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John Oliveira (2002-)
The Owner
John is the man behind the Renegades. You may not see him on the field or hear him in team meetings, but his influence is everywhere. John met Coach Weissman in 2000 and the two had a vision to create a competitive beepball league in the Boston area. That vision may have been tweaked over time, but the Association of Blind Citizens found a way to fund the Boston Renegades Beepball program. John helped get the team started in 2000 and coached them in their first World Series in 2002. In 2003, he moved “upstairs” and left the coaching duties to new coach Rob Weissman. Oliveira’s passion to promote programs for visually impaired people has been the number one reason the Boston Renegades exist as a team. |
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#62 Rob Weissman (2003-)
Head Coach & Catcher
Weissman helped start Beepball as a competitive sport in the Boston area. He got his start as the head coach of the Lowell LAB Retrievers in 2000. In 2003, he returned to the coaching ranks as the head coach of the Boston Renegades. He brings a unique style to the team where he is heavily involved in every aspect of the game as a hands on vocal coach. Those vocal chords get a work out during the season as he is known to lose his voice during tournaments yelling words of encouragement and barking out strategy. He may be the only head coach who catches during the game, which helps him keep a unique perspective. In his coaching career he has caught for over 3500 at bats and pitched to 20 batters. This means he has not been involved in a pitcher catcher battery in just 2 at bats since 2003. |
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Lisa Andrews (2013-)
Running & Defensive Coach/Trainer
Lisa had been looking for an opportunity to volunteer and help the visually impaired exercise. After teaming with Rob Weissman and Rick Myers on the volleyball court for a few years she was sold on the team. From her first practice she showed the guys that she is an expert in the field of fitness. Her specialization in injury prevention is something we desperately need. Her competitive fire and drive that has helped their volleyball team win a championship will fuel the Renegades to get into shape and improve their fitness! After her first outdoor work out with the team a long time Vet was quoted as saying, WOW! Rob, where has she been, she is great!” |
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Peg Bailey (2013-)
Volunteer/Catcher
On a cold April Rainy night at Fenway, Peg got up from her grand stand seat and was walking around the concourse when she stumbled across a table with a few blind guys. Curiosity brought her to the table and after talking to a few people she was interested in learning more about beep baseball. That interest turned into a volunteer coaching position. Peg has a deep background in softball. She walked on to her college softball team as a 37 year old freshman pitcher at Salem State. She also currently still pitches in a modified fast pitch league. Beyond that, she has coaching experience in softball and is a Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN). These skills will prove useful as she learns both the offensive and defensive sides of the sport. We are excited that night at Fenway was cold, or we may never had met her. |
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#2 Joe Bourque (2013-2014, 2017-)
Spotter/Catcher
Joe Bourque joined the Renegades in 2013 while he was still attending Boston College. After graduation, he left the area but never lost touch with the team. Even though he was not actively on the roster, he did attend some games in 2016 and never lost interest in the game. He vowed to return. In 2017, his career path takes him back into the Boston area and before he has even started his first day, he has voiced his pleasure that he is planning to be back with the team. Hailing from Wakefield, Bourque, a two-time marathoner, grew up playing baseball, basketball, hockey and football throughout his childhood and continued in running track during his high school years. Bourque found out about the Renegades through his close friend and current Renegade player, Joe McCormick. While with the team in is first two seasons. Joe played many roles from helping with running practices, getting paperwork, keeping stats, shooting video, catching, hitting grounders, running drills. He also was part of the coaching staff that attended the 2014 World Series. With his knowledge of the game, his role will be expanded with the team. |
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#44 Ron Cochran (2006-)
Pitcher
Cochran returned to beepball in 2006 as he along with Weissman and Grillo helped get beepball started in Massachusetts back in 2000 with the Lowell LAB Retrievers. In his first year as a pitcher he set many of the Renegade records including best batting average against (.368). Cochran continued to improve into his fourth year as he is currently the all-time leader in batting average against (.349), Putting balls into play (78%) and at-bats (2507). Ron has helped 6 players win 8 offensive MVP awards in the 2007-2013 seasons. Ron brings with him experience in pitching, a hard core competitive fire and years of coaching experience which has translated into helping him become one of the better pitchers in the NBBA |
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Peter Connolly (2016-)
Pitcher
Peter joins the Renegade after the start of the 2016 season and he is quickly picking up the sport. Peter has seen the Renegades play games in Long Island and in Woburn and is familiar with the intensity of the sport. In team history, he becomes just the 3rd volunteer (and only active volunteer) who is related to a player. He is Joe Yee’s younger cousin. Peter is part of the Renegade volunteer staff youth movement as he is in his mid-twenties. During the work week, he is an actuary for John Hancock but for the Renegades he wields a big bat. That big bat is needed as we want ground balls to be “smoked” to help us prepare for the World Series. Watch out, he has an interest in pitching as well and could become our 4th Active pitcher! |
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#49 Jamie Dickerson (2014-)
Spotter/Pitcher
Jamie will joint the Renegades in 2014 as another volunteer from Harvard University. Jamie found us through Renegade Joe McCormick and has been friends with other coaches Joe Bourque and Sean Sweeney since middle school. An avid Ultimate Frisbee player, Jamie brings a competitive spirt to the team and a desire to do something that is rare in our volunteers…Pitch! We have high hopes that we can bring Jamie along as a pitcher and catcher in his first year to help the team in this space where we have been looking for new pitchers for years. You can never have enough brave people on a beep ball team to pitch. This no fear attitude and willingness to get into the game gives us high hopes we have found yet another gem of young volunteers looking to help lead this team into the future! |
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Max Goder-Reiser (2016-)
Volunteer
Max joined the Renegades weeks before the games began in 2016 and has fallen in love with the sport. He first heard about the Renegades and Beep baseball at a SABR metrics conference where one of our coaches was discussing the statistics of the sport. Max kept this in his mind since last fall and joined us guns ablaze! He is one of the youngest coaches on the roster and is part of a new wave of 20 something coaches who have found us in the past few years. Max is putting his stats background to use and has helped us score games, work base running and defensive drills. We hope to expand his role in the 2017 season and may even have him analyze baseball swing statistics…You never know what this clipboard carrying team can come up with to improve our game! |
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#33 Bryan Grillo (2003-)
Defensive/Running Coach & Spotter
Grillo gets his beepball roots from coaching with the Lowell LAB Retrievers in 2000 with Rob Weissman. While in Lowell, he was often found wearing a blindfold and playing the game as player. The perspective of being a player has helped him to lead the team in the field. Grillo is the Renegades Caller. When there is a ball put into play you will hear Bryan yelling out signals to the players to help them zone in on the ball. Grillo has been the Renegades sole caller in a single caller system in 80 of 82 games since he joined the team in 2003. Since the team has moved to a dual calling system, Grillo has called more games (31) than anyone else. Historically, he was on the field to help Darren Black (2) and Guy Zuccarello (2) earn their World Series All- Star awards. |
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Brandon Jewer (2018-)
Volunteer
Brandon found about Beep baseball from one of his Stonehill baseball teammates, Robert Minton. He joined the team in late May, 2018 and has quickly fallen in love with the game. Jewer is a pitcher at Stonehill who can bring it with a fastball that clocks in over 90 MPH. This billerica resident is also bringing it on the beepball field, but with his bat. Brandon is learning the defensive side of the game and this six foot four pitcher can hit the ball harder than most players in the league. That will be great practice for a Renegade defense that is prepping to field bombs off the bats of the best teams in the world. |
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Gina Lebeau (2018-)
Catcher
Gina officially joined the squad in 2018 after sitting on the sidelines as a fan in 2016 & 2017. Gina resides in Salisbury, Ma with her fiancee, Shawn Devenish who plays with the squad. Her experience as a teaching assistant and time running track, playing field hockey and watching the Renegades practice for the past 2 years will help make her a valuable asset to the team. Gina likes the fact the Renegades help blind and visually impaired people be part of a team while having a reason to stay in shape and stay active.
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#32 Jason Lenicheck (2004-2015, 2017-)
Hitting Coach/Spotter
Jason “Ace” Lenicheck has more coaching experience than the entire Renegade staff, with years of coaching girls soccer. In 2004, Ace joined the coaching ranks to help the Renegades with their hitting. Back in his playing days he was known as an all hit no field 3rd baseman for Acton Boxboro High School. The combination of his hitting and coaching skills quickly have made him an impact coach on the staff. In 2011, he was pressed into learning the defense and asked to call. Taking his skills of playing 3rd base, he called the left side of the defense for 5 games in 2011 leading the defense to 4 wins. He has called at the World Series, Chicago and in the Beast of the East and helped the team to a 9-5 record as a substitute spotter! His do it all mentality has helped the Renegades improve their on field success. Jason was interviewed in the fourth podcast of “The Renegade Report”, which can be heard on SoundCloud. |
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Mike Marciello (2013-)
Hitting Coach
Media plays an important role in connecting people and that was the case for Mike. He found about us through an article on our documentary that was in the Boston Globe. Mike has some personal ties to the team on a few levels. Athletically he loves baseball and has played and coached it at different levels. Personally has been diagnosed with Stargardt’s disease which impacts his central vision. Professionally he trained at Spaulding Rehab and is currently a doctor of Physiatry which focuses on treating pain and restoring maximum function lost through injury. Mixing all of the above together and we have the ingredients and a recipe for a coach who we hope will help us as much as we can help him.
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Patrick Marquis (2012-)
Web Site Designer
Patrick has a personal interest in web design and had been sitting near Rob Weissman at Work at IBM for a few years. With Rob’s super novice web design knowledge, Patrick was able to help him through a few sticky points over the years. In 2012, Patrick and Rob got to talking about the organization’s desire to move the site to WordPress. The lucky thing here was Patrick’s technical curiosity was steering him to learn WordPress and a partnership was formed. Patrick redesigned the entire Renegade web site to be hosted on a WordPress site. This redesign was his first major project in this realm and was a success. He made it easier for the team to update the web site, link it to social media and we have many more things planned now that its easier to maintain. You may not see Patrick on the field, but this improved web presence has helped us reach many people across the globe with more up to date content about our great sport and team. |
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Fabricio Martinique Caldas (2015-)
Volunteer
Fabricio found out about beep ball from his brother in law, Rob Weissman and in 2015 he decided that he wanted to get active and be part of a team again. Fabricio is of Brazilian blood where Baseball is not popular but he brings a competitive spirt to the team. Fabricio is very active and into fitness and can be found working out with the guys on the field. He has also been helping out off the field with projects and fundraising during the afternoon when his baby daughter is sleeping. He came to the team when we needed to finish off some projects and he has been a big help willing to take the ball and run. We hope he sticks with it and learns more about the sport as he could become another valuable asset to the Renegade volunteer staff. |
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Chhany Minton (2018-)
Volunteer
In the spring of 2017, Minton was walking through the Prudential Center inBoston when he came across a volunteer fair and ran into the Renegades. At the time, the team was looking for game day umpires for the Home tournament. Minton expressed interest but was unavailable on that date. During the winter, this Stonehill College student and Outfielder for their varsity baseball team expressed interest in becoming a coach. His excitement grew and he recruited his teammate, Brandon Jewer to help as well. Minton’s knowledge of hitting, Love of photography and knowledge of baseball technology and analytics have helped him be a great fit for the team |
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#26 Rick Myers (2004-)
Defensive Coach & Equipment Manager
Myers was introduced to the game of beepball in 2000 as he was part of a sighted team asked to play the Lowell LAB Retrievers in a scrimmage game. He was one of the few sighted people to score a run in those contests. In 2004, Myers joined the coaching ranks to help Boston with their defensive skills. One important lesson he taught was the importance of wearing a protective cup as he accidentally hit a player three times before they made the all important purchase. Myers has a PHD in Physics which has been helpful off the field repairing bases, studying breakage in bats and developing defensive charts for the coaches to use to set up the team defense. Myers has not been able to be on field as much in recent years but has stayed involved helping to repair equipment and work with stats for the home games. |
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Kara Peters (2013-)
Defensive Coach/Running Coach
Kara has been a Renegade follower for a few years and in 2013, joined the team. We have worked with her in the past as she has run some beep ball camps for kids at the Carroll Center for the Blind. Professionally she works with visually impaired kids from 3-22 years of age as a certified orientation and mobility specialist. We have hopes this partnership will help us reach/recruit kids and help them see what is available for them to play. Kara brings a love of team sports, a competitive desire, knowledge of softball and a degree in Physical Education with a concentration in Motor Development Therapy to the Gades. We will put all of this to use to improve the team!
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#28 Aaron Proctor (2009-2011, 2017) Spotter
Aaron joined the Renegades half-way through the 2009 season. He spent the first half of the season observing the team before deciding he was interested in helping out. Aaron spent most of that season as the team’s umpire learning the ins and outs of the game. Beyond umpiring, Aaron has helped the team with a few off the field projects including helping us find ways to save money through grants and some ingenious out of the box thinking. He also has helped create marketing material for our fans. Aaron was with the team in a small capacity in 2016 but has planned to return in 2017 as more of a full time presence.
See Aaron appear on Fox25 Sportswrap in 2018, NESN in 2018 and on Comcast in 2010 |
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Lucas Schwallie (2015-)
Hitting Coach
This 16 year old found out about the Renegades in 2014 when he stopped one of our players on the street out of pure curiosity how a guy with a walking cane could be wearing a uniform and holding a bat. A year later, he remembered this and reached out to us to ask if he could help out. Now in his Junior year of High School, Lucas juggles his Varsity baseball at Weston High with homework and volunteer work. In the 2016 season he has stepped up and is leading our offensive work outs teaching many of the guys mechanics, reviewing film and bringing his trained eye to help our hitters.
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Hunter Weissman (2011-2013, 2015-)
Catcher, Team Operations Intern
Hunter, one of the Weissman twins, is Coach Rob’s nephew and former coach Lisa Klinkenberg’s son. Both Lisa and Rob thought it would be great to have the kids involved in the team and as they grow, they are getting great experience volunteering and learning about the visually impaired. Hunter has a lot of baseball experience and can often be found catching, throwing balls into the team defense or helping guide players back from base running drills. With his growth spurt and return in 2015, Hunter has been working with hitters on their swings |
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Teigan Weissman (2011-2013, 2015-)
Volunteer
Teigan is the the left handed half of the twins. He is actually a great left handed catcher in baseball…but if he does not bring his glove..we have to give him other duties. Teigan has an interest in film..so he has helped the team record practices on video which we use to break down players swings. He also helps out on defense and base running. When the twins started they were smaller than all of the players. Entering the 2015 season they are taller than most of the players and have been able to play a bigger role in helping coach the Renegade hitters. Teigan has been helpful in teaching players about their swings. |