{"id":662515,"date":"2026-04-04T09:54:43","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T09:54:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/662515\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T09:54:43","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T09:54:43","slug":"harleysville-boy-throws-out-first-pitch-at-phillies-home-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/662515\/","title":{"rendered":"Harleysville boy throws out first pitch at Phillies home opener"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>                        <a href=\"https:\/\/northpennnow.com\/photos\/2026\/apr\/03\/219180\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/>\n                            <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Screenshot_2026-04-03_at_12-49-18_Harleysville_boy_throws_out_firs_pUoD9oQ_t800.png\" alt=\"\" style=\"width: 100%;\"\/><br \/>\n                        <\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 7px; font-style: italic; font-size: 14px;  \" class=\"mb-4 article-subhead\">Before the game, a celebration in Bibro\u2019s honor was held at Nemours Children\u2019s Hospital in Wilmington, DE<\/p>\n<p>A Harleysville boy who underwent open-heart surgery threw out the first pitch at the Philadelphia Phillies\u2019 opening game Thursday, March 26, against the Texas Rangers.<\/p>\n<p>Ten-year-old Lucas Bibro described the moment as a \u201conce-in-a-lifetime\u201d opportunity.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s really cool,\u201d Bibro told CBS News Philadelphia. \u201cI told most of my friends. They\u2019re a little jealous.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/northpennnow.com\/photos\/2026\/apr\/03\/219182\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Screenshot_2026-04-03_at_12-51-21_Harleysville_boy_throws_out_firs_wufPJjt.png.287x191_q85_box-0,0,5.png\"\/><\/a> \u00a0Lucas Bibro underwent open-heart surgery for a congenital heart defect at the age of 4. (Photo by Jennifer Corbett \/ Nemours Children\u2019s Health)<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/northpennnow.com\/photos\/2026\/apr\/03\/219181\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Screenshot_2026-04-03_at_12-51-25_Harleysville_boy_throws_out_firs_MiH5jaX.png.287x208_q85_box-0,0,5.png\"\/><\/a> \u00a0Lucas Bibro poses for a picture with his family. (Photo by Jennifer Corbett \/ Nemours Children\u2019s Health)<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Before the game, a celebration in Bibro\u2019s honor was held at Nemours Children\u2019s Hospital in Wilmington, Del., where Bibro underwent open-heart surgery for a congenital heart defect at the age of 4. During the event, Bibro practiced with the Phillie Phanatic and received a video message from Phillies superstar second baseman Trea Turner, to whom Bibro threw the ball.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBeing on the field to throw the first pitch of the first game of the season against a really good team \u2026 it\u2019s gonna be a lot of fun,\u201d said father Aaron Bibro, manager of Hatfield Township, to CBS News Philadelphia during the celebration.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before the game, a celebration in Bibro\u2019s honor was held at Nemours Children\u2019s Hospital in Wilmington, DE A&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":662516,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2397],"tags":[5,4,144,25,4216,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-662515","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-phillies","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mlb","10":"tag-philadelphia","11":"tag-philadelphia-phillies","12":"tag-philadelphiaphillies","13":"tag-phillies"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116345839226820598","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=662515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662515\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/662516"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=662515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=662515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=662515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}