About: Playing for Life

Playing for Life is a New York City-based softball tournament that benefits various organizations which support portions of the city’s LGBT community. Started as a one-time event to assist the many organizations that responded to the HIV/AIDS crisis in the early 1990s, it was resurrected as a mostly annual event in 2003. The tournament’s eighth edition is scheduled to take place on Labor Day weekend, September 2011 in New York’s famous Central Park.

Playing for Life is a NAGAAA (North American Gay Amateur Athletic Alliance) sanctioned tournament, open to LGBT and LGBT-friendly teams from across the continent. It is organized each year by the Big Apple Softball League, New York’s only gay and lesbian softball league. BASL is the city’s oldest and largest gay athletic group, has been in continuous operation since 1977, and follows both NAGAAA and ASA (American Softball Association) guidelines, as well as its own specific rules.

Various organizations have benefited from funds raised by Playing for Life over the years, including God’s Love We Deliver, the Ali Forney Center, and SAGE NY (Services and Advocacy for GLBT Elders).

Team Spirit!

Related Resources

Big Apple Softball League

SAGE