The Cost of Doing Business

The first ball my son ever threw was a plastic baseball and he kept throwing it until he could throw a rubber ball and then a tennis ball, then a real baseball. He hit balls with a plastic bat and then a wooden bat and then a metal bat. He had an infielder's glove, an outfielder's glove, a brief stint catching, and with every step up it got more expensive but we found a way to keep making it happen. It wasn't easy but we knew it was the right investment.  When something went missing or was left at the field there would be a drive back at midnight and a search of everything to find it because he knew there surely wasn't money in the budget for a replacement.  It didn't come easy for us but it came.

When Cole played travel ball I was involved on the money end from the start.  I watched from the outside for a season and knew if they wanted to do the things they aspired to it was going to take money and a lot of it. We started a baseball business because the cost of taking a team of 12 year old ball players on the road coached by a real coach (not their daddy) was expensive.  Since that first team I have looked at the programs as we have moved up and considered how I could help them financially, more to some than others.

I thought when Cole got to college they would have this big whopping budget.  They would pay all my son's school expenses and then fly the boys all over the country playing ball and eating at fine restaurants.  I was in for a rude awakening.  College programs are only different from good travel programs in that everything they do costs more and they do it more frequently.  There are so many aspects of the typical athlete's costs that the average fan never considers.

People think the College of Charleston is a big time program when the reality is they barely get by.  They have two full time assistants, one who works for camp money.  He does it for the love of the game and to build a career.  None of them have gotten to the top of coaching without working another full time job and dressing in the parking lot of a field to put in another ten hour day.  Baseball is the only game based on failure, where you have a play called a sacrifice to help the team win and where stealing is a good thing.  It's hard to understand why these guys are willing to do so much for so little but Pete Rose probably said it best when he said, "I would walk through hell in a gasoline suit to play baseball", I guess that sums up the love of the game.

At a typical away game a big first baseman ambles down the steps of a chartered bus carrying a bucket of baseballs and an equipment bag filled with bats.  He steps in line and collects his meal stipend from the coach and heads in to an average hotel to share a room with one of his teammates.  This is how it breaks down.  His uniform probably cost $300.00 with his cleats, each bat in the equipment bag costs $300.00 and there are at least 20-30, the balls are $5.00 each and they average two dozen per game.  The cost of the bus and rooms runs around $7,000.00 a trip and this is before we even consider a dollar of scholarship funding.  The budgets are big and they have shortfalls and the shortfalls are big.  The most conservative programs are falling short. 

This is the way I see Coach Lee's program. They work hard, long hours, they get their guys the best equipement they can for the money.  They work the sponsors for donations.  They work their donors and then they are at the end of the rope and still have a shortfall. That's when we step up and say we want to invest in your success.  A steak dinner from Outback usually costs you what-$25.00?  Next Thursday you can have a steak dinner and all the beer you can drink after our golf tournament at Patriots Point Links for only twenty bucks.  This meal will buy four baseballs, numerous batting gloves, and contribute to other pieces of equipment.  Come out, have dinner, meet Coach Lee and the players you are investing in because you never know, one day you might be able to say "I bought that major league player a baseball".  Remember it was only a few seasons ago that Brett Gardner was playing at this field.   Really, come and join us.  We will have dinner at 5:00 call me (437-7332) or see me this weekend at the field for a ticket. 

And the next time you see a kid chase a foul ball, help him retrieve it, that's five bucks.

CofC beat both Holy Cross and Charleston Southern yesterday in the frigid cold.

Please come out this weekend for the Alabama Series.  Friday at 6:00 and Saturday and Sunday at 1:00

See you at the field.