11U baseball team adds service component to regimen, donates food to Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank

By Carol Ladwig • January 16, 2018 3:20 pm
Players and coaches of the Wildcat Baseball Club pose for a photo after delivering a donation to the Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank. The players organized the drive to include a community service element to their team involvement. Courtesy Photo
Players and coaches of the Wildcat Baseball Club pose for a photo after delivering a donation to the Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank. The players organized the drive to include a community service element to their team involvement. Courtesy Photo

Playing on the Wildcat Baseball Club in the Snoqualmie Valley is a little different from playing baseball on a more traditional club team. The practices and competitions are there, and the coaching, but there’s also a classroom component to Jeff Gregory’s team, new to the Valley this year, and community service.

“The idea is if you want to be on this team, you have to do more,” Gregory said, discussing his team’s recent donation to the Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank in North Bend.

His goal in starting the team, he said, was “To put together a baseball club that develops the young player as an individual and not just a player that can throw and hit a baseball.”

So his athletes, 10- and 11-year-old boys from the Snoqualmie Valley, “some experienced, some not,” he said, decided that one of their community service projects would be a food drive to support the Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank. On Monday, Jan. 8, the boys and coaches delivered their donation, 277 pounds of food, to the food bank and were given a tour of the facility, from Executive Director Heidi Dukich.

The boys also spend time each week “in the classroom,” usually in the North Bend or Snoqualmie Libraries, discussing baseball theory and history, nutrition, injury prevention and related topics.

The Wildcat Baseball Club is expecting to compete in weekend tournaments this spring and summer.

Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank Executive Director Heidi Dukich gives the Wildcat Baseball Club a tour of the food bank and a briefing on who the food bank serves Jan. 8 when the team delivered a donation from its recently completed food drive. (Courtesy Photo)

Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank Executive Director Heidi Dukich gives the Wildcat Baseball Club a tour of the food bank and a briefing on who the food bank serves Jan. 8 when the team delivered a donation from its recently completed food drive. (Courtesy Photo)