Huge Success for Dirk and Heroes Celebrity Baseball Game

For the last 13 years, celebrities come together for one night in a friendly game of baseball.

Former-Dallas Stars center Mike Modano first started the event, but for the last three years, that has shifted to Dallas Mavericks forward Dirk Nowitzki.

Nowitzki and more than 40 celebs played on June 21 in Frisco’s Dr. Pepper Ballpark. Each team was divided into a White Sox team and a Blue Sox team.

Nowitzki led the White team as the game was in Frisco for the first time.

The Heroes Charity Celebrity Baseball game was sponsored by Baylor Medical Center. The event benefits the children’s charities of the Dirk Nowitzki Foundation and the Heroes Foundation, established by Mavs owner Mark Cuban.

Some other stars included, from the Mavs, Shane Larkin, Devin Harris, Monta Ellis, and Bernard James. Tyler Seguin represented the Stars. Former players included Michael Young, Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez, Eddie Najera, Brian Cardinal, Ben Grieve, Terrell Owens, Michael Finley, Vernon Wells. Jason Garrett, Tony Romo, Jason Witten and Dez Bryant from the Cowboys was also there. The Jet, Jason Terry, was also in attendance, which included almost 9,200 people, first time the event has sold out.

Non-athletes included Dallas radio men Jeff “Skin” Wade and Ben Rogers, and TV star Josh Henderson of Dallas.

Nowitzki, who batted third, singled in his first at-bat, but finished the run to first going backward and almost was thrown out from the outfield. He would advance to second on Young’s hit and barely came home safe after Harris’ double.

It seemed as if the White team had the game in the bag after scoring five in the bottom of the first, but the Blue team put up eight in the second.

In between the first and second, there was a homerun derby, which included Young and Dirk. Young was able to homer once. In between other innings, Rick Carlisle grabbed sticks and joined the Mavs drumline.

Dirk and Cardinal joined some young cheerleaders in a little competition in between other innings. Dirk tried his best to do the moves, but did end up with the best move of the night when he held a little girl over his head on top of his hands for the picture-perfect ending.

Dirk and the White team scored in every inning except the fifth, but trailed 12-10 after the fourth when the Blue team scored four more in the top of the inning.

Blue put up another three runs in the sixth to take a 15-10 lead, but the White team wasn’t done yet.

Nowitzki would single up the middle again in his final at-bat.

The White team scored seven in the sixth after Cardinal’s bases-clearing double. Nowitzki and Cardinal were named co-MVPs.

With two on and one out in the seventh, which was the final inning, Wells was up to the plate looking to tie or take the lead. With the leftfield wall sitting at 364 feet, Wells hit a bomb, but it landed 363 feet for the out, scoring Larkin from third. On the throw home, the runner on second tried advancing to third on the tag, but was ruled out for the final play of the game.

Nowitzki’s team won 17-16 as it was the Big German’s first win in the event.

With 33 runs, the teams combine to have 40 hits.

It was a blast and everyone had fun.