Another charity softball tournament to be held. This time the cause is the “war” against the Alzheimer’s disease. The competition is named “Miriam Burnette Memorial Softball tournament”. There are lots of local softball teams, which are going to take part in the competition.
This will be the fifth edition of the charity tournament. The competition is called after the chairman’s mother, who has died of Alzheimer’s disease 4 years ago after fighting it for 6 years. The chairman of the tournament, Darron Burnette, told that he was helped by his friend (Chandler Dennard), who has already had a softball tournament and then just renamed it in Marion’s honour. Dennard used to call the competition “Bulloch Bash”, but he decided to help his friend Darron Burnette.
In the very beginning of the organization of the tournament, there have been 6 teams. But, now there are 14 softball teams to take part in the competition.
To continue with, such an initiative is a great opportunity to be raise the awareness of such diseases. The growth of the tournament has attracted several sponsors, who have donated much more money for the cause.
Thanks to the main sponsors – Southeast Roofing Solutions and Southern Manner, the chairman has reached his goal of $20 000. The sponsorship was necessary, because the tickets hardly paid the cost for renting the softball facilities. The total amount Burnette has collected is $250 000 for the last year. He is going to use the money for a new Alzheimer’s research.
The teams to take part in the competition are mainly schools. And this tournament will be very helpful for the players, who can play in competitive games before the start of the season. Moreover, the coaches of the teams have been touched by the initiative, because all of them know people, who is suffering from the disease. They are also causing a great support to the chairman!
The tournament is going to last 2 days. The local high school teams will be 4, while there will also be lots of high school teams from the neighboring counties. For example, there will be teams of Pinewood, Bryan County, Vidalia, Gatewood and so on.