Southwestern Athletic Conference baseball announcer Marque Denmon fills in for the Mariners’ Tom Hutyler, while the Dolls & Gents Drumline and Drill Team of HBCU alumni will perform during player introductions and two-inning breaks. The game starts at 7:42 p.m. in honor of Griffey (No. 7) and Jackie Robinson (whose No. 42 is retired leaguewide).
Even the sponsors took extra steps beyond simply slapping their logo on the event. Presenting sponsor T-Mobile is presenting its T-Mobile Impact Award to a participating athlete for their leadership and community commitment. In early 2024, T-Mobile will host an HBCU Athlete Summit for student-athletes who participated in the Swingman Classic. The event will feature panel discussions, roundtable talks and networking opportunities with T-Mobile HBCU alumni, executive leaders and former student-athletes. They will get to look behind the scenes at T-Mobile corporate facilities and consider careers with the company.
“As a company with a longstanding commitment to [diversity, equity and inclusion] and a longtime partnership with MLB, we’re proud to support this event and MLB’s goal of promoting greater diversity in baseball,” said Mike Katz, president of marketing, innovation and experience at T-Mobile. “Representation matters, and in baseball it’s important to give players a platform to demonstrate their talent on a significant stage like what this event provides.”
Chevrolet is bringing its “Discover the Unexpected” (DTU) partnership with the National Newspaper Publishers Association to the Swingman Classic and giving marketing and journalism fellows from HBCUs a chance to cover the event and interview players. Getty Images, meanwhile, has invited two members of its HBCU photographer mentorship program and one HBCU student photographer to photograph the Classic and other All-Star events for an exhibit showcasing HBCU sports culture.
Griffey, the YDF and the United Negro College Fund of Seattle are prefacing Swingman with an HBCU fair at T-Mobile park featuring recruiters and alumni groups from nine HBCUs and seven Divine Nine fraternities and sororities. While there will be donations to the United Negro College Fund, the Black Play-by-Play Grant and Scholarship Fund, and space for Black-owned vendors, Swingman’s greatest potential lies in its ability to draw attention on the MLB Network and SiriusXM and, eventually, increased funding for HBCU baseball programs from MLB and its partners.
“I am excited to help these kids get the national attention that they don’t receive compared to other college baseball programs,” Griffey said. “College scholarships for baseball are not comparative to other sports, and a lot of families cannot afford to pay the difference. So, this effort is the industry coming together to give these kids an opportunity to play the game they love on the national stage.”