Aaron Artman grew up playing whiffle ball on a makeshift rectangle field in his Gresham, Oregon, neighborhood.

A ball hit into the trees, the Tacoma Rainier president recalled Tuesday, was a home run unless the opponent could knock it free and catch it in one motion.

“I have some great memories of playing whiffle ball,” Artman said of the variation of baseball that uses a plastic bat and lightweight balls.

Artman hopes a new whiffle ball field at Cheney Stadium will generate similar memories for Tacoma residents.

The Tacoma Rainiers announced Tuesday it is building a 9,670-square-foot park along the first base side of the stadium. The new park, located behind a grass berm, will include a playground for children and the whiffle ball field.

The facility, built in partnership with the Ben B. Cheney Foundation and Metro Parks Tacoma, will be open year-round.

Construction is expected to begin in November and finish in early April in time for the 2016 Rainiers season, Artman said. The park will be built by Tacoma’s Korsmo Construction.

The project is being funded by the team, the foundation and Metro Parks. Artman declined to say how much the park will cost.

“It’s the one area (of Cheney Stadium) that wasn’t really touched during the (2011) renovation,” Artman said. “I think it’s going to be really cool.”

The idea for the whiffle ball park came several years ago when Brad Cheney, president of the Cheney Foundation, attended a Seattle Mariners spring training game in Arizona. He noticed his sons where spending more time playing on a small family baseball field than watching the game.

 

theolympian.com

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