Baseball at Walt Anderson Field
Friday May 14 thru Sunday May 16, 2021
David Hick, a Rippey native and East Greene High School alumni (class of 1984) grew up playing baseball at the Rippey Ballpark, now called the Walt Anderson Field. He currently plays baseball on the Twins team of the Mid Iowa Baseball League 48+ division in the Des Moines area.
One of David’s teammates, Bruce Thome, has attended the Minnesota Twins Fantasy Camp in Florida and has several contacts with folks in Minnesota. Last fall the Twins of the Mid Iowa League drove to Minneapolis to play the Brooklyn Center Dodgers and Crystal Cubs on a Saturday. After the games the players all sat in the parking lot and determined that they would like to keep the tradition going of an early spring game. Since Minnesota is still cold in the spring, they said they wanted to come south. So, we said “Let’s make it happen”. David said that we should play in Rippey as the Rippey Baseball Commissioner, Mel Murken was maintaining the field, so a tournament plan was established.
The weekend after Mother’s Day was selected as that is before all the graduation parties are held, and well as before the regular season begins. The plans were put into motion and hopefully Mother Nature will supply us with plenty of sunshine for the boys of summer. Joining the Urbandale Twins in Rippey, the Crystal Cubs, South Dakota Jackalopes and one more Twin Cities team will compete in the Rippey Tournament.
We will have a full slate of baseball scheduled starting at 6:00 P.M. on Friday night with two games under the lights. On Saturday there will be four games starting at 10:00 A.M., 12:30 P.M., 3:00 P.M. and 5:30 P.M. Sunday is scheduled to start at 10:00 A.M. and 12:30 P.M. Games will be scheduled for a two-hour time limit but may go over if in the middle of an inning.
Come on out and see baseball in Rippey. The concession stand will be open for favorite ballpark food and drink with all proceeds going to the Friends of Rippey for continued ball park improvements.
This is just the beginning as all season long, teams from Mid Iowa Baseball will be bringing games to Rippey. Schedules for those dates are still in the planning stages.
Let’s PLAY BALL!!!