THIS IS INDIAN COUNTRY

I'm proud to be leading this GoFundMe campaign on behalf of a wonderful team of filmmakers and fans! Last year we began first work on a feature-length documentary on the life and times of Rocky Colavito, which we're tentatively calling "Land of Colavito," a tribute not just to the great player so many of us came to love, both in Cleveland ("the Land") to Detroit, to all ends of the baseball world. Our ultimate goal is to jumpstart a movement to get Rocky what he deserves, a spot in the Baseball Hall of Fame. The doc is far more than just a story about a ballplayer; it's also about the integration of baseball, which Rocky experienced and embraced, best articulated perhaps by his friendship with his Indians teammate, Larry Doby, the second Black player in the league. It's about Rocky playing as much for the Indians as he did for the new Italian Americans in this country, as downtrodden as any community in the early/middle 20th century. But it's also about something that at long last sportswriters and the Hall take into account as importantly as statistics when considering inductees -- the character of the player, his connection to his fans, his enduring love for the communities for which he played, especially Cleveland. Sadly, Rocky left us on December 10, 2024 at the age of 91, but he knew we were already celebrating him with this film, and we made a promise to him that we'd get it done, even if it took "extra innings." THIS GOFUNDME is that promise kept. The nonprofit producing the doc is a Washington State 501(c)(3) that has produced and distributed four Emmy Award-winning films to date, co-founded in 2011 by Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Billy Frank Jr., and the director will be Michael Harris, 12-time Emmy Award-winning documentarian, longtime ABC News contributor, former ESPN Baseball Tonight producer, and lifelong (albeit Cincinnati Reds) baseball fan. PLEASE HELP US MAKE THIS FILM, which like the statue now in Cleveland's Little Italy, will be an enduring celebration of "Rocco Socco," as Roger Maris called him, and a hero to us all.