On Wednesday morning in suburban Barrington, the Kiddie Cubs took on the Wee White Sox at a beautiful new diamond in a backyard.
According to ABC7's Frank Mathie, it was a game filled with the sound of wiffle.
As summer begins, the trees are full and in the backyard it's the sound of the crack of plastic on plastic. In a ball diamond in a backyard in Barrington, it's a wiffle ball field that brings the big leagues to little sluggers. It's the lifelong dream of Michael Goodman.
"When we were kids we used to play wiffle ball and we had a lot of fun and we always wanted a real field to play in. So I thought I had the opportunity to let my kids play in a real field in our back yard," said Michael Goodman.
Goodman, a landscape architect and father of four sons, built his field for little wiffle wiffers. The field consists of 30 foot base paths, on-deck circles for the batters, a pitcher's mound and everything else that carves out a diamond from the rough.
"I really like it. It's really fun," said Keaton Goodman, Michael's 10-year-old son.
Keaton and his friends play ball whenever two or more kids show up. On Wednesday, it was the Cubs against the White Sox. Both sides won.
Ten-year-old Megan Whitman admits what she'd be doing if she weren't playing wiffle ball.
"Probably sitting at home watching TV," said Whitman.
A man in Connecticut invented the wiffle ball for his sons in 1953. At fifty-five years old, the game is usually played by a couple of kids in a small back yard. It's the field of dreams of wiffle ball.
The cost of Goodman's field is about $5000; the results are priceless.
"Yup, you build it and they will come," said Goodman.
