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Strategy August 18, 2025

Little Leaguer’s Controversial Bat Flip Celebration Becomes Commemorative Pin

What started as an ejection- and suspension-worthy moment ended with something fans can remember for years thanks to a physical product.

By  Brendan Menapace

Key Takeaways

• Marco Rocco, a 12-year-old Little Leaguer, was initially suspended for a celebratory bat flip but was reinstated after an appeal, turning the moment into a symbol of youthful expression in sports.

• Inspired by MLB players, Rocco’s bat flip was immortalized in a limited-edition collectible pin, tying into the long-standing pin-trading tradition at the Little League World Series.

• The pin’s exclusivity, clear branding and integration into a beloved tradition created a highly engaging and memorable promotional item.

Little Leaguer Marco Rocco probably learned the bat flip from watching the big leagues. At first, the 12-year-old player from New Jersey was in hot water after giving his bat a quick toss after hitting a two-run home run – the umps ejected him, and the league gave him a one-game suspension that would’ve kept him out of a crucial game.

His family appealed, the player was reinstated and now the moment is even being celebrated and commemorated as part of the Little League World Series merchandise collection as a collectible pin.

After Rocco and his family appealed to the league to nix his suspension, word traveled fast through the sport, reaching active and former MLB players, including Jeff and Todd Frazier, who floated the idea of the pin to Marco’s father, Joe.

“They told me that this would be a very hot pin,” Joe Rocco told the Athletic, “and that people would love to have the pin if I was to create it.”

For context: Collectible pins have been part of the Little League World series since the ’70s. The story goes that a team from Chinese Taipei started the tradition by bringing pins as gifts for other players. Since then, there have been official pin-trading events every day during the competition in Williamsport, PA.

The pins showing Rocco’s bat flip feature the player tossing his bat with “Haddonfield,” the town in New Jersey where Rocco’s team hails from, and “Batflip 2025,” positioning the moment as the definitive bat flip moment, even if another kid decides to celebrate a big hit.

Only 75 will be available, and they’re only available through the trading program, rather than placed for sale.

“We all agreed on the design and the number of pins that we were going to release,” Joe Rocco told the Athletic. “We wanted to keep it limited to make sure that it was a rare pin at the event, which is important, so we did it together, and we’ll see how popular it is.”

Joe Rocco is onto something there. This promotion hits at the heart of a few key factors of a successful promo product. Exclusivity drives demand, for one. Think of giveaways at sporting events where it’s advertised from the outset that a limited number will be available. The most recent example of this, keeping within the baseball world, would be the Mac Miller bobblehead that drew crowds lining the streets to Pittsburgh’s PNC Park.

Second, from a design standpoint, they made sure the item itself didn’t just represent an event, it made it impossible to forget who did it, what team he played for and when it happened. Distributors can sometimes lose sight of the aim of a promotional campaign or get too in the weeds of fun design elements or rollouts to remember that the primary function is advertisement. If the brand name isn’t prominently featured and easily remembered, its promotional ability diminishes entirely.

Finally, by tying it into the pin-trading tradition at the Little League World Series, the Roccos created engagement. They weren’t simply handing out the pins, they required the added fun of attending the pin-trading events and doing something memorable.

“It symbolizes more than just a bat flip,” Joe Rocco told the Athletic. “It evolved into a healthy discussion about tradition in sports versus modern expression, and should we let the kids play and have fun versus do we want to maintain a stricter line on sportsmanship.”

With all of those aspects combined, the family created a home run of a promotion. Seems like a bat flip is warranted there, but the powers that be at Little League might feel differently.

Oh, and the bat that Rocco flipped is going up for auction, managed by the star of the Netflix reality show King of Collectibles: The Goldin Touch, fellow New Jersey native Ken Goldin. But that’s another conversation about how simple products can accrue value with the right pinch of magic.