[Sportsandrec] {Spam?} RE: {Spam?} Information on Starting a Beep Baseball Team in North Seattle

Fri Jun 3 15:32:20 UTC 2016

Hi Jacob and Daniel,

I might be interested in volunteering (not as a player), and helping with promotion or organization. Just let me know once you get the ball rolling. 

Best,

Marian

-----Original Message-----
From: Sportsandrec [mailto:sportsandrec-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Jacob Struiksma via Sportsandrec
Sent: Thursday, June 02, 2016 3:35 PM
To: 'Daniel Heathman' <dbheat at gmail.com>
Cc: Jacob Struiksma <jacobstruiksma at gmail.com>
Subject: [Sportsandrec] {Spam?} Information on Starting a Beep Baseball Team in North Seattle

Hey Everyone,

     I am attempting to start a Beep Baseball team here in North Seattle., and hopefully this is a dream that can be realized as soon as this upcoming spring and/or summer, but several things are needed to make this happen.
First, players are needed; they must be legally blind.  At least six players
are  needed to have a legal team.   Second, a sighted pitcher and catcher
are required.  Third, we need a coach; this person can be blind or sighted.
Fourth, equipment and a location to practice.  The location for practices and games must be on or very close to a bus line.  Fifth, volunteers!
Volunteers are very much needed and welcome!  Don't think as a volunteer you have only little to offer, because even the smallest task is essential to facilitate things running smoothly and safely.  

     Last but not least, sponsors both big and small are needed to help with procuring equipment and uniforms for the team.  Every dollar helps!  I have attached documents that is more specifically detailed as to what is needed and information about the sport of Beep Baseball.  Anyone interested, please contact me via email, phone, or in person.  Looking forward to hearing from you!

Sincerely,

Jacob Struiksma

206-387-7736

jacobstruiksma at gmail.com

Things need for getting North Seattle beep baseball team started

1.   Come up with team name and colors

2.   Location of practice and time schedule day of week and day of weekend

3.   Board of directors 

4.   Beep baseballs 

5.   Two bases

6.   Field to play on grass or turf

7.   Chargers for the beep baseballs

8.   Bat bag 

9.   Uniforms (shirt, pants, need pads, gloves, hats)

10.                Sleep shades

11.                Batteries 9  volt 

12.                Water cooler with spigot

13.                First aid kit 

14.                Pa system

15.                6 blind players

16.                4  sighted players (pitchers, catcher, spotters)

17.                Somewhere to store equipment

18.                Transportation of equipment or players

19.                Base operator 

20.                Player attendant

21.                Announcer

22.                Umpire

23.                Coach

24.                Assistant coach 

25.                A volunteer certified in first aid or a certified first
responder, preferred EMT/paramedic

Marketing materials

1.   promotional t-shirts

2.   promotional hats

3.   flyers

4.   website

5.   social media (face book, twitter, YouTube, meetup.com)

6.   key chains

7.   news media

8.   photographer

9.   fund raising

10.       sponsorship

11.        raffles

12.       Car washes

Candy bar sales, raffles, bowl-a-thons and/or walk-a-thons, eat-ins/cookouts (chili,

1.   Pancake, spaghetti, BBQ, etc.), craft sales, baseball tournaments, golf
tournaments, etc.

The National Beep Baseball Association - Starting a Team

How to start a Beep Baseball Team

Starting a new beep baseball team takes dedication and commitment. The following items are needed in order to be successful:

List of 3 items

. Funding

. Players

. Dedicated Volunteers

List end

Funding:

Funding is needed to buy and repair equipment, to pay for transportation and lodging for tournaments, to buy uniforms, and to pay registration fees.

Dedicated Volunteers

Volunteers are needed to donate their time for a variety of tasks; the main ones being working with the team as Pitcher, Catcher and/or Field Spotters.

Other tasks might include providing transportation to and from practices and games, marking and setting up/taking down the field for practices, charging

Beep baseballs, maintaining the equipment, attending team meetings, and fund raising.

Players:/h2> 

Players the last ingredient necessary for a beep baseball team is at least five or six blind or visually impaired individuals willing to play the game of

Beep baseball. 

Beep Baseball Overview

Beep baseball can be an expensive sport. Money is needed for special equipment, travel, lodging and miscellaneous expenses. Special equipment is necessary

To play the game. It requires special 16-inch audio softballs that beep which cost approximately $34 each, special 4-foot tall foam cylinder bases that

Buzz at a cost of $300 per set, and blindfolds that cost approximately $5 to
$12 each for the batters and fielders (Note: All players must wear blindfolds.).

No special bats are required. Any legal softball bat is allowed. No special uniforms are required. However, if the team plays in tournaments and/or the

World Series of Beep Baseball, they at least need to have T-shirts that have the player's number imprinted on them.

In order to play other visually impaired beep baseball teams, most teams must travel to other cities for a weekend tournament or a scrimmage game. If they

Attend a weekend regional tournament; there are tournament entry fees, transportation costs and lodging fees.

Dedicated volunteers

Several dedicated volunteers are crucial for a team to survive. These volunteers may have several duties. A few key people are needed to be the pitcher,

Catcher and spotter(s). They must be willing to attend all practices and all tournaments which may require taking time off from their jobs to attend the

weekend tournaments and taking a one week vacation to attend the World Series.

Continuity is vital! A pitcher must know his/her batters and know where to place the ball for each batter on his/her team. This knowledge comes from constant

practice. The batters must know and trust their pitcher, they must be familiar with his/her rhythm for pitching, and have faith that he/she will get the

ball on their favorite bat at just the right spot for a great hit. The catcher must work closely with the pitcher to set an accurate target for each batter

as well as to know if each batter is set up properly in the batter's box.
Each field spotter needs practice learning the defensive strategies so the fielders

will feel comfortable with their spotter(s) and trust their calls.

the team

Beep Baseball teams usually have two practices a week and practice for approximately two hours per practice. Usually one practice is on a week night during

the middle of the week and the other is on the weekend.

This method or practice schedule may not necessarily work for every team, but the more practice completed, the better a team will become.

Practice usually starts as soon as the weather cooperates. Volunteers are usually needed to transport the team members to and from practice. These people

could rotate and are not required for every practice as long as someone is available for the task. A volunteer or spare player needs to be the base operator

(activating the base so the runner can run to the buzzing base). One or two people are needed to mark the field and set up and tear down the bases for

practice. This must be someone who has knowledge of how a beep baseball field is laid out. It could be one of the other volunteers such as the pitcher,

catcher, etc. Someone else is needed to be sure that the equipment is ordered and is in working order in time for each game. Equipment should be ordered

in the off-season (September - January) to allow time for the equipment to be made and shipped. This includes keeping the beep balls charged. It takes approximately

twelve (12) hours to fully charge a beep baseball (NOTE: A beep baseball must be completely discharged before it can be recharged). 

The local Pioneers group" are a good source for volunteers. Team meetings and organizational meetings will also occupy the volunteer's time. Quite often

players will need rides to and from the meetings.

Unless a team is lucky enough to get total corporate sponsorship, someone must coordinate the fund raising. This fund raising is usually done during the

off-season from September to March and could include such activities as candy bar sales, raffles, bowl-a-thons and/or walk-a-thons, eat-ins/cookouts (chili,

pancake, spaghetti, BBQ, etc.), craft sales, baseball tournaments, golf tournaments, etc. Everyone on the team must be willing to help with the fund raising.

If volunteers and players pull together and share in the various tasks, and the team is successful with their fund raising efforts, they should have an

operational beep baseball team. If the team also is fortunate to obtain corporate sponsorship, they could have some relief from the eternal fund raising

activities.

Getting a beep baseball team started--and keeping it going--takes work, organization, and dedication, but it can be fun and rewarding.

Questions for the NBBA

As always, any member of the NBBA, the Public Relations Group or the Secretary is always available to assist in answering any questions you might have

in starting a team.

Read Beep Baseball in a Nutshell, a guide for creating a Beep baseball Team

Contact the NBBA Secretary at:

Stephen Guerra

NBBA Secretary

1501 41st St, NW | Apt G1 | Rochester, MN 55901

Phone: 

data/call_skype_logo

866.400.4551 FREE Extension 2

the NBBA Secretary, Stephen Guerra

Beep Baseball in a Nutshell

Copyright 1976, 2014 by the National Beep Baseball Association

Introduction:

Spectators who witness today's style of Beep Baseball are delighted and amazed. They see athletes who are visually impaired dive on to the ground to stop a beeping ball and run full speed 100 feet toward the sound of a buzzing base to score a run. They see desire, determination, teamwork and in many cases skilled performances of players with visual impairment having fun in the midst of extreme competition. They also witness an occasional injury.
Beep baseball is not a game for those who are concerned about a scraped elbow. Safety is a high priority, but due to the nature of the game, some injuries do occur. As with any sport, players know this and fully accept the injury risks for the sake of playing a sport they love.

Beep Baseball Overview:

Understanding the game is relatively easy, but there are differences from baseball.  A contest lasts six (6) innings unless more are needed to break a tie. Teams can be co-ed. A team has three outs per inning, and umpires have the right to eject unruly players or spectators. There is no second base.
First and third bases, four foot padded cylinders with speakers, are placed one hundred feet down the respective lines and ten feet outside the foul lines. This is to prevent a runner from colliding with a defensive fielder.
The bases contain sounding units that give off a continuous buzzing sound when activated. The batter does not know which one will be turned on. When the ball is hit, the base operator activates one of the bases. The runner must identify the correct buzzing base and run to it before the ball is fielded by a defensive player. If the runner is safe, a run is scored. In other words, there is no running from one base to another. A player does one of three things when batting: hit the ball and be put out by the defense, hit the ball and score a run, or strike out. A batter is allowed four (4) strikes and one (1) pass ball. The fourth swing must be a clean miss.

To better understand how the game is played, keep in mind that each team has its own sighted pitcher and catcher. The pitcher attempts to place the ball on his hitter's bat. 

The ball is pitched from a distance of no less than twenty feet from the front of Home Plate. According to the rules, a pitcher is obligated to clearly verbalize two words. He or she says "ready" just before the ball is about to be released. This alerts all players the ball may soon be hit. As the ball is being released, the pitcher says, "pitch" or "ball." The batter allows a split second before starting his/her swing. If contact is made, one of the two bases is activated and it becomes a race between the runner and the defense. Also, a hit ball must travel at a minimum forty (40) feet to be considered fair. A ball that travels one hundred seventy (170) feet in the air is considered a home run, worth two (2) points as long as the batter makes it to the buzzing base in 30 seconds. A hit ball grazing or rebounding off the pitcher is ruled a "no pitch". It helps for pitchers to be quick and agile.

A pitcher never fields or bats, but the role is critical. Most pitchers are good athletes with competitive spirits. Their success is in direct proportion to the number of runs their team scores. High ERA's are preferable.

Defense:

Playing defense is a challenging aspect of the game. There are six defensive players in beep baseball. Not all teams use the same defensive placement of their players. Most teams use the same numbering system to identify the direction the ball has been hit. One thru five or one thru six in pie shaped wedges emanating from home plate on both sides of the field are the only numbers allowed. Five or six being the common, overlapping numbered zone, up the middle of the field.  Some teams reverse this and have the 'one zone' be the up the middle, with a "five" or "six" call being along the base line.
The narrower the zones, the more precise the information the fielder has to respond to. There are one or two sighted spotters positioned in the outfield, one on either side of the field. A good spotter should be aware of fielders at all times and stay out of the way of the play, not distracting the fielders, who are intent on the ball. 

When a ball is hit, a spotter will quickly call the number indicating the general direction the ball is traveling. The number does not signify a person so much as the zone the ball is heading to. A spotter is allowed to call one number, one time. The only exception is if both spotters call the same number. Each spotter takes half the field to call the one thru five or one thru six numbers. A "three" call alerts the fielders to move toward the center of the half of the field of the spotter making the call. The 

players coordinate their defensive moves according to the number called.
Some spotters use inflection in the number to indicate a 'short' ball, or air/fly ball or pop up. Most teams stagger the depths of player placement for freer lateral movement, usually but not always consisting from base line to center field, side to side and a specific amount forward or backward.
Each team decides on various players' areas of fielding responsibility.
There are no set ways to arranging how a field is set up. Each team develops its own defensive strategy of fielder placement. Some shift more players to right field if a left-handed batter appears, for instance. Some have two players in the 'short' depth area to play dribblers; others elect to only have one player in order to have another player further back. Some teams have two deep fielders, others have only one roving behind.

The players can verbally communicate with each other and frequently do. "By me right" or "By me left" is a helpful statement to fielders further back.
Players are free to speak to each other as long as it does not supersede the pitcher's cadence.  

A defensive player does not throw the ball to another player to record an out. Outs are earned by fielding the ball before the runner reaches the base. In the umpire's opinion, the fielder must have the ball in hand and off the ground to constitute possession. Players do not snatch balls out of the air. Many attempts have been made to catch an air ball, but in the N.B.B.A.'s history, there have been less than half a dozen instances of a hit ball being caught. Should it happen, it does immediately retire the side!

Good defensive players learn to use their bodies and the ground to block hit balls, and then pick up the beeping ball and display it for the umpire's call. Because most fielding is done in this manner, flat grassy areas, free of protruding sprinkler heads, pot holes, trees and bushes, are preferred.
Quiet lawns or soccer fields are often best.

Many teams keep individual statistics on their players. Good hitting teams may have several players with batting averages of .500 or above. Players proudly admit they enjoy the thrill of swinging at a pitched ball and making solid contact, charging down the base path full speed to score a

run. They like the exhilaration of diving to cleanly field a well hit ball to make an out. Even the most modest players are happy to vividly describe the put-outs they've made.

Beep baseball has evolved into a wide-open, competitive game. Each year new and improved training and coaching methods are introduced. Throughout the country and internationally, there are now many good players and teams. As time goes by, Beep Baseball continues to expand.

Organizing a team:

Organizing new teams to play competitive Beep baseball is not a simple matter. More than one ingredient is necessary in molding a group of individuals into a coordinated unit. 

Essentials are: dedicated sighted help, players and 

reliable equipment and practice fields. Absence of any one of these requirements is guaranteed frustration.

A team of outstanding Beep Baseball players would flounder without benefit of dedicated sighted help. Successful teams have sighted help who are willing to devote the time it requires to become skilled at pitching, catching, and number calling, (also known as "spotting") and to help out for fund raising, transportation to practices and tournaments. It is a team effort for all. 

New teams are generally started in one of two ways. Either a person who is blind learns about beep baseball and recruits other players and sighted help, or a person with sight, usually one with enthusiasm for new and innovative projects, meets a person who is blind and introduces them to the game. Either way, recruiting has to commence. A minimum of six players with visual impairment and four people with sight are required. Finding recruits with a visual impairment is not as hard as some may think because players do not have to be totally blind. Many beep baseball players are partially sighted. They are all required to wear blindfolds while batting or fielding.

When starting a new team, contact organizations and agencies who provide services for the blind and low vision about seeking players for a team

Reach out to local civic groups for sighted volunteers to assist your team

Tools for success:

Review the different equipment needed for playing Beep Baseball at:

http://www.nbba.org/equipment

Identify if a team is located near you:

http://www.nbba.org/teams

Attend regional tournaments or practices if possible to observe how other organized teams handle various situations, practices and team procedures.
Each team adopts its own character and methods. However, there are similarities that have resulted from experience. Next, obtain a copy of the official N.B.B.A. Rules. They can be reviewed or downloaded from the below
link:

http://www.nbba.org/rules/current_nbba_rules.pdf

Contacting the NBBA:

You can also contact the NBBA Secretary for help or advice for beginning a
team:

Stephen Guerra, Secretary

National Beep Baseball Association

1501 41st ST, NW | Apt G1 | Rochester, MN 55901

Phone: 866.400.4551 Extension 2

Email: secretary at nbba.org

Good luck and Play ball! 

From: The National Beep Baseball Association Secretary, Stephen Guerra [mailto:nbbasec08 at gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, February 05, 2016 5:47 AM
To: jacobstruiksma at gmail.com; pr at nbba.org
Subject: RE: Information on Starting a Beep Baseball Team in North Seattle

Jacob-

I am also part of the PR committee and will be glad to send you the documentation you are seeking for the start of a beep baseball team.

Respectfully yours,

Stephen Guerra, Secretary
National Beep Baseball Association
1501 41st Street, NW,
Apt. G1
Rochester, MN 55901

All checks or other financial instruments should be sent to:
P.O. Box 290
Glenview, Il 60025

Office phone of the Secretary: NBBA Secretary, 866.400.4551 Ext. 2 <tel:866.400.4551> Direct Mobile: NBBA Secretary Mobile, 507.208.8383 <tel:507.208.8383> The NBBA Tournament Committee: The NBBA Tournament Committee, 866.400.4551 Ext. 4 <tel:866.400.4551> Office of Public Relations: Office of Public Relations and Marketing,
866.400.4551 Ext. 5 <tel:866.400.4551>
NBBA Secretary, Stephen Guerra <mailto:secretary at nbba.org> Visit the NBBA on the Web <http://www.nbba.org/> Read all the News published about the NBBA and Beep Baseball <http://www.nbba.org/news> Watch all the videos about Beep Baseball <http://www.nbba.org/videos> 

Connect with the NBBA on
Twitter <http://twitter.com/nbba>
Facebook <http://www.facebook.com/NBBAPublicRelations> 

From: Jacob Struiksma [mailto:jacobstruiksma at gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, February 05, 2016 2:18 AM
To: pr at nbba.org
Subject: Information on Starting a Beep Baseball Team in North Seattle

Dear Mr. Boudreaux,

               My name is Jacob Struiksma, and I am very interested in forming a new beep baseball team in North Seattle.  I am well aware of the team in South Seattle; however I have decided not to play on the team due to the long commute I have to make to practice.  I really love to play beep baseball, as does several of my friends, but traveling so far makes it extremely difficult to make practices on a consistent basis.  I am looking for any information you can provide that would help facilitate my dream in starting a new team closer to my home in North Seattle.  I have spoken to my friends, both blind and sighted, who are very interested but do not know much about the sport.  Are there any videos and/or printed materials you may know of that I can show to further interest and increase awareness of our beloved sport?  

Sincerely,

Jacob Struiksma

206-387-7736

jacobstruiksma at gmail.com

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