Have a Guide or Service dog?
Read and identify if you can obtain a free eye exam during the month of May for your companion.
Read here for information about free eye exam for guide or service dogs.
Beep: Inside the Unseen World of Baseball for the Blind
On March 5, David Wanczyk released the much-anticipated book, “Beep: Inside the Unseen World of Baseball for the Blind”.
In Beep, David Wanczyk illuminates the sport of blind baseball to show us a remarkable version of America’s pastime. With balls tricked out to squeal three times per second, and with bases that buzz, this game of baseball for the blind is both innovative and intense. And when the best beep baseball team in America, the Austin Blackhawks, takes on its international rival, Taiwan Homerun, no one’s thinking about disability. What we find are athletes playing their hearts out for a championship.
Wanczyk follows teams around the world and even joins them on the field to produce a riveting inside narrative about the game and its players. Can Ethan Johnston, kidnapped and intentionally blinded as a child in Ethiopia, find a new home in beep baseball, and a spot on the all-star team? Will Taiwan’s rookie MVP Ching-kai Chen—whose superhuman feats on the field have left some veterans suspicious—keep up his incredible play? And can Austin’s Lupe Perez harness his competitive fire and lead his team to a long-awaited victory in the beep baseball world series?
“Wanczyk gets it—that disability is a cultural formation and not a defect. The book offers a great example (much in the manner of early Tom Wolfe) of entering a relatively unknown and essentially closed world and making it entirely compelling and fully realizable for the general reader. It’s unusual, witty, and quite needed.” —Stephen Kuusisto, author of Planet of the Blind
If you haven’t taken time to read the book, do yourself a favor and grab a copy on Amazon, on Apple iBooks, or as an audiobook on Audible.
Don’t forget: When buying through Amazon, you can always donate a portion of your purchase to the NBBA through Amazon Smile. See more details on Amazon Smile here.
Question: What did you think about Wanczyk’s “Beep” book? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below.
The stories behind the beep
There’s a lot to love about this game of ours.
You know, the adrenaline you feel as you smash a ball deep into the outfield and start barreling toward the base? Or that unbelievable feeling you have as you dive to snag a ball that would be all but gone if you hadn’t left your feet at the right second?
For those who are new, those who have played for decades or those who just love to watch the great game of beep baseball, we’re wanting to do more to use this space to showcase the talents and triumphs of our league.
In the coming weeks, you’ll see new and exciting content on NBBA.org. With a mix of audio, video and the written word, we want to capture and share the amazing and impactful stories behind the beep.
If you love this game as much as we do, consider sharing your story or passing along the name of someone who you think might be interested in sharing their own. You can send email to web@nbba.org to touch base with our Web Team..
Here’s to an awesome 2018 season. Let’s play ball!