OTTAWA-Baseball Canada is pleased to announce that Carillon Minor Baseball (Manitoba) is the 18th minor baseball association in Canada to become RBI Approved (Reaching Baseball Ideals).
Carillon is the fifth minor baseball association in Manitoba to achieve the designation joining Red River Valley, Winnipeg South, North Winnipeg and St. James Assiniboia.
“We believe Baseball Canada, Baseball Manitoba and Carillon Minor Baseball have improved baseball for our young athletes,” said association president Louis Cote. “To be able to get recognized by our governing bodies goes a long way to showing our representation how well things are going as well as some outstanding public relations opportunities to get more kids involved in sport and baseball.”
Carillon Minor Baseball is in its 27th year of existence and sees somewhere in the neighbourhood of 700 registrants each season.
In addition to Mr. Cote, local volunteers Alex Grenier, Curtis Smith and Jeremy Culleton were largely responsible for pushing the association to become RBI Approved.
“Carillon Minor Baseball Association has worked to put initiatives in place that Baseball Canada and Baseball Manitoba have endorsed as well as start our own initiatives in our region while sharing results with Baseball Manitoba,” explained Cote. “This shared respect made it a natural fit to apply for the ‘RBI Approved’ certification.
“We believe becoming RBI Approved will cause our numbers to improve as a result of the positive attention that comes with the designation,” he said. “(Hopefully) people in the area will get to see the great product we have available and the opportunities that are available locally and provincially in baseball.”
A component of becoming RBI Approved is implementing the Rally Cap program into an association’s development system. Carillon Minor Baseball instituted Rally Cap in 2008 and has taken things a step further by offering Baseball Canada’s Grand Slam program.
The link between these programs and an increase in registration numbers is a sign that the programs are having an impact at the grassroots level.
“The numbers from Rally Cap to Grand Slam were 237 registrations in 2008 and last year (2012) we had 347 kids registered,” added Cote. “More and more communities have been offering Rally Cap each year.”
To find out more about the RBI Program and how your association can become RBI Approved please click the link below:
