Two teachers at Revere High School (RHS) started a new wiffle ball Minuteman Time (MMT) session, receiving a positive response from the student body.
This school year, social studies teachers Eric Browne and Rachel Walgate decided to start a MMT in which students play games of wiffle ball throughout the 24-minute period. Both have experience with the sport, as Browne is the Junior Varsity baseball coach at RHS and Walgate’s son plays competitive wiffle ball.
The administration at RHS encourages teachers to provide activities for students to participate in during MMT, and this school year, Browne had the idea to start a wiffle ball session. He explained why he decided to create it.
“I just think it’s a good opportunity for students to get moving . . . and I just thought it would be something that would interest a few students here,” Browne said.
Browne approached Walgate for help, and she decided to join him. She explained the process that teachers go through to create a new MMT.
“[We talk to] Mr Faris and just say ‘hey can we offer this’ and then [work out] the logistics of how many kids, where can we have it,” Walgate said
Walgate also explained the roles she and Browne play when advising the MMT.
“[Browne has] done the logistics . . . I supply the backstop . . . I’m bringing four of those and then you just use the skinny bats, I’m bringing those,” Walgate said.
Both Walgate and Browne umpire one of the games each. They get the help of two staff members to umpire the other two games going on.
When Walgate and Browne decided to start the MMT, they expected a small number of students to join. Walgate explained what happened instead.
“We have 48 or 49 kids. It was originally 160 signed up, so there’s no way we could have that many. Mr Faris ended up cutting it to juniors and seniors,” she said.
They have had three MMT’s this school year, and by the second, the two teachers had four games up and running. Walgate explained what they did at their first meeting.
“Mr Browne picked eight captains, and then they literally drafted teams,” Walgate said.
Browne and Walgate initially planned for the MMT sessions to be outside but with recent weather difficulties, the event was moved to the main and auxiliary gymnasiums. The two teachers have the gymnasiums split in half, making it so half of a gymnasium is one field. This accommodates their eight different teams.
Walgate gained her knowledge of the sport because of her son. He became interested in wiffle ball recently and found it through social media. There are MLW (Major League Wiffle Ball) accounts on different social media platforms that post videos from their games. Walgate knew that the sport had gained popularity through their social media accounts and thought that some students at Revere would have the same interests as her son.
“[The MLW] gets a lot of followers and a lot of views. YouTube is where people watch it. . . . They drop a video every Friday and it’ll get 100,000 views the next day,” Walgate said.
Walgate talked about why she thinks people are so interested in the sport. At the games, usually there are little to no live fans, so anybody who wants to tune in to the game has to do so through their social media accounts.
“You play three games against the same team, each game is three innings. The first game of the three they live stream on Instagram and then they cut it off. You get sucked in because you want to know who won,” she said.
Some RHS students joined the MMT because they are interested in competitive wiffle ball, but some also just like baseball. One of the captains chosen, Chris Anderson, plays club baseball. He explained why he joined.
“[It] sounded fun and I’m really just in it because it’s wiffle ball and I like wiffle ball,” he said.
Although the sport is similar to baseball, there are still some differences. Browne pointed out that the main differences are the field size, the ball and the fact that there is a backstop behind the batter.
Along with the sport being different from baseball, Browne also had to modify other rules to make it work within their 24-minute period.
“Innings will be going by quickly and the game will be fast compared to a normal baseball game. It’s designed to be very quick. . . . And you can peg a person with the ball to get them out as well as tagging the base and the runner,” Browne said.
Some other rules he implemented include starting with the bases loaded, one inning per game and a series of five second rules. He explained the five second rules he came up with.
“Pitchers have five seconds to deliver the pitch once they receive the ball from the catcher. Catchers have five seconds to retrieve the ball. The next batter has five seconds to be ready after the last play ends. Delays may result in an out or one-base advancement,” Browne said.
There have only been three MMTs so far so Browne says there are still things to work out. He is excited about what this will look like in the future, though.
“I’m looking forward to this. I’m really encouraged by everyone’s reception of it. I think from what I’ve seen so far . . . they’ll be some kinks I’ll have to work out but maybe [by] session two I’ll be rocking and rolling,” Browne said.
Browne and Walgate will continue to have their MMT open to students throughout the rest of the school year. Browne stated that for the next session, they may possibly open it up to students who did not get an opportunity to join this session.
Click HERE for more Lantern coverage on social studies teachers at RHS.
