BPG Sports Sweeps State with DE Turf, Sports at Beach Deals

Katie Tabeling, Delaware Business Times

GEORGETOWN —The Buccini Pollin Group is betting big on sports, and with its latest management deal with Sports at the Beach, its sports management company now is in all three counties in Delaware.

BPG Sports has signed a 15-year lease to operate and manage the largest sports complex in Sussex County. Sports at the Beach has 16 grass baseball fields as well as concession stands, picnic areas, pavilions and welcome center. The facility’s capacity can host up to 100 teams and 10,000 visitors. The site also includes playgrounds, eight basketball courts, and fishing ponds.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

BPG Sports plans to invest in Sports at the Beach, including its playing surfaces, in the next couple of years with Titus Baseball Academy as a training and development partner.

“They got all the bones there to be a great facility, there just needs to be some upgrades,” BPG Sports General Manager Steve Cavalier said. He listed painting, new fences, parking and filling potholes as immediate needs. “There’s also some cosmetic things that would go a long way that we can do pretty quickly, like hanging televisions outside to create an experience.”

Long term, BPG Sports hopes to expand into softball games and tournaments, and the turf fields required to host them. There are no plans to expand beyond baseball and softball at this time.

The deal comes seven months after BPG Sports had quietly inked a 10 year deal to operate and manage DE Turf — a massive turf complex and arguably the state’s biggest sports tourism draw.

In that deal, BPG Sports coordinates with the on-site DE Turf Executive Director Dan Yearick and team to book and identify events. BPG Sports has no agreement to invest in that site, though DE Turf has already received millions of state funds in the past and millions more in a grant fund established in 2024.

Cavalier said so far, the management with DE Turf has gone well, with winners of tournaments at DE Turf and the Chase Field House go on to play each other in a championship match. There’s also been new sponsorships delivered to DE Turf as well.

“We have a lot of synergies with the events we run, and we’re working directly with Dan and the team to expand bookings, leagues and what they’re doing,” he said.

BPG Sports is one arm of the multi-million dollar development firm, the Buccini Pollin Group, and now has had real momentum ever since the firm built the Chase Fieldhouse on the Wilmington Riverfront. The firm was founded by Rob and Chris Buccini and their college roommate Dave Pollin and has been built into a powerhouse development and property management company across the region.

But a lesser-known fact is that the Buccini Pollin Group leadership were founding investors in the Philadelphia Union major league soccer team and still have a minority stake in the team. The developers also built the Union’s Subaru Park home stadium under the Commodore Barry Bridge in Pennsylvania as well as the $55 million WSFS Bank Sportsplex.

Both of those sites – which sit 15 minutes away from Wilmington – have now been catapulted in the spotlight as Côte d’Ivoire soccer team will train there this summer ahead of its first matches in the 2026 FIFA World Cup.