3/31/16

(Tacoma, WA) On Saturday ESN will be settling in for about 9 hours of High School Baseball from the cozy comforts of Beautiful Cheney Stadium in Tacoma, home of the AAA Tacoma Rainiers. The Rainiers have been offering this program of allowing High School teams to play a game on the beautiful Rainiers field. A chance kids will no doubt relish and be able to look back on for years to come.

We talked with Media Manager Brett Gleason who tells us the program began in 2010 and has grown every year since. Gleason says it’s a win/win for those teams who want to participate. Each team gets 350 tickets to a Rainiers game they choose they want to attend. The teams are responsible for selling the tickets to the Rainiers game and they also get to keep about $5 of each ticket sold. Gleason says there is a variety of seats and prices each school gets to select from but in the end they can expect to raise about $1,500 each plus play on the Cheney Stadium Field.

Additionally, Gleason says there is no charge to come to the High School games they do have some concessions available but it is more important to the Rainiers to allow the High School fans to experience Cheney Stadium.

Rainiers Group Event Coordinator Caitlin Calnan, who runs the HS baseball program says ” The High School Baseball program was created to not only help local high school teams fundraise and grow their program, but also to give the players a unique opportunity to play on a professional field and experience what it’s like to play at Cheney Stadium.”

This year there will be 6 nights of games at Cheney Stadium when the Rainiers are out of town and a total of 11 games. 22 teams will take advantage of the Rainiers hospitality for likely a once in a lifetime opportunity for hundreds of kids over the years. It truly is a win/win situation.

Here is the complete schedule of games from Cheney Stadium this season beginning Friday night, April 1st:

Friday, 4/1

4pm: Klahowya vs Tenino

7pm: Capital vs Yelm

Saturday, 4/2 **all 3 games live on ESN 1

12-Noon: Hazen vs Curtis

3pm: Black Hills vs North Mason

6pm: Auburn vs Todd Beamer

Saturday, 4/16 **Both games live on ESN 1

12-Noon: Mt. Rainier vs Kennedy Catholic

3pm: Gig Harbor vs South Kitsap

Monday, 4/18

7pm: North Kitsap vs Sequim

Thursday, 4/21

6pm: Bremerton vs Stadium

Saturday, 4/30

3pm: Centralia vs Garfield

6pm: Franklin Pierce vs Washington