Ahead of Major League Baseball’s ‘Battlegrounds’ event in Hyde Park on July 4th, players from County Champions Middlesex swapped their whites for LA Dodgers and Boston Red Sox uniforms and took to Lord’s hallowed turf with baseball bats.
Dawid Malan, recently called up to the England T20 squad, Nick Gubbins, James Franklin and John Simpson competed to score the most home runs in under two minutes.
Unlike in 1917 when teams representing the US and Canada played at Lords, the wicket wasn’t replaced with a diamond, so Home Runs were calculated by hits of over 250 feet.
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Major League Baseball will host a July 4th party in London, with a full takeover of the Barclaycard presents British Summer Time Hyde Park music festival site.
This free event – running from 5pm-10pm – will mix sport, street food and music with representatives of two of MLB’s most popular teams, the Boston Red Sox and L.A. Dodgers, going head-to-head in an explosive, quick-fire format of the game never seen before in Europe.
The MLB Battlegrounds July 4th extravaganza will culminate in an all-star ‘Home Run Derby’ hitting contest on the Main Stage. Some of MLB’s biggest hitters and surprise UK sporting stars, will battle it out to score the most home runs against the clock.
“This represents an exciting statement of intent for Major League Baseball in Europe. Hyde Park is the perfect location to bring a flavour of our game to London with two of the most popular teams in the sport – the Red Sox and the Dodgers – set to provide a night of big hitting on the Main Stage,” said Charlie Hill, Managing Director of MLB Europe.
The Home Run Derby is traditionally a feature of MLB’s All-Star Weekend and MLB legends Carlos Pena, Cliff Floyd and Shawn Green will all be looking to knock it out of the park, alongside stars of women’s softball and some soon to be announced stars from British sport.
MLB Battlegrounds will also bring the music of Boston and L.A. to the July 4th celebrations, just days after North American stars Justin Bieber and Green Day headline the Hyde Park Main Stage.
