Taking the Pepsi Refresh Challenge with the Oakland A's

15 Seconds of Your Time Can Make a Huge Difference
for Underserved Kids In Northern California

Major League Baseball and the Pepsi Company have joined forces to design a very special charity fundraiser - the MLB Pepsi Refresh Challenge. For this event 15 Major League Baseball teams identified a local charity they would like to see supported. The Oakland Athletics selected the Alameda East Bay Miracle League as their cause.

The Alameda East Bay Miracle League is a small, grassroots, non-profit with the dream of revitalizing a dilapidated, neglect neighborhood baseball field into a beautiful, adapted, multiuse sports field accessible by the thousands of special needs youth in communities surrounding the Oakland and the Bay Area. The new field will be called Miracle Park and host a baseball league for differently-abled children. Seniors, adults with special needs, and disabled veterans will be encouraged to use the park as well.

National publicity for the first Miracle League field in Northern California begins with the All Star Game, July 13th. The public votes for their local team or favorite cause and the 'team' with the most votes collected before August 18th earns $200,000 for their identified organization.

Currently there are thousands of children in the San Francisco Bay Area with disabilities significant enough to limit their access to parks, athletic fields, and team sports. These are youth, like middle-schooler Nicholas Simpson of Alameda, who cheer for siblings’ sports teams, but never have a chance to join a team themselves. Nicholas's Mom, Helen points out, "We have a national campaign to encourage increased physical activity and decreasing obesity – let's not forget ALL the children in our communities need to be active."

According to special educator and founder of this Miracle League, Roberta Rockwell, Bay Area communities are doing a good job of including special needs students in our schools, but outside of the school it's a different story. "Access to a field is more than just playing a game," Rockwell explains, "everyone, especially professional baseball players, understand the life-long sense of accomplishment, teamwork and competitive fellowship that team sports offers."

The Alameda East Bay Miracle League and the Oakland A's believe all children deserve a place to play, and want to provide opportunities for the differently-abled youth of the San Francisco Bay Area to participate in team sports. In the MLB Pepsi Refresh Challenge every vote for the A's is a vote for Miracle League.

You can vote by online by visiting mlb.com/pepsiRefresh or by using your mobile phone to text "Athletics" to 76462. Each person can vote once every day between July 13 and August 18. We're counting on you to make the Alameda East Bay Miracle field a reality!

Help make our GOAL
a REALITY!

Be sure to VOTE for
Alameda EB Miracle League in the
Pepsi Refresh Baseball Challenge!

Nicholas at the Oakland A's fan appreciation game.