Schwartz: HOPE Week Grows Into Another Proud Yankees Tradition
By Peter Schwartz
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When it comes to the Yankees, the mission statement has always been simple and straight forward: Get to the World Series and win. But over the last eight years, winning baseball games and raising championship banners are no longer the only objectives for arguably the most famous team in professional sports.
The new mission statement is to honor special people who do extraordinary things to help others.
In 2009, the Yankees embarked on an important project called HOPE Week. HOPE stands for "Helping Others Persevere & Excel." According to the Yankees, the initiative is based on "the belief that acts of goodwill provide hope and encouragement to more than just the recipient of the gesture."
The Yankees' eighth-annual HOPE Week gets underway Monday when the Bombers take on the Angels at Yankee Stadium and runs through June 10, when the Yankees face the Tigers. On each of those five days, the Yankees will reach out to an individual, family or organization worthy of recognition and support while generating publicity for the highlighted causes and organizations.
It's become a very special Yankees tradition.
"It speaks to the thought behind it, and it also shows the stories that we're highlighting really are special," said Jason Zillo, the Yankees' executive director of communications and media relations, who came up with the idea for HOPE Week.
With five more honorees on tap for this year, the Yankees will have recognized a total of 40 since the initiative's inception. HOPE Week is something that the entire organization takes pride in, and the plan is to make it bigger and bigger each year.
"The people that we're honoring year after year, it makes us want to do it even better each time out because they really are inspiring," said Zillo.
In an effort to surprise the honorees, the Yankees do not reveal their identities until their designated day. The organization does its own share of research to find those special people to honor, but eight years after launching this initiative, the ideas are now coming in from other sources.
That speaks to how big HOPE Week has become.
"We didn't know where it was going to go, but we knew that the stories that were being told were worth telling over and over again," said Zillo. "People in the organization, our fans, and people out there who aren't necessarily Yankee fans wrote in and said we heard about this person or this story."
All of the honorees are both unique and special. What the Yankees have found is that there are many inspiring people around. You just have to roll your sleeves up and find them.
Take last year for example.
In 2015, the Yankees honored Frank Squeo, who founded Baking Memories 4 Kids, a nonprofit organization that bakes and sells chocolate chip cookies during the holiday season with proceeds used to fund all-expenses-paid vacations for families of children with life-threatening illnesses.
Another honoree was Valerie Jenson, who opened The Prospector Theater in Ridgefield, Connecticut. The theater has a staff of 90 people, primarily individuals with disabilities, and they are given training and confidence needed to realize their own potential.
HOPE Week is proof that there are inspiring people everywhere.
"If you're having trouble finding inspiration, you're just not looking hard enough," said Zillo. "There are people that you should be gravitating towards in life, and not just a baseball team."
Speaking of the baseball team, the Yankees are working hard to try to find their way on the field this season, but there is a collective sense of pride in the clubhouse and in the front office when it comes to HOPE Week.
Whether its players such as Brett Gardner and CC Sabathia, who have become regular ambassadors of the initiative, or manager Joe Girardi and general manager Brian Cashman, the entire organization has bought into what this project means to the franchise.
"We have momentum built now," said Zillo. "They know what this week is about now to the point where I don't need to explain anything. They just want to look at the stories, read them and find out which one they want to dive into. We've got some street cred now in the clubhouse, which is a great thing."
That street cred has now spread to other parts of the organization.
This is the fifth consecutive year that the Yankees' minor league affiliates will hold their own HOPE Week. Whether it's the Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes Barre RailRiders, the Double-A Trenton Thunder or the Class A Staten Island Yankees, honoring special people is something a player learns about as they climb up the ladder.
"It really is an organization-wide initiative," said Zillo. "It's neat to see when you get younger guys and they hear us talking about HOPE Week and I don't need to tell them what it is because they are already doing it."
There's no question that Yankees HOPE Week has become one of the most important and unique community initiatives by any team in our area. It's a project that rewards people for helping to make a difference in the lives of others. The Yankees' efforts have also inspired other organizations, companies, and schools to do their own HOPE Week.
"To me, (it) is an ultimate compliment because this was never supposed to be an exclusive thing," said Zillo. "It's supposed to be an inclusive thing because there are people all around the country and all around the world who can use an outstretched hand."
For many years, the most important week for the Yankees took place in October with the objective being to win the World Series. While that's still the goal every year, there is now another important week on the calendar for the Yankees, and you can make the argument it's just as important.
For a franchise that has so many traditions, HOPE Week has become a special way of showing pinstriped pride.
For more information on HOPE Week, visit www.hopeweek.com.
Don't forget to follow Pete on Twitter at @pschwartzcbsfan. You can also follow the New York Yankees @Yankees.
