Arkansas Kickball! Not Child’s Play – Fun, Serious, Social & Sharing

As part of our effort to provide a place for sporting life Arkansans to build a community around all aspects of what sporting life is in our state, we are happy to announce that we are the official home for news, information and fun of the Little Rock Kickball Association and the Northwest Arkansas Kickball League.

When you mix part rock -n-roll, with sporting event, intense competition, some beer, and big hearts, you get the Little Rock Kickball Association and the Northwest Arkansas Kickball League. Membership in Little Rock’s league eclipses 2,000 and in Northwest Arkansas, there are more than 500 members. These people make up teams and divisions who gather in parks on dedicated fields of play every week for several weeks in the spring (March-May) and again in the fall (Aug.-Oct.) to play hard, have fun and do good through community service and fundraising.

From the Little Rock Kickball Association website:

Do not forget that we are also community minded and that we have our own 501 (c)3, The Big Red Ball Charitable Foundation. Through that organization, we have made almost $300,000 in cash and in-kind donations to local charities serving animals and children including Hearts and Hooves, Youth Home, Our House, Big Brothers and Big Sisters, CASA, Pfeifer Youth Camp, and the Little Rock Animal Shelter.

Our calendar is full of events with charity in mind!

Our motto: “If you do good, good things happen…”

Speaking of fundraising, the Little Rock Kickball Association is hosting its Chili with a Kick chili cook-off competition on February 16, 2013.

The event benefits Youth Home.

This coming year will be a very special year for the LRKA as they celebrate 20 seasons (10 years) of kickball in Little Rock. With that in mind, they are  launching “The 20/20 Vision for the LRKA” in which members of the league will undertake 20 community service projects in an effort to do 20 acts of good for the community in gratitude for 20 seasons of kickball.

The LRKA’s goal will be to identify projects and causes that touch on as many issues as possible including poverty, housing, health, children, animals, LGBT, the elderly, the environment, education and others so that  members can each find a cause or two dear to their hearts to get involved with.

At the completion of this year-long effort, the association will also identify the LRKA Volunteer of the Year. This person will win a special award to be named in honor of Christa Stramel-Wilson. She was a member of the LRKA family from the first day and was one of the group’s most energetic angels who helped shape the giving nature of the LRKA.

And not to be outdone, the Northwest Arkansas Kickball League has raised more than $10,000 and more than 6,000 pounds of food during their annual Springdale Animal Shelter drives over the past three years.

Some important notes regarding both kickball associations: Registration for Central Arkansas teams is Feb. 8, 2013 and league play begins March 3. Registration in Northwest Arkansas ends March 1, and play begins March 10.

The Northwest Arkansas league plays its games on Sundays after 12 p.m. at J.B. Hunt Park in Springdale. The Little Rock kickballers play Sundays on the softball fields at Interstate Park in Little Rock.

As part of the fun, we have installed  a message board for the two leagues. Be sure and register so you can participate in the message board fun!

These boards are intended to build community among members of the leagues, be a forum for fun, taunting, and an easy way for organizers of the leagues to communicate with their members. They are moderated and administered by kickball leaders and we look forward to watching these big-hearted, fun-loving, highly competitive people share their sporting life with Arkansas.

Below is a documentary about the Little Rock Kickball Association showing you just how much fun this sport is for its members and fans. What are you sporting, Arkansas? For some of us, it’s kickball!