The Washington Nationals and a Reddit user teamed up to show kids in Zambia how to play baseball, and brought some joy to their lives in the process.
Many pictures posted show the kids showing off their equipment, or just clowning around and having a great time. It was a great display of the sheer happiness that baseball can bring to a group of kids.
From Reddit:
These kids are great….
They work really hard every Saturday and we have been at this for about 6 months now. When we started they were running from first to third and swinging the bat like cricket players. Now they are arguing strike calls and stealing bases.
It’s fun to watch but a lot of hard work. We really need to find space to build a baseball field and not play on a horse field with a sprinkler system soaking the kids. We also need equipment for left hand players and catchers. One of these days we will be able to field a few teams to start a tournament.
One of the photos provided on imgur shows a kid wearing a helmet with a facemask that’s used as catchers gear. Despite them not having all the necessary gear, the kids are clearly still having a great time learning how to play the game.
The kids have gone from running from first to third (directly across the infield) to properly standing at the plate and changing their cricket stances to baseball stances.
How exactly did this happen? Let’s let Reddit explain once again.
Last month the Nationals New Media and Marketing manager reached out to me because he saw the story online. We got to talking and he gave me some advice about moving forward and how he loved the story. They gave us some hats and that’s what you see them wearing in the picture. We also got some equipment donated to us from various donors as we were back in the states. We went from having two bats, two helmets, and seven gloves and some bases to 15 bats, 5 helmets, and 30 gloves….. Awesome!
The cause seems really good, and if you’re interested in making a contribution, you can send a private message here. All contributions of equipment and other goods will certainly be appreciated and put to good use.
