Curtis Granderson keeps busy on the diamond, leading off and
playing rightfield day in and day out for the Mets. He hits leadoff homers,
steals bases and plays the game the right way, as a manager would say. But did
you know he serves as an international ambassador for Major League Baseball? Or
that he is a national representative for the White House’s Anti-Obesity
campaign, Let’s Move! and spokesperson for the partnership for a healthier
America’s Drink Up Water Initiative?
They’re all true, and then some for Granderson. He not only
goes to bat for the Mets but also goes to bat for those people in the
communities he plays for.
His desire to help people is something he learned as a
child, watching his parents lend a helping hand at every available opportunity,
that has helped transform him into a leader in his community.
“At a very young age (my mom and dad) engaged neighbors,
family members, friends that I would have over in a hospitable, giving and
welcoming way,” Granderson recalled.
“There were things that they knew they could help out with
whether it be rides to and from school, food, a place to sleep or stay,
clothing (things that we weren’t wearing or using anymore), little things like
that.”
The Grandersons, Curtis Sr. and Mary, did not seek fame or
fortune with their charitable efforts. Curtis Sr. was a dean and physical
education teacher while Mary taught chemistry. They were a middle class family
who didn’t make a ton of money, but they were still able to provide things for
people if they could.
“I think that’s where I saw it early on,” Granderson said.
“As I get older and can start doing those things, maybe I’ll look into doing
that kind of stuff too.”
Later on in life while Granderson was attending college and
playing baseball at the University of Illinois-Chicago, it was a former Chicago
Bears player, Chris Zorich, who made the next impact on Granderson’s desire to
help in his communities. Zorich had a food drive around Thanksgiving and all of
the student-athletes at UIC participated in the event.
Part of Granderson’s duties during the event were to help
get the food, especially the large turkeys, and bring them to unsuspecting
folks around the Chicago area who didn’t think that they were going to have a
meal to eat for the holiday. The responses he received when he went out on the
deliveries still stay with him to this day.
“I remember that vividly standing out and from that moment
thinking that if I ever am in a professional setting and can engage people to
help the community, I’d want to do some things like this,” Granderson recalled.
Granderson has followed through on that hope. Since his
arrival in the major leagues, Granderson has founded a myriad of community
outreach programs. All of his community programs provide different services but
they all start from the same place: education. The desire to provide
educational tools to those in need is how the Grand Kids Foundation, which was
established in 2007, began.
However, during an event in Flint, Mich. early on in his
outreach, he realized his reach would have to go beyond just the classroom if
he wanted to help educate the youth of America.
“The principal said ‘I’m so happy you’re here and the kids
would love to hear from you. Unfortunately I’m not going to be able to allow
you to speak to them because if I take them out of lunch, some of these kids –
it’s the only meal they get for the day,’” Granderson remembers today.
That event put things into perspective for Granderson. While
education was the base for his outreach initiatives, education alone wasn’t the
only solution. If the kids are only getting one meal a day, how would they be
able to focus on their studies throughout the school day?
“I remember being a student and knowing the days that I ate
a little bit lighter, whether I was rushed or wasn’t hungry, and as that test
or exam came about later in the day, the lack of focus started to go up,”
Granderson added. “Then I envisioned kids that I’d known who only came to
school because they hadn’t had a meal in the last four or five days and the
teachers would say I know that child will be here because they can get a meal.”
This is how his vision with the Grand Kids Foundation has
morphed into what it is today, to aid positive youth development via education,
physical fitness and nutrition by providing tools and resources for education
and societal advancement.
In 2012, Granderson made an initial donation of $5 million
to his alma mater, the University of Illinois at Chicago, to help build Curtis
Granderson Stadium. The university, Major League Baseball and its partners
contributed the additional funds for the $15 million endeavor to build the
state of the art facility. The stadium not only hosts the school’s baseball
program but also 38 area little leagues.
Over the last three years Granderson has coupled his work
with children with Grand Giving, a month-long event which has become the
largest growing fundraiser in the Chicago area. In 2012, the inaugural Grand
Giving campaign resulted in the donation of 36,000 pounds of non-perishable
goods. They also donated the equivalent of 30,000 meals to the Greater Chicago
Food Depository Kids Café program, which provides nutritious meals and
enrichment activities that support physical and academic potential among
children and teens.
A year later, Granderson and Grand Kids teamed up with a
local supermarket in the Chicago area to embark on a month-long Grand Giving
campaign during the month of November that allowed folks to donate at checkout
to either the Greater Chicago Food Depository or the Northern Illinois Food
Bank. The campaign resulted in over $78,000 to support the cause, which is
equivalent to nearly a quarter million meals.
In 2015, the group raised $350,000 and provided over a
million meals to the Chicago area alone.
In New York, Granderson helps with the New Balance
SparkStart Fitness Challenge, which began as an offshoot from First Lady
Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! Campaign. The goal of the initiative is to inspire
children around the world to discover how they love to move.
“Whether you like to dance or swim, jump rope or do martial
arts, any form of being active is what we encourage,” Granderson explained.
They’ve been to several schools in Brooklyn already this
year and he says that the feedback and energy from the kids have been
impressive.
“The most recent one we were in Brooklyn a couple of weeks
ago and there was a push-up station and a sit-up station,” Granderson
explained. “And they were all bringing me in challenging me to do push-ups and
sit-ups.”
“Just focusing on the idea that of being active is fun,
which will ultimately keep you in shape to, again, help you become a better
student.”
Granderson and his foundation are reaching tens of thousands
of kids from New York to Chicago (and beyond) with the aforementioned programs
in addition to others like the Citi Community Home Runs, little league sponsorship and youth baseball programs that are hosted across the globe.
He’s got his eyes set on even bigger things for the near
future, as they are close to a deal with Major League Baseball and the Player’s
Association with their youth academy in Chicago. They’re not necessarily trying to get the
next major leaguer, although that would be a bonus, but he is more so trying to
get kids on a college campus for the first time.
“Last year we had over 750 kids come on to a college campus
for the first time in their life and they were escorted by college students
from their area,” Granderson said.
As Granderson explained it “Kids say ‘Wow, you grew up down
the street from me so this actually is possible. I’ve heard people say it but
I’m actually seeing it because that student who is not that far removed from me
in age, is now guiding me at this university they go to.’”
They have programs for both baseball and softball for kids
ages 8-18 and welcomed over 10,000 kids to Curtis Granderson Stadium last year.
While they are there, they add in the educational components, staying in shape,
eating healthy and all the other things that Granderson preaches across his
many different platforms.
This program is not something he wants to keep in Chicago
but wants to expand to other cities in the future like New York or Detroit.
“That’s the big one, especially as I start to transition out
of the game, I want to be able to know what the next step is and that is
definitely one of those things on my radar in terms of continuing to provide
opportunities for those who don’t realize they might exist.”
Granderson
is still more than a few years away from that as he still looks to be in his
prime, especially after setting a franchise-record for home runs by a leadoff
hitter last season with 26 to help the Mets win the National League pennant.
But whenever Granderson does make that transition, it sounds like he’ll never
step away from making an effort to help others.