Baseball field gets named after Rizzo
Cubs star donated $150,000 to help get lights for playing fields
PARKLAND — Standing near the pitcher’s mound of his old baseball diamond, Anthony Rizzo recounted how he was cut from the Stoneman Douglas varsity baseball team.
Despite the discouraging demotion to junior varsity, Rizzo did make the Eagles’ varsity squad eventually. He was later drafted by the Boston Red Sox and became a star for the Chicago Cubs.
Now one of Major League Baseball’s top first basemen, Rizzo found a way to give back to his alma mater. The former Douglas star donated $150,000 and helped raise additional funds so the school could install lights for the baseball and softball fields.
On Monday, the school debuted the lights and named the baseball field Anthony Rizzo Field.
“It’s crazy, especially with all that’s happened the last couple of years,” Rizzo said. “But going to school here, growing up here, playing with a lot of really good players that have played at this school and come into this program, and having this named after us is something that I’ve never thought of. To be able to do it is just surreal.”
The lights cost between $400,000 and $500,000 in total, according to former Stoneman Douglas principal Ty Thompson. He said about 50 companies donated money and over 100 people donated different amounts to the project.
“When we started this project back in 2016, it was definitely, obviously, kind of a pie-in-thesky idea,” Thompson said. “And then once Anthony got on board, it kind of got us kick-started. It really took off from there. And the community’s been great. They’ve been talking about lights for a number of years now.”
Rizzo, who was diagnosed with limited state classical Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2008, is no stranger to helping out his community. He pledged a $1 million donation to Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital in 2019 and has hosted his Walk-Off For Cancer charity walk for the last eight years.
“When we decided to do the lights, we wanted to make it nice,” Rizzo said. “We wanted to get the best lights we could, and we’ve got to thank a lot of people who also donated for the baseball field and the softball fields.
Douglas coach Todd Fitz-Gerald, who has coached the Eagles since the 2012 season, said the lights will make things easier for players’ parents and other fans who want to attend games.
“It’s going to really help our parents,” Fitz-Gerald said. “It’s hard to take off work at 3:45 in the afternoon. … The atmosphere, I think, will be really good. I think it will be a great draw for the community to be able to get out here at night, after work hours, and come support us and watch us play.”
The Eagles will get to use their new lights in a game when baseball season begins on Feb. 17.
“Baseball under the lights — there’s nothing better,” Fitz-Gerald said.
Anthony Rizzo and his wife Emily Vakos pose in front of the scoreboard after the debut of Stoneman Douglas’ new baseball field lights on Monday.