Futures Collegiate Baseball League

The Futures Collegiate Baseball League (FCBL) is a special baseball league for college students that started in 2011. It is called a "summer" league because it happens during the summer months when students are not in school.

Right now, in the 2026 season, the league has seven teams. Three of these teams are located in Massachusetts, two are in Connecticut, and there is one team each in New Hampshire and Vermont. Young players use this league to practice and improve their skills while having fun playing baseball together.

Format

The Futures Collegiate Baseball League is a special type of baseball league where players use wooden bats. Each team plays 64 games during the regular season—32 at home and 32 away.

Players in this league are college students who aren’t paid. They join to get practice and show off their skills to scouts from Major League Baseball. The league’s goal is to help these young players get ready for professional baseball.

The league has some unique rules. Players must have been on a college team the year before or must have agreed to join a college team soon. Teams can have a few new players joining college, but most players need to come from New England areas or colleges.

If a game ends in a tie after extra innings, they play a “Home Run Derby” instead of continuing. Each team takes turns hitting home runs, and the team with more home runs wins. The top four teams with the most points make the playoffs. Points are given for wins and for ties decided by the Home Run Derby.

History

The Futures Collegiate Baseball League, often called the Futures League, was created by Drew Weber and Chris Carminucci. They wanted to form a new baseball league because another league, the NECBL, would not add teams in certain places. The Futures League started in 2011 with four teams: Martha's Vineyard, Nashua, Seacoast, and Torrington. Nashua won the first championship that year.

In 2012, the league grew to nine teams, adding new teams in places like Leominster/Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Nashua won again as champions. Over the years, the league changed its rules for playoffs and added new teams. Sometimes teams moved to different divisions or left the league.

In 2017, the league introduced a special rule: if a game was tied after 10 innings, players would compete in a home-run hitting contest to decide the winner. This was to keep games from going too long and to be friendly to pitchers.

The league continued to change, with teams joining and leaving. By 2026, the league planned to add a new team called the Spinners in Lowell, Massachusetts.

League officers

Joe Paolucci is the commissioner of the Futures Collegiate Baseball League (FCBL). He took over after Chris Hall, who was commissioner from 2011 through 2018. John Creedon Jr., who owns the Worcester Bravehearts and Nashua Silver Knights, is the chairman of the league's board of directors.

Teams

The Futures Collegiate Baseball League (FCBL) started in 2011 and is a summer baseball league for college players. As of the 2026 season, it has seven teams. Three of these teams are in Massachusetts, two are in Connecticut, and there is one team each in New Hampshire and Vermont.

League champions

Here are the teams that won the Futures Collegiate Baseball League each year:

• 2011: Nashua Silver Knights
• 2012: Nashua Silver Knights
• 2013: Martha's Vineyard Sharks
• 2014: Worcester Bravehearts
• 2015: Worcester Bravehearts
• 2016: Nashua Silver Knights
• 2017: Nashua Silver Knights
• 2018: Worcester Bravehearts and Martha's Vineyard Sharks were both winners
• 2019: Worcester Bravehearts
• 2020: Nashua Silver Knights
• 2021: Vermont Lake Monsters
• 2022: Nashua Silver Knights
• 2023: Norwich Sea Unicorns
• 2024: Norwich Sea Unicorns
• 2025: Norwich Sea Unicorns

Single season records

Career records