The game will be played…
It’s time to fill you in. Since my last posting, the world became aware of baseball in Uganda. Unfortunately, much of this awareness came at the expense of heartbreak for 12 talented young players in Uganda who got caught up in a bureaucratic mess. They were front page news in a Sunday New York Times, and ESPN’s Sportscenter came calling and asked us to put a 5 minute feature together that they would run in the week leading up to the Little League World Series to address the absence of Uganda. We did that. Here is the piece if you haven’t yet seen it. http://search.espn.go.com/uganda-baseball/videos/6
The response to this piece was incredible. The emails and phone calls came pouring in. 5 year old kids wanted to send their gloves to Uganda (which you can do btw, ill tell you how), baseball coaches around the country wanted a copy of the film to show their teams (which you can do when its done…), high profile MLB Stars reached out asking how they could help (more of them later too), Hilary Clinton’s office reached out to make a plan for addressing the documentation issue for future teams, Roberto Clemente Jr. contacted us offering his impressive connections.
All of this was absolutely amazing. We were swarming with what to do with all of this interest and motivation to help, and that’s when another important group reached out, the Langley Little League team from Vancouver, Canada.
This was the team that Uganda was scheduled to play in Williamsport if they had gone. It was the team that was to be in the other dugout when an African team took the field for the first time in the history of Little League Baseball… The game, as we all know, never happened.
So, a woman named Ruth Hoffman called me. She is a woman who understands Africa after spending several years working with development projects in East Africa, and she understands baseball and is passionate about supporting individuals of all abilities to follow their dreams. She is, in short, an incredible woman. When she called me and said Langley wanted to help we hatched a plan … let’s play the game.
The question was where. After I spoke with Coach George, and a few of the players in Uganda it was clear where we would play this game… in Uganda. Now, I went to Africa as a 15 year old boy once upon a time, but we are talking about 11, 12, and 13 year old boys from Canada now. I understood the challenge to get them to agree to this, but I also understood the importance.
As I’ve written about countless times before, perhaps my entire passion for this film is to alter the way Americans or the “Western” world views Africa. It goes back to my first trip when I was constantly disappointed by reactions to my trip, I wanted people to ‘get it’, whatever that means. I wanted to combat the general fear of Africa held, most times, irrationally by people in the west and stoked by selective media coverage and romanticizing of ‘quaint’ poverty. This team from Canada getting on a plane with their baseball gear and taking the field against these boys in the places where they live sends the perfect message to the world. It’s no surprise really, that “when you leave it up to kids, they keep it so simple, they just play.” The coach from Dubai told me that after the 2010 tiebreaker fiasco in Poland when they boys played the 2 innings just for fun. It’s really remarkable looking back at the past 3 years at the crazy string of events that put this game in motion. The determination that this community has displayed is impressive and inspiring. They could have given up hundreds of times, but here they are, still ready to play. And now they’ll do just that.
Let me explain this event a little more. It will take place January 15-21st in Uganda. We are still building the itinerary but the intention is to play the games between Canada and Uganda as a series and play it in different locations through the country. If you’ve been reading this blog you know them all (Richard’s complex, Sharing youth center, St. Peters school, Lugazi field, St. Noa school, Jinga s.s.). Just thinking about how incredible the scenes will be of these kids from Canada taking these fields and playing for 6 innings with hundreds of curious onlookers is breathtaking. Those kids from Langley are making quite a historic trip, and they are going to have the time of their lives. Beyond the baseball fields, the kids will just be kids and eating some kikimondo in the heart of Nsambya and talking about their lives will enrich both sides immensely. But that is not the entire event. Roberto Clemente Jr will be chaperoning the team and 
speaking to the local communities there before and after games about the power of sport, I couldn’t think of anyone better for that job. Derek Lee (now of the Pittsburgh Pirates) will be joining us as a guest coach. And Jimmy Rollins will be the other guest coach (most likely, still not 100% confirmed). These two world series winners obviously know their stuff and can provide incredible coaching to both teams, but their intent is not only to go coach, but to leave a lasting impact to improve lives of baseball players in Uganda and the future of the program. Money raised for this trip goes to 4 things, 1) is making the event a reality with some logistic costs, 2) is building a field closer to their homes (I don’t know where that will be just yet, maybe sharing?), 3) is starting an educational scholarship fund for players (this was a request of George’s and a very important one), and 4) providing money for future teams to travel to International Tournaments (hopefully older teams to provide a good incentive for kids to stick with the game). Easton Russell is providing uniforms for both teams and a donation of equipment for the Ugandan team, Sheraton Hotels has generously offered rooms to players for the event, and other sponsors such as Rogers SportsNet have made sizable donations. All of this is being handled by an amazing organization called Right To Play. If you haven’t heard of it, check it out. They are really special.
And anyone can help reach the target dollar amount. Here is where you can do it…
http://righttoplay.akaraisin.com/youthbaseball
The news doesn’t stop there. George was just elected to be president of the Baseball Federation in Uganda. This is a pretty remarkable thing. The Federation was dissolved in the past year due to massive corruption and ineffectiveness. This is a common chorus for many African Federations. But George is the right man for the job. An effective Federation would mean good things for Uganda Baseball and a much cleaner path to support from their local government, and it is also a necessary step for Uganda to compete in the World Baseball Classic or hopefully the Olympics (put baseball back in there already sheesh).
I’ve been receiving letters from players like Asharaf, Ochen, Aaron, Benard who are all so excited that this is happening, they are beginning to sense that this is really a big deal. They are, as they’ve always wanted to be, on the map.
So, that’s about where we are now. This event, as you may have guessed, will be the conclusion of our film. Just when you think it’ll end with an ellipses, you get an exclamation point.
