Rob commented on his role as a coach: “From a coaching standpoint, it really challenges your communication skills. One thing I learned really early on is that you don’t need to yell to be heard since the field is so silent. You can just talk at a normal level and they can hear you across the field.”

I asked Rob if there were different levels of vision loss for different players, and whether that caused a competitive advantage for some.

“You are always suspect when you see guys with giant Coke bottle lenses and they are walking around just like you and I would be, but when you go under the blindfold, everybody is on the same playing field. The blindfold is the great equalizer.”

I was surprised to learn that many Renegade players were not blind most of their lives, and that several were excellent athletes who had played varsity baseball before losing their vision.

Tim Syphers (Watertown, MA, 24) played ball for Watertown High School, and 2013 marks his rookie season with the Renegades. Tim was a client at the Carroll Center for the Blind in Newton when one of the coaches of the team invited him to workout with the team. Tim explained how loss of his sight impacted his involvement in sports.

“I remember one of the times before I knew I was legally blind, I was throwing a football around with a buddy and I couldn’t catch the darned ball. It was depressing. It was sad. I just thought I needed glasses. When I found out I was legally blind, I thought sports were gone forever. When I met Rob, it was like a weight had been lifted. Something physical was back in my life.”

Joey “Wrong Way” Buizon, (Somerville, MA, 30) lost his vision when he was 17 shortly after playing for Somerville High School. Initially, doctors thought he had Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy, which causes sudden onset of unilateral painless blurry vision, followed within two months by the same symptoms in the other eye. To this day, doctors aren’t exactly sure what his affliction is, but his nickname proves he hasn’t lost his sense of humor about it.

“In Beep Ball, when one of the bases go off, you really don’t know which one – that is one of the challenges of the sport to keep it competitive. So one time, when the bases went off, I went to first base, but really, the other base was going off. I went all the way down the wrong line. From then on, they’ve called me ‘Wrong Way.’”

Joe McCormick (Melrose, MA, 20) first heard about the team from Wrong Way while interning at the Massachusetts Commission for the Blind. Joe played ball through Little League, and played varsity soccer in high school. He lost his sight three years ago, gradually, over the course of a year.

“I was a senior at Malden Catholic and one day was in our robotics lab and went to look through a PVC pipe. When I went to look through, I thought there was a cap on the end. But there was no cap.” Joe continued: “I found out it was a disease called Leber’s, and basically they said I had days to weeks to months before I’d loose vision in my other eye.” Joe lost vision in his second during graduation week of high school.

“My initial fears were loss of independence, and not being able to drive. I love driving. But sports was also a big thing. I was so used to like going out after school playing Frisbee or pickup basketball. After finding the Renegades, I knew this game was for me. I could compete at the same level as everybody else.”

From a competitive standpoint, Joe even finds beepball even more thrilling than traditional baseball.

“Every play is a scoring play. In baseball, you hit a single, someone can score on an RBI, but you’re not gonna be able to score on that play. But in beepball, if you hit a ball in the field, you can score on that play. So it makes it way more exciting. Once you dive into the base and make contact with it you hear the umpire yell safe ‘safe’ it just you are just filled with energy and passion for the game.”

Aqil Sajjad (Cambridge, MA, 33) is originally from Pakistan, but is currently a student at Harvard, who has played with the Renegades for four years. Aqil was 10 when he had retinal detachment in his first eye, and 16 when it hit his other eye. Back in Pakistan, he had mainly played cricket.

“For a while I didn’t play any sport. This is the first time I’ve played a sport since losing my eyesight. People had introduced me to blind cricket, but it was so different from sighted cricket that I just said ‘Forget it. I’m not gonna play this.’ When I started playing this game, that was when I prepared myself that it would be different than sighted baseball.”

And a different game it is.

“Apart from the fact that the ball beeps, the pitcher is on the same team as the batting side. The pitcher is sighted and tries to put the ball in the exactly in same spot. Your goal is to swing your bat exactly in the same spot with exactly the same timing. It’s about muscle memory and consistency of your swing. At home you swing, swing, and swing so that you have that muscle memory on the field. This is different from sighted baseball where you are looking for the ball with your eye and the pitcher is trying to get you to miss the ball. Here, the pitcher and you work together.”

Beginning July 30, the Renegades will attend their 12th consecutive Beep Baseball World Series in Columbus, Georgia. If you would like to join the Renegades as a player or volunteer, visit the Boston Renegades for more details.