“Wanna have a catch?” Hundreds of people gathered at a New Jersey ballfield to toss a ball and maybe break a record, all in memory of Yogi Berra.
ESPN said those taking the field ranged from children, Little League teams, former MLB players and even local politicians, all for the simple pleasure of tossing baseballs to each other at Yogi Berra Stadium at Montclair State University.
It was called “Yogi’s Big Catch,” the MLB said.
“Yogi loved bringing people together,” former Yankees player and coach Willie Randolph said. “He made everyone feel like they’re family. He would have been ecstatic. I think he’s looking down on this field and is so proud.”
The day on the field took place on Monday, the day before the anniversary of his death and the anniversary of his MLB debut.
The group had to have more than 972 pairs of people to beat the record set in Illinois eight years ago.
And Little Falls, New Jersey, delivered, crushing the record with 1,179 pairs of players tossing their baseballs on the field, ESPN reported, some coming to the town from as far away as California, Florida, Washington state and North Carolina.
“I talked to people from Florida, from Seattle, from North Carolina,” Lindsay Berra, Yogi’s oldest grandchild, said after the event, according to MLB. “People flew in to come play catch with us, which is pretty cool. [There were] 50-somethings here with their 80-something-year-old parents. Lots of little kids, obviously, and it’s just really cool to see so many generations out here just doing something that we all love. We all love playing baseball, we all love having a catch, and we don’t do it nearly enough.”
Other members of Yogi’s family were there too -- his sons, Larry, Tim and Dale. Yogi’s Hall of Fame plaque was driven more than 200 miles from Cooperstown, New York, to the event, ESPN reported. It was the first time the plaque left the Hall of Fame since Berra was inducted in 1972.
There were only a couple of rules - no rolling the ball, no looking at your phone, no selfies, no TikTok posts, the MLB said. It didn’t matter if the balls were thrown overhand or underhand, just that they were tossed. Only eight pairs of people broke the rules and were not counted, according to Guinness adjudicator Michael Empric.
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