AREA BASEBALL TEAMS PLAY 100-INNING GAME TO BENEFIT JOSH PALMER FUND (2022-05-16)

Southern Tier Sports Report
HORSEHEADS — It was 100 innings of baseball all for a good cause on Saturday as Horseheads, Edison, Notre Dame and Elmira’s baseball teams played in a 100-inning game to benefit the Josh Palmer Fund.

“It’s very special to me, because myself, and many families in the area, we know somebody who has dealt with this disease,” Horseheads varsity coach Jeff LImoncelli said. “It’s important for kids to put things in perspective. We get to play the game we love and at the same time help somebody in our community.”

For the 100-inning game they use a pitching machine and it’s one swing per batter and they rotate it so each team does five innings at a time, three-outs with the one swing per at-bat. The game takes about three or four hours to play.

“It goes pretty quickly with the pitching machine and one pitch,” Limoncelli said. “A regular baseball game we’d probably be out there 10 hours. It works out great, it’s efficient. Josh Palmer does a great job helping us out, getting t-shirts for the kids and pizzas at the end of the day.”

This year’s 100-inning game was the first time it’s happened in a couple of years because of Covid. Even though Horseheads varsity played in the STAC Tournament that day, they started the day at the 100-inning game and then the JV did a lot of the playing for Horseheads.

The whole thing started about 10 years ago as the Josh Palmer Fund Holiday Basketball Tournament was having a lot of success and the baseball teams wanted to get involved as well.

“W wanted to do something with our game,” Limoncelli said. “Basketball does a great job and raises so much money. We though of a 100-inning baseball game, its’ fun for all the kids and we are able to get donations. It actually has worked out great. We had some years where rain put a damper on things and obviously we hadn’t don a couple of years with Covid, so it’s nice to have it back. The whole idea is to raise money for families that struggle with medical bills, with the necessities. All the money goes to the Falck Center to help families in need.”
——
PROVIDED PHOTO