PLAY BALL Weekend

For the second straight year, the New York Yankees will activate the "Summer Night Lights Program," which will take place in conjunction with Major League Baseball's PLAY BALL initiative.

The program is a partnership between the New York City Police Department's (NYPD) Blue Chips Program, NYC Parks, the New York City Department of Youth & Community Development (DYCD), SCAN-Harbor and is designed to keep area young people engaged in recreation and character-promoting activities on summer evenings.

On Tuesday and Wednesday evenings in July and August, approximately 300 young people from the Bronx between the ages of 12 and 18 will have the opportunity to take part in tournament-style, co-ed baseball and softball games at Elston Gene Howard Field, which is located on the site of the original Yankee Stadium. The nighttime schedule was chosen to supplement the limited number of organized evening activities available to young people during the summer.

Summer Night Lights is a collective effort to encourage youth to engage in baseball-related activities that demonstrate the positive way the game can serve as an outlet for recreation, social responsibility and healthy competition. Additionally, by gathering young individuals from all areas of the Bronx, artificial and territorial boundaries can be shattered in a way meant to bring communities together.

The PLAY BALL initiative is baseball’s collective effort to encourage young people and communities to engage in baseball or softball related activities, including formal leagues, special events and casual forms of play.

PLAY BALL events have become MLB’s signature youth engagement activity during the professional and amateur baseball and softball calendar, especially on key dates throughout MLB’s Championship Season and through the Postseason & World Series. PLAY BALL events demonstrate the positive way the game can serve as an outlet for physical activity, fun with friends and learning how to play the sport at its most basic levels.