Paid practice fields yield more strikeouts than hits for owners.

SPRING training is nearly in sight, not just for major league ballplayers in Florida and Arizona, but for customers of the 100 or so batting cages that dot Los Angeles County.

This is the beginning of the peak season for batting cages as players of all ages and leagues take swings as a device shoots balls over the plate.

"Batting cages are so seasonal," said Lloyd Burton, whose family has owned the A-1 Batting Cage in El Monte for 30 years. "That's why there aren't more of them. Unless you save the money during the good times, you go out of business when the lean times come."

Typically, January through July are the peak months for batting cages--that's when they're used primarily by those in recreational and school leagues. July through October are, at best, break-even (soccer and basketball leagues start up during the summer), and by November and December business can drop by as much as 90 percent, forcing some cages to close until the weather turns.

Burton, also a $1 15-per-day substitute teacher, said at least 18 operations in the San Gabriel Valley-Pomona area have come and gone since the cages his father Carl designed and constructed first opened.

He said reaching his operation's $2,500-per-month break-even threshold is relatively easy during the season. A-1 attracts at least 100 customers per day, who spend $7.75 for 15 minutes in one of his seven batting areas. A half hour costs $15 and an hour $27.50.

The business requires a fair amount of upfront capital. Castle Concessions Ltd., which operates nine cages at both the city-owned Sherman Oaks Castle Park and the privately held Malibu Park in Redondo Beach, had invested around $200,000 to get each up and running.

The cost of pitching machines varies considerably, depending on sophistication. A battery-operated device that shoots balls out of a tube using compressed air can be had for between $400 and $700, but those units aren't good enough lot many customers.

Most operations prefer pitching machines that throw both fastballs and curveballs and run close to $3,000. Castle Concessions' machines, which only throw heat, cost $2,000.

"That's the big mistake people make about going into the batting cage business," said John Wawee, Castle Concessions' general manager. "It's like any other business--labor, expenses, rent and the weather plays a big part in our sales. People think it's a lot easier than it is."

Born of necessity

The batting cage was invented in 1907 by Willington Titus, an amateur league catcher who, according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame, grew tired of chasing foul balls and wild pitches. His patented "base ball (sic) back stop" served as a prototype for today's cages.

The first multi-batter cage was devised by Florida State University head coach Danny Litwhiler, who was hired into an under-funded baseball program in 1955. He had to work with a single cage, which cut into practice time for players, so he came up with a screening system that allowed five pitchers and hitters to practice safely.

These days, batting cages are often part of larger entertainment complexes.

At Castle Park, which also has a miniature golf course and arcade, would-be sluggers pumped $546,468 into the cages in 2003 (the latest figures available), representing 14.7 percent of the entertainment complex's $3.8 million in revenues.

Castle Concessions' lease gives the city 37.5 percent of batting cage revenues and 10 percent of merchandise sales, which totaled $201,687 in 2003, said Anthony Sanchez, concessions analyst for the city Department of Recreation and Parks.

"There is definitely a big advantage to be in a family entertainment center," said Wawee, who also sponsors recreation leagues. "But you have to know how to market it and maintain it."

Also having an impact are the demographics of an area.

Temple City Batting Cage, a 35-year-old enterprise, has seen annual revenues drop by a third since the heyday of the late 1980s, said Jim Powers, a retired L.A. Department of Water & Power civil engineer who bought the business in 1983.

Skyrocketing housing prices that hit the area in the 1990s proved cost-prohibitive for many families with young children, and that has reduced the number of Little League teams in the area.

There also has been a heavy influx of Chinese immigrants for whom baseball is not a passion. "For part-time, it's not a bad supplemental business," Powers said. "There are just fewer kids that are playing baseball so there are fewer kids that want to practice."