{"id":699,"date":"2017-03-28T00:10:33","date_gmt":"2017-03-28T04:10:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/?p=699"},"modified":"2017-03-28T00:10:33","modified_gmt":"2017-03-28T04:10:33","slug":"tr-east-little-league-to-host-opening-day-parade-this-weekend-honor-challenger-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/2017\/03\/tr-east-little-league-to-host-opening-day-parade-this-weekend-honor-challenger-league\/","title":{"rendered":"TR East Little League to Host Opening Day Parade This Weekend, Honor Challenger League"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Toms

Toms River East Little League<\/p><\/div>\n

T<\/span>oms River East Little League\u2019s Opening Day is this Saturday, April 1, and this year the league will pay a special tribute to its Challenger Division, a division where\u00a0special needs children can participate.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Parade starting at 10 a.m. at the East Dover First Aid Squad located at Garfield and\u00a0Third Avenue.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s theme is celebrating \u201c25 Years of TRELL\u2019S Challenger Division.\u201d TRELL is the only little league out of all other leagues that comprise District 18 that allows for the township\u2019s handicapped and other physically or developmentally\u00a0challenged players to be able to learn about, as well as play baseball with a \u201cbuddy system.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

The games are under the Direction of longtime Director Jim Kelly.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMr. Kelly\u2019s dedication and stewardship of this division enables approximately 75 boys and girls each season to have an active part in playing and learning about sportsmanship and baseball. Without Mr. Kelly and his tireless efforts and dedication this would not be possible,\u201d an announcement of the event from the league said. \u201cWe are grateful to Mr. Kelly and his steadfast dedication to the \u2018Challenger cause\u2019 of the Toms River East Little League!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In the winter of 1993, Toms River residents Nick Lilly and Kelly were\u00a0brought together after both had expressed interest to Jackson Holbrook Little\u00a0League representatives about developing a Challenger baseball program.\u00a0Jackson had just completed their first season of Challenger and Jim had been\u00a0out to Jackson to observe the games. Nick was on the board of directors at\u00a0Toms River East Little League (TRELL) and Jim was the parent of a disabled son\u00a0and along with TRELL coach, John Wnek, they decided to bring Challenger\u00a0baseball to TRELL.<\/p>\n

Completely supported by local sponsors, TRELL Challenger has had the same\u00a0sponsors for most of the division\u2019s existence. Locally, the division is supported\u00a0by the Toms River Elks, Jersey Iron Motorcycle Club, Toms River Post Office\u00a0Employees, Berkeley Pallets and New Jersey Natural Gas Company. The division\u00a0has never charged a player a registration fee and all donations directly support\u00a0the players uniforms and activities. The program has averaged around 65\u00a0players on 4 junior teams and 2 senior teams. Senior teams developed based\u00a0upon the interest of several players who wanted to continue their involvement\u00a0with Challenger as they grew older. A few players have been playing since the\u00a0inception of TRELL Challenger<\/p>\n

TRELL Challenger is also completely supported by volunteers, who, from\u00a0buddies to team moms, to the coaches and buddy leaders, make the games\u00a0possible.<\/p>\n

<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Toms River East Little League\u2019s Opening Day is this Saturday, April 1, and this year the league will pay a special tribute to its Challenger Division, a division where\u00a0special needs children can participate. The Parade starting at 10 a.m. at the East Dover First Aid Squad located at Garfield and\u00a0Third Avenue. This year\u2019s theme is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":700,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,2],"tags":[271,11],"class_list":["post-699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-toms-river-life","tag-toms-river-east-little-league","tag-toms-river-nj-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/Screen-Shot-2017-03-28-at-12.09.26-AM.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/tomsriver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}