With half their season complete, the three teams in Thompson's senior men's baseball league are gearing up for playoffs - both their own and the Manitoba provincials in August.

"We're just preparing for playoffs in just a little over a month in Wawanesa," says Jack Sangster, coach of the Reds, who compete in the senior league against Bankside and the Dropkick Murphys.

The Thompson league will wrap up its season a week before provincials with a one-day weekend playoff to determine the league champion. The team with the best regular-season record will receive a bye into the final, while the second- and third-place teams will face each other for the other championship game berth.

"Murphys and Bankside have really improved. Murphys and Bankside have been playing quite well as of late," says Sangster, noting that there's more parity in the league than last season. Former Reds co-coach Ken Stuart moved to Bankside this year to coach with his son Ryan. "He's doing a good job with them."

Steve Matechuk took over as coach of the Dropkick Murphys this season.

"He took over from Ryan Cameron," said Sangster.

The Reds have been hit by the loss of a few players, which resulted in a planned road trip to Neepawa being cancelled earlier this season when players who are RCMP officers were called in to Shamattawa, dropping the number of players available for the trip from 12 to seven.

"We've lost some players," said Sangster. "We just keep plugging at her."

Players employed in shift work can throw a wrench into the schedule at times, when they're not able to make it out for any or some of the games for a whole week. The advantage of having only three teams, said Sangster, is that there are usually players from the one team not in action available to fill in.

"The guys don't mind. They're getting more ball," said Sangster, who'd still like to see the league have four squads in the future.

Thompson is trying to get some exhibition games in before playoffs.

"We're looking for an exhibition home-and-home with Swan River," said Sangster, with Thompson having offered to chip in for the opponents' travel costs. "We can pay for their trip up. Hopefully it'll happen."