End-of-Year Summary!
Thanks to everyone for your support this season! We set new records across the board for almost every trackable metric – stats below, for those who also like #softballmath. I also included photos and results from the raffles and giveaways we hosted this season, so I hope you enjoy the summary!
Play Ball, Y’all!
Ryan Mentock
Commissioner
Softball
Including both Spring and Summer, we had 579 registrations and 34 teams hosted for softball, both are all-time league records. We broke the number of teams record by accident because I forgot how to count, but we at least proved that an 18-team league could work and set up a long-awaited promotion/relegation system to make games a bit more competitive. I’m excited to see everyone back on the field next season!
Cornhole
Our weekly Cornhole league hosted 24 nightly tournaments, averaging ~16 players per tournament. We have attracted some great players and groups from a large pool of amazing players in North Carolina, leading to some great matches! We’ll be playing some games indoors this Winter for the first time, so check out the flyer below if you want to play soon!
Wiffle Ball
Our first season of Wiffle Ball was a success – we raised almost $1,000 from hosting Wiffle Ball for Miracle League of the Triangle! We played more than 40 games at the beautiful Durham location for Miracle League and had over 50 people play our games. The league’s donations will allow us to begin sponsoring a second Miracle League team in 2025, so we’ll be proud to have two teams soon!
Andy Mills won the 2024 Durham Softball Blanket Raffle! The 6’x6′ blanket was made of extra / discontinued softball jerseys from previous seasons and featured 16 colors and charity designs. The blanket cost about $120 to create and we sold 50 tickets at $5/each, raising ~$130 in total.
Play NC sponsored the Durham Avengers, a team of disabled veterans from the Durham VA who competed in the 2024 National Wheelchair Games! We started by sponsoring their softball team, but ended up sponsoring all of their sports because the field we reserved was perfect for everyone to practice. Our league’s sponsorship paid for the team’s jerseys, practice field reservations, and equipment. The team came home with 10 medals, overall, including a gold, silver and bronze in Cornhole and Disc Golf. Total Donation: ~$850.
Play NC sponsored the North Carolina Air-Medical Assocation’s Battle of the Blades, a charity softball tournament between different branches of the air-medical community in the Triangle. Our sponsorship was mostly with loaned equipment, advice, and promotions, so it only really cost some time to support a really cool event at the Durham Athletic Park!
Play NC sponsored the All-American Women’s Baseball Classic, a 3-day tournament at the DBAP that featured the best women’s baseball players in the world. Our community sponsorship cost $750 and we were able to sell 50 of the free tickets that came with the sponsorship to raise extra funds for South Durham Little League and Miracle League of the Triangle. Total Donation: ~$750 to AAWBC and $500 to SDLL/Miracle.
Play NC hosted three donation drives, collecting 30 box fans for Meals on Wheels, 340 pounds of food for PORCH-Durham, and >$700 cash / ~$500 in doggie items for Vets to Vets United. Thanks to all of our players for donating physical items to these great causes!
2024 Final Donation Standings
During the softball season, teams earn $1 per run scored and bonuses for coming in the Top 3 or winning playoff games. Forget wins and losses – these are the standings that matter the most!
| SPRING | SUMMER | EARNED | |
| Crayons2Calculators | $202 | $626 | $828 |
| SDLL | $593 | $129 | $722 |
| Housing for New Hope | $265 | $376 | $641 |
| Meals on Wheels | $289 | $136 | $425 |
| Miracle League | $272 | $136 | $408 |
| Families Moving Forward | $106 | $227 | $333 |
| Vets to Vets United | $214 | $108 | $322 |
| Don’t Waste Durham | $133 | $173 | $306 |
| Play NC | $155 | $137 | $292 |
| APS of Durham | $96 | $176 | $272 |
| Urban Ministries of Durham | $115 | $129 | $244 |
| Girls on the Run | $160 | $83 | $243 |
| CPCANC | $101 | $116 | $217 |
| NCCADV | $149 | $59 | $208 |
| PORCH-Durham | $83 | $58 | $141 |
| TreesDurham | $29 | $106 | $135 |
| Senior PharmAssist | $54 | $37 | $91 |
| Josh’s Hope | $29 | $65 | $94 |
| NCFFF | $29 | $37 | $66 |
| SwingPals | $29 | $37 | $66 |
| TOTAL | $3,103 | $2,958 | $6,054 |
We also gave away bonuses during donation drives ($100), distributed tickets to the AAWBL ($500), played wiffle ball ($1,069), sold lemonade and cookies ($363), and paid for rainouts that canceled games ($400). These extra activities supplemented an additional $2,462 to the team’s on-field performances.
After rounding up for our sponsored APS of Durham Kennel, a second Miracle League team, and a second SDLL team, covered mostly from proceeds from our weekly cornhole league ($1,903), we’re up to $10,409!
If you also include our sponsorships of the Durham Avengers, Battle of The Blades, and the All-American Women’s Baseball Classic that we’ve already paid out this season, Play NC helped local bat-and-ball sports with another $1,600 in donations, for a total of $12,009 donated in 2024!
Thank you to everyone who played a game with us this year for your contributions!