It was nearly impossible for Cascade View Elementary School (Snoqualmie) teacher Tim Rooney to get his fifth grade class to focus Wednesday afternoon. A morning visit from Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh made sure of that.
Nearly two weeks ago, Rooney’s students were the stars of a viral video, when Rooney filmed them chanting Raleigh’s nickname, “Big Dumper! Big Dumper!” after watching him hit a two-run first-inning homer off Alek Manoah in the Mariners’ 4-0 win over the Toronto Blue Jays in Game One of the AL Wild Card Series on Oct. 7.
Raleigh knew that he wanted to pay the class a visit, so on Tuesday, he reached out to Rooney and asked if he could drop by.
With Raleigh scheduled to show up between 10:30 and 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday, Rooney spent the early part of the day trying to keep word of the visit under wraps. He was at the board teaching a lesson when he saw Raleigh walking up the pathway to the portable classroom.
“Cal pops in, I turn around and four or five of my kids have got their jaws at the floor,” Rooney said. “One kid right up front, I said ‘Do you know who that is?’ and he’s like ‘Is that Big Dumper?’
Raleigh said hello to the class, and immediately started getting peppered with questions. The first one was ‘can we have your autograph?’ but Raleigh also fielded a few more challenging queries from the 10-and-11-year-old fans.
“They were good questions,” Raleigh said. “They were funny, asking me who my favorite player on the team was besides myself, and silly things like what my favorite food is, what the days are like, what it’s like to be a Mariner, playing against other players, who my favorite player was growing up, stuff like that.”
It was a special experience for Raleigh, who became a Mariners fan favorite in his first full season in the big leagues.
At 25 years old, he remembers what it was like to be a young baseball fan, and said that he would have ‘flipped my lid’ if a big league ballplayer had come to visit his class as a kid.
For Raleigh, it was a chance to give back to the community and thank his young fans for their enthusiastic support.
“I think it just goes back to doing the right thing,” Raleigh said. “I remember back to when I was in school, and how important it is to give back and to be a good influence on younger kids’ lives, because they’re the next generation. You want to make a positive impact on the kids.”
Raleigh bonded with another fan back on Sept. 30, when he autographed a bat and ball for the 17-year old who caught his walk off homer against the Oakland A’s on Sept. 30, a hit that sent the Mariners to the playoffs for the first time in 21 years.
“It kind of just happened organically, and I think that is what makes it kind of cool,” Raleigh said of his bond with young Seattle fans. “To see young fans becoming Mariners fans, becoming baseball fans, and growing the game and growing the Mariners. Making that a cool thing and making that something that kids want to do, they want to come out and see the Mariners, and I think that’s a big, important thing.”
After close to half an hour of answering questions, Raleigh sat at Rooney’s desk and autographed a photo for every kid in the class.
“I passed those out to the kids at the end of the day, and they were on cloud nine,” Rooney said. “And then as Cal was leaving, they had to go through the lunchroom and all the fifth grade classes were in there.”
When Raleigh walked through the lunchroom on his way out of the building, Rooney said, the kids from the other fifth grade classes “went nuts.”
“Of course, they start chanting ‘Big Dumper! Big Dumper!’, Rooney said. “He’s high-fiving the kids as he walks out, gives them a wave, and it was an unreal experience for the kids. I mean, obviously something they are going to remember. “
For Raleigh, it’s important to help grow the next generation of Mariners fans, and he knows that things like his classroom visit could have a big impact on kids’ lives.
“Always wanting to be like a certain person or looking up and having a role model in the community or on TV, I know that impacted me greatly and helped me get to where I am today,” Raleigh said. “Hopefully I can do the same thing for those kids.”