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Bat-a-thon is a program that combines league fund-raising efforts with a live batting competition. This year's program will include GF Little League baseball players from the Majors, AAA and AA teams as well as Little League players from the softball Majors and Minors teams. There will be prizes for all the players based upon their funding raising efforts, team prizes for fund-raising, player and team awards for the top batting performances and a Grand Prize for the child who raises the most money for the league. How does Bat-a-thon® work? There are essentially two parts to Bat-a-thon®, the fund-raising effort and the competition. The fund-raising effort: In the fund-raising effort, the players are asked to solicit donations for the GFLL. These donations can take the form of simple cash donations or pledge donations. With the pledge donations, the donor agrees to pledge a certain amount of money based upon that player's teams batting score on Bat-a-thon (R) day. The players' are awarded "Sponsor Points" based upon the amount of cash and pledge donations they solicit. These Sponsor Points can then be used to purchase prizes for the players. These prizes can be anything from an "Authentic 2004 World Series Baseball" (for those members of Red Sox Nation), to Certified Autographed Baseballs (the Cal Ripken, Jr. "Streak" ball is a favorite), to kids equipment such as batting gloves, wristbands, helmets, equipment bags, bats and gloves. The prizes will be distributed to the players at the 2007 Closing Ceremonies on June 16, 2007. In addition to individual donations, the players can also solicit Corporate donations. These donations would be in the form of two types of cash donations. For the first type of donation ($250), the company's logo would printed on the official 2007 Bat-a-Thon® tee shirt that will be distributed to all the participants. For the second type donation ($500), a banner showing the company's logo will be hung in the outfield of one of the various fields at Nike park on Bat-a-thon Day. The Competition: The Bat-a-thon® competition will consist of each player standing at bat and facing 20 pitches from a pitching machine calibrated at a speed appropriate for the level of play. We will use normal "game balls" for the competition. Each player will get one "free" practice pitch that they can hit. If they like their score, they can keep that pitch or they can elect to count the next 20. Points are scored based upon how hard and far their hits go. The points range from "0" for a swing and a miss, to "10" for a hit over the home run fence. Line drives and ground balls will receive points under a scoring system based upon where the ball lands and how far it goes. The Major league players will use the normal home run fences. All the other leagues will have a temporary fence set up based upon their level so that each player will have a legitimate chance to "hit one out". Each player will generate a score based upon the points earned from their 20 at bats. The overall team scores will drive the amount of the donations for those that pledge based upon points.The teams with the highest number of total points will be eligible for the team prizes. In addition, there will be individual awards for the top three scores in each division. These will be awarded at the Closing Day Ceremonies on June 16th. What is Bat-a-thon® Day?
We have scheduled Bat-a-thon Day on the same day as Picture Day so that all of the Great Falls Little League participants, including the Coach-Pitch and T-Ball players will be in attendance. We strongly encourage the younger players in these groups to stay and enjoy the day's experience. These kids represent the future of our program and frankly, they stand to gain the most from the fruits of this type of fund-raising effort in the future. When and Where is Bat-a-thon® Day? Bat-a-thon® Day will be held on Saturday, May 19th at Nike Park. In the event that a rain date is required, that date would be Sunday, May 20th. The competition will be held on Nike Fields #1, #2, and #6. Other activities will be held at locations adjacent to these fields. What will the Bat-a-thon Proceeds Be Used For? The Great Falls Little League Board has put together a very aggressive plan to make the Great Falls Little Program the best that it can be. Our goal is to not only create the best "game experience" for our players, but to create the best "family experience" for the members of our community who support the program at the fields at Nike Park on a regular basis. The players' dues only serve to cover the leagues operating expenses. Without the benefit of fund-raising efforts such as Bat-a-thon, the League cannot afford to improve the overall quality of our facilities to get them to the level that our kids and families deserve. Shortly, you will see the benefits of our previous fund-raising efforts in the form of an upgraded snack shack facility as well as higher quality rest-rooms, new scoreboards, lighted batting cages and upgraded storage facilities. We are also looking into additional landscaping, picnic tables and other amenities around the snack shack area. In the future, we plan to make significant improvements to our playing fields to make them much more weather resistant and ultimately we are working to build permanent facilities for the snack shack, bathroom and storage facilities which will ultimately give us the ability to provide the best experience possible for our players and parents as part of our Little League Program. Why should I Support Bat-a-thon? The Great Falls Little League program is a volunteer program. It is full of parents from our community that have volunteered their time and efforts to try to create a program that we, as a community, can be proud of. We live in a community that can, and should be able to afford to give our children the best experience possible at a time in their lives where they can enjoy the experience of sports competition in a manner that they can enjoy and carry with them for the rest of their lives. Our goal as a program is to help them make this happen. We hope that you will support us in these efforts.
 © 2007 Great Falls Little League, All Rights Reserved
Bat-a-ThonŽ is a service mark owned exclusively by Perpetual Funding Corp.,
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Bat-a-thon Day is the day of the actual Bat-a-thon Competition. We have designed Bat-a-thon Day to be a "carnival-like" event that celebrates our Little Program in a manner that promotes our program as well as the Great Falls Community in general. While the competition will be the highlight, Bat-a-thon Day will also be a day of fun, food and activities for all who attend. In addition to the normal snack, there will be burgers, pizza, subs, sno-cones and other great food offerings. We also plan to have a moon bounce, dunk tanks, speed pitch booths as well as other activities to make the day special.