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Baseball Reaches Out to the Next Generation on Their Own Turf

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — In Section I of BB&T Ballpark here on Sunday night, Logan Castellano had the rare opportunity to sit next to a major league pitcher. So he took advantage and asked Steven Matz, a Mets starting pitcher, for tips on throwing a changeup.

“He asked me how I gripped the ball and how I threw it,” said Castellano, 13, an outfielder and pitcher for the Mid-Island Little League team from Staten Island. “It was exciting, because I’d never done that before.”

For a few innings during Major League Baseball’s second annual Little League Classic, in which the Mets defeated the Philadelphia Phillies, 8-2, four Mets starting pitchers — Jacob deGrom, Noah Syndergaard, Zack Wheeler and Matz — jammed their large frames into the bleachers and interacted with some of the world’s best young baseball players.