CINCINNATI - TJ Friedl didn’t just jump into the Reds’ Players’ Weekend cleat project because it sounded like a nice gesture. He understood it from the inside.
This weekend in Arizona, as the Reds face the Diamondbacks at Chase Field, plenty of Cincinnati players will wear custom cleats painted by patients at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. The idea has grown fast, but Friedl’s connection to it goes back to a hospital bed in San Francisco.
Before his freshman year of high school in 2010, Friedl spent nearly two months at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital with a sinus cavity infection that required surgery. While other kids were outside playing baseball and basketball, he was stuck inside, dealing with long days and a slow recovery. A renovation to the wing, funded by San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds, helped make the stay more bearable with new TVs, a PlayStation and other amenities.
“It made it a little easier on me to be in there,” Friedl said. “They didn’t let me walk for a little bit.
I was laying in my bed. It was probably a week before I could walk, and it was a week before I could actually walk around.
I didn’t realize how bad it was until maybe a couple of years after. My parents told me that we were very fortunate.”
That experience stuck with him, and it helped shape what he wanted to do when MLB brought back its reimagined Players’ Weekend in 2024 after a five-year break. Friedl had a pair of white Air Jordan cleats in his locker and saw a chance to turn them into something more meaningful by sending them to kids at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital to paint.
He asked Jim Myers, the Reds’ director of player relations and authentics, whether it could happen. Myers took it to the hospital, and the response came quickly.
By the next day, the idea had caught on so strongly that Myers asked Friedl if other players might want to join in. By the time Players’ Weekend arrived, 19 pairs of cleats had been painted by kids at Cincinnati Children’s.
That number has kept climbing. In 2025, 23 players got involved. This year, 25 players - along with manager Terry Francona, though not all are on the active roster - had cleats hand-painted by patients.
“It’s become a team thing, and they’ve done a great job of letting the kids make it their own,” Friedl said.
The players don’t just drop off shoes and wait for the finished product. They also share details about themselves so the kids have a starting point if they need one.
Matt McLain’s pair includes blue and yellow for UCLA, his alma mater. Friedl’s cleats this year include nods to basketball and golf.
Last year, he also had Taco Bell cleats, tied to what he called his cheat meal.
“I had Taco Bell cleats last year, which was really cool because that’s my cheat meal - Taco Bell. It always has been,” Friedl said.
Devin Young, who owns D’s Heat Customs, handles the painting process by prepping the shoes, showing the kids how to work on them and then getting them ready for game use.
The project has also turned into a fundraiser. Last weekend, during the Cincinnati Children’s Employee Appreciation Games, Friedl presented a check for $7,490 from auction proceeds tied to last year’s shoes.
And the work hasn’t stopped at cleats. Friedl also staged a “reverse signing” event last year with Topps, creating baseball cards for some of the patients. The Reds hosted the kids at Great American Ball Park before a game, and the children signed their cards for players.
“It’s awesome that something like that can get their mind off of what they’re going through,” utility player Spencer Steer said. “They’re fighting tougher battles than we’ll ever go through. The fact that you have to see kids go through that is unfortunate, that there’s that kind of suffering in this world, but through that suffering, you see glimpses of hope.”
Tyler Stephenson added to the effort this year by ordering a white chest protector and shin guards for kids to paint. Like the cleats, those pieces of catching gear will be auctioned off, with the money going back to the hospital.
“Since we were already doing the cleats, why not do catching gear to match it?” Stephenson said.
“I have no idea what it’s going to be. It’ll be a surprise for me, and I’m excited to see it.”
For Friedl and his teammates, the impact goes well beyond the auction totals. Myers said players are making hospital visits on their own, often without cameras or media around.
“I have guys who will go on their own and do room-to-room visits, and they request no cameras, no media,” Myers said this week. “I just got back from the hospital an hour ago, where a player visited five kids on one floor who are all going through some hard times.
He was in a gown; he had a mask and goggles. It didn’t faze him one bit.
He was going room to room, making sure everyone had time. He had gift bags; he was signing autographs and taking photos.
That’s the kind of ripple effect that TJ Friedl has had on this locker room.”
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