When the Jr. Rolling Twins play softball they check to make sure their parents -- and oncoming traffic -- are watching them. The wheelchair softball team has gotten used to cars buzzing in and out of the parking lot in Brooklyn Park where they practice.
If you build it, they will roll
The Jr. Rolling Twins wheelchair softball team may be playing in a parking lot now, but that could change soon.
By HANNAH GRUBER, Star Tribune

"They see something is going on but they just don't care to stop or avoid going," said Mark Braun, 16. "It is a parking lot, but it is also a field that we are allowed to use."
Not only can all the cars gong in and out of the parking lot between the Community Activity Center and the city library disrupt practice, but the vehicles and the playing field's hard surface also can pose a very real danger.
"When you crash [onto the pavement] you kind of get scared and you're seeing [bodies and wheelchairs] fly into the air and into the gravel. I mean, I've done it myself a couple of times," Braun said.
With any luck, the Jr. Rolling Twins, who play in a Courage Center recreation program, could be headed for much more compatible digs. The Minnesota Twins are helping them out. The Twins are advocating for the Jr. Rolling Twins' need for a new field by competing for $200,000 from the Pepsi Refresh Project, which is giving away millions of dollars toward ideas that "refresh" communities. The project calls for Major League Baseball teams to promote an idea that benefits a community in some way. People vote online (www.mlb.com/pepsi) and the idea with the most votes wins the money. The Twins are competing against 14 other Major League Baseball teams, whose ideas include building community parks, teaching young people about cancer and planting an urban garden to feed the poor. In the Twins' case, that idea is a new ballpark for the Jr. Rolling Twins.
"I think the great thing the Twin Cities has over other cities is that it is more of a tighter- knit community where people get on board to support something like this,"said Mike Bauler, the Courage Center recreation coordinator for the team.
A new field could do wonders for the team, providing benches, awnings, a scoreboard and fencing -- not to mention a dugout. Then players wouldn't have to deal with the parking lot's uneven ground, the gravel that gets caught in their wheels and cracked pavement, to say nothing of the traffic and hard pavement hazards.
"There are kids who don't have the ability to move their legs, so when they fall they have to wait for assistance," Braun said. "On a rubberized or specialized field they could probably do it themselves because the field is set up to help them get up."
The Jr. Rolling Twins, aged 7 to 18, began playing in the parking lot eight years ago with eight players. Now, the team has grown to 24 kids competing against up to eight other teams from Milwaukee, Chicago and Nebraska in national tournaments at the end of each summer.
Adult wheelchair leagues have been around for more than 20 years, but a competitive junior league is a new concept. Sure, there's the Miracle League of Minnesota -- a baseball league for young people with disabilities -- but they focus on participation more than competition, said Mark's mother, Claire Braun.
To join the Jr. Rolling Twins, players must be wheelchair-bound and have a drive to win. The players include amputees and those who have cerebral palsy, spina bifida, paralysis, sacral agenesis and stroke damage. Both adult and junior teams use the parking lot.
The team may not have its own field, but that hasn't stopped players from competing. After winning their first game ever last year, the team will participate at this year's national tournament in Chicago this weekend.
"We better win [at nationals] because our major league team got a new field so I think we have a good chance too," said 12-year-old Diggy Bika.
Voting for the new field ends Aug. 17. Either way, the young people will continue to play, whether it's at a new ball field or the community center parking lot.
"At least we have a field. It might not be ideal, but it's something," said Claire Braun. "We're all patient. Rome wasn't built in a day."
Hannah Gruber • 612-673-4864
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HANNAH GRUBER, Star Tribune
The pilot was the only person inside the plane, and was not injured in the emergency landing, according to the State Patrol.