New England Knockouts | |
Founded: | 2024 |
City: | Brockton, Massachusetts |
Ballpark: | Campanelli Stadium |
League: | Frontier League |
Division: | North Division |
Former Names: | New England Chowdahheads (pre-debut) |
Owner: | Brian Kahn |
General Manager: | John Wilson |
Manager: | Jerod Edmondson |
The New England Knockouts are a professional baseball team based in Brockton, Massachusetts. The Knockouts compete in the Frontier League (FL) as a member of the North Division in the Atlantic Conference.
The Knockouts, founded in 2023, play their home games at Campanelli Stadium, a facility they share with the Brockton Rox of the Futures Collegiate Baseball League.
The Frontier League announced late in the 2023 season that it would be placing a team in Brockton for the 2024 Frontier League season to replace the Empire State Greys, a traveling team founded when the Southern Illinois Miners were disbanded after their owners retired. Brockton's most recent professional baseball team had been the Brockton Rox, who were founded as a member of the former Northern League in 2002, and left the Can-Am League following the 2011 season to become a collegiate league team.
A team naming contest was conducted following the 2023 season, with five names chosen as finalists.[1] Of these, the most popular was New England Chowdahheads, and the team initially selected it as their new moniker, announcing it in November 2023.[2] However, reactions from fans and local business leaders in the area were lukewarm at best; as such, the owners of the team reconsidered. On December 15, they announced that they would be dropping the Chowdahheads name in favor of a name that was reflective of Brockton's history of producing championship caliber prizefighters such as Rocky Marciano and Marvelous Marvin Hagler; the team thus became the Knockouts.[3]