Saturday lead-off

Youth baseball starts season with parade

MOSES LAKE — Their uniforms bore the colors and the insignia of Major League Baseball – the Yankees, the Mariners, the Rockies, the Cubs. But the backs of their jerseys all had the names of their local business sponsors – Jensen Farms, REC Silicon, Stetner Electric, The Six, J. R. Simplot. And they came out in force: kids of all ages with their parents, coaches and sponsors, all on brightly decorated pickup trucks through downtown for the annual Dick Kelly Memorial Parade, jointly organized by the Moses Lake Youth Baseball Association and the Columbia Basin Girls Softball Association. The parade marks the leading off of the spring youth baseball and softball seasons. “It’s incredibly important,” said Moses Lake Mayor Don Myers, one of the judges of this year’s float contest. “With baseball and with softball, they help groom them for high school and college. Get some of the basics, get them in team sports, gives kids something to do. It’s a positive for this community.”