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Accessibility is key idea in design of new ballpark

Youngsters with special needs now can come out to play

Charley Able, Rocky Mountain News

Published April 3, 2006 at midnight

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LAKEWOOD - When teams step onto Jason Jennings Adaptive Field this spring, they will open the first baseball season on a new diamond that levels the playing field for youngsters with special needs.

Jennings Field, the latest in a long line of youth baseball parks built with the support of Colorado Rockies stars, is designed for accessibility.

The $380,000 ballpark features a rubberized surface to accommodate players in wheelchairs, those unsteady on their feet and other potential sluggers whose physical challenges make the opportunity to play organized sports a miracle of sorts.

The Mile High Miracle League will begin spring season play April 22 at the facility nestled among several traditional baseball fields at Foothills Park and Recreation District's Schafer Athletic Complex, 9750 W. Hampden Ave.

The league also plans to field teams for a fall season.

The league got its start nearly two years ago when Lisa and Roger Koenigsberg, of Greenwood Village, saw a televised account of a Miracle League ballfield in Conyers, Ga.

The program inspired the couple, who decided to ensure that Denver-area youngsters had the same opportunity to play.

When Lisa Koenigsberg contacted the group that operates the Conyers ballpark, she discovered that a number of other Colorado residents wanted to start a league here.

After putting together a core group of supporters, the couple contacted the Colorado Rockies and Jennings. The veteran pitcher readily adopted the idea.

"For me it's a way to give these kids a chance to play the game that everybody loves to play," Jennings said. "These kids have some challenges in life, some disabilities that don't allow them on a normal field with a majority of kids in this country and in Colorado. This gives them a field to call their own and to enjoy doing what everybody else gets to do."

Jennings will throw out the first pitch to open the league's first season when the field is dedicated.

The adaptive field was completed last year and its first event was a baseball clinic for the soon-to-be baseball players, some of whom had never before hefted a bat or caught a ball.

Within a week, the field's first, and so far only game, followed to the delight of the fledgling league's rookies.

"If you saw their faces and the smiles, it was worth every moment spent on the project," Lisa Koenigsberg said.

"The first day we had the clinic, I had to walk off the field in tears because there are absolutely no words to describe the faces of these children and the sense of accomplishment that you could see in their faces," she said.

After the field is dedicated, the Miracle League's teams will square off for the first league-sanctioned games. Each team will play six games this season.

Nearly three dozen aspiring ball players have signed up, but other youngsters can join the Miracle League anytime. No one will be turned away.

"If they come, even on the day of a game, they will play," said Roger Koenigsberg, who gives his wife the lion's share of credit for pursuing the project.

The Miracle League's teams are noncompetitive groups. Every player gets into the lineup in every game. All bat and reach base in every inning. The last batter in each inning gets a "home run."

The players will be charged a $45 registration fee, but the league offers financial assistance to make sure no one is left out.

"If the families do not have the money, we provide the money. Nobody is turned down, period," Roger Koenigsberg said.

Other young players, who haven't faced such monumental challenges in their lives, will serve as mentors and on-field "buddies" for the league's players.

"Each kid has a buddy with them, so they are not by themselves. Each kid gets an able-bodied adult or child to work with them, to protect them in the field and also to help them play to the best of their ability - not to play for them, but to help them," Lisa Koenigsberg said. "I think it is a wonderful experience for both."

More information

• Contact the Mile High Miracle League at

• To register a child for league play, contact Kevin Brown at Foothills Park and Recreation District, kevinb@fhprd.org, orcall 303-409-2610.

or 303-892-5020