{"id":160376,"date":"2026-02-18T21:51:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T21:51:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/160376\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T21:51:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T21:51:09","slug":"mets-host-local-special-olympic-athletes-at-spring-training-in-port-st-lucie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/160376\/","title":{"rendered":"Mets host local Special Olympic athletes at Spring Training in Port St. Lucie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>PORT ST. LUCIE (CBS12 News) \u2014 The New York Mets hosted their annual Special Olympics clinic today in Port St. Lucie, adding another chapter to a proud tradition that now spans more than 20 years. Nearly 100 Special Olympics athletes took the field at Clover Park alongside Mets players, taking ground balls, shagging fly balls and stepping into the batter\u2019s box \u2014 even local sports fan Malcolm Harris Gowdy getting in on the action in a moment that highlighted his well-known passion for the game.<\/p>\n<p>Mets pitcher Shawn Manea said the day goes far beyond baseball. \u201cBeing able to hang with all of these very awesome athletes being able to play the game of baseball, it\u2019s kind of a universal language,\u201d Manea said. \u201cIt turned into ground balls, fly balls and everything in between and we just had fun with it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Mets continue to build a special bond with Special Olympics athletes rooted in inclusion, inspiration and genuine connection \u2014 creating memories that will last a lifetime. Many of those athletes will also be in the stands this weekend when the Mets open spring training at Clover Park against the Miami Marlins on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PORT ST. LUCIE (CBS12 News) \u2014 The New York Mets hosted their annual Special Olympics clinic today in&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":160377,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[171,173,172],"class_list":["post-160376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160376","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160376"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160376\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160376"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160376"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160376"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}