Celebs to play bad baseball for good cause

If you want to see some good, entertaining baseball Saturday afternoon, head to Arlington to check out the Rangers playing the Astros. If you want to see some bad – yet equally entertaining – baseball Saturday night, head to Dr Pepper/Seven Up Ballpark in Frisco.

That's the site of the third annual Reebok Heroes Celebrity Baseball Game, a nine-inning confirmation that celebrity does not equal baseball skill. In this case, that's a good thing, because it wouldn't be nearly as fun if most of the celebrities knew what they were doing out there.

Last year's most valuable players, Chris Kirkpatrick of 'N Sync and Kenyon Martin of the New Jersey Nets, will be back in uniform. Other celebrities involved include Mark Cuban and Michael Finley of the Mavericks, the Cowboys' Roy Williams, the Stars' Mike Modano and his former teammate Brett Hull.

The game benefits the children's charities of the Mike Modano Foundation, the Todd Wagner Foundation and Little Heroes Baseball. (For those who don't know, Todd Wagner was Cuban's partner with Broadcast.com and is the CEO of 2929 Entertainment, a film-production company the two created.)

The celebrity game begins at 8 p.m. but preceded by a 3 p.m. Little Heroes game, which features players 10-12 years old. The celebrity home-run derby is at 6 p.m.

Tickets, which can be purchased through Ticketmaster (214-373-8000) or at the ballpark, range from $5 to $20. The Houston Rockets' Yao Ming will throw out the first pitch, but a pitching machine will be used for the game.

That means the players will get some good pitches to hit. Getting good hits, however, might not be such a sure thing.

-- Dallas News