They left the balls but not the bats. 

Thieves have broken into and stolen from a storage shed at a baseball field in Elmwood (Koskie Field), taking, among other things, dozens of aluminum bats.

Elmwood Giants Baseball Club board member Al Kinley says the bats are part of a youth baseball program.

"We call it Learn to Play, for basically eight and unders. We had about 50 bats sitting in a couple bins there... and the aluminum bats were all gone, every one of them," said Kinley. He says a couple of pitching machines are also missing (one heavier, older pitching machine was left laying in the field), along with some catcher's masks and a brand-new stand-up batting screen.

"They'd obviously rooted through the place a little bit."

Kinley says damage was first noticed at the field on Friday, but it wasn't until Saturday that a coach realized there had been theft.

According to Kinley, they haven't determined all of what's been stolen yet, noticing something new each time they go to the field.

The stolen bats won't affect the older teams who use the field, according to Kinley, but it may affect Learn to Play.

"It just means in the off-season and come early spring we'll have to do a lot more scrounging to make sure we come up with all the catcher's equipment and bats we need to run the program."

Kinley says the bats that were taken have the Elmwood Giants decal on them. Some kids took bats home for the winter, so those bats have been saved.

Kinley said earlier today he was still talking with insurance; they have a $1,000 deductible, according to Kinley. He says the club has its major fundraiser coming up as well, with a third of those profits going to the youth program.

The thieves even took the tap off the field's water supply.