LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — America's Pastime is for everyone and something called Beep Baseball is helping make it possible for players young and old who are visually impaired.
One of the hardest things to do in all of sports is hit a baseball but the Gateway Archers Beep Baseball team makes it look easy despite being visually impaired.
"I put that blindfold on and swung the bat with the timing of the pitcher and hit the ball and that was extremely exhilarating," player Marc Morris said.
Beep Baseball is essentially softball but instead of seeing the ball, you hear It.
This weekend, players from all over the country will be at Alyn Beck Memorial Park for the first Beep Baseball tournament west of Texas in a decade.
Growing up, a lot of the players tell me because they are visually impaired, they weren't able to sign up for youth sports. However, the passion and drive was there.
"I recall actually having make-believe baseball games in my own backyard by myself," Richie Flores, the second VP of National Beep Baseball Association, said. "I'd throw a ball in the air and I'd swing a little plastic bat and hit a Wiffle ball but never played competitively."
Once they discovered the game, the players told me they were hooked instantly, not just from the thrill of a base hit, but also from meeting the people they now call teammates.
"Not only do we have bond of being the Gateway Archers, but we have the bond of the life experience, that life experience of having to deal with vision loss," player Chad Dillon said.
Through the game, they want to show everyone jut because you can't see, doesn't mean you're disabled.
"I think society wants to look at us and say oh. They're disabled. Those poor disabled people. Those poor blind people," Morris said. "That's not it. We have capabilities. We have the ability to be athletic."
"If we get up and move and we make some runs, we make some put outs, if we win and we lose with learning with our team, that shows folks that hey, if they can do this, then maybe we'll hire them for a job or maybe we'll marry them, you know," Flores said.
