statement.

The project is located near the Queen Elizabeth Sports Centre, with an ultimate capacity of around 8,000 fans.

That would potentially give the country the ability to host NCAA baseball games and perhaps even MLB exhibition games.

While baseball has not found much popularity in most of the region, it has long been popular in the Bahamas.

Indeed, the archipelago has produced six Major League Baseball players, most recently Antoan Richardson, who finished the 2014 season as an outfielder for the New York Yankees.

And for years several teams flirted with opening a baseball academy in the country.

To learn more about the burgeoning baseball culture in the Bahamas, see the Caribbean Journal video below: