The Biggest Step in My Life...So Far

Well, for those of you who didn't know by now, I have accepted a job with the Dunedin Blue Jays, the Advanced-A team in the Toronto Blue Jays system. I will be working as a communications intern with the team, which will mean I'll be working a lot on the writing end of things: press releases, articles about the team, stuff for the website, gameday productions (like the updated play-by-play you get on the GameCenters for Internet coverage) and so on. I'm also hoping I'll be able to hit the mike a couple of times as a public announcer or a promotions guy, or even as a play-by-play guy. It's interesting to note how I got here in the first place.

First, I took time off from work to...well, go work. The Major League Baseball Winter Meetings were in Las Vegas this year, and at it was the PBEO Job Fair, where 500 young guys (and a couple of old dudes) would descend upon the Las Vegas Convention Center at the Las Vegas Hilton to try and start or improve their career in the wonderful world of professional baseball. This being my first time to an event of this stature, I was a bit intimidated.

Sunday was a day of getting in there with everyone and listening to what the guys in the business had to say about trying to get a job at the fair. Everyone had their own stories, and it was fun to hear them, but I was in tunnel vision mode. I was ready for the job room to open so that I could see my prospects. I had 10 folders full of my play-by-play stuff and 20 extra resumes to see what I could find. I go in...and there's three play-by-play jobs. And about 30 guys going after them. Odds aren't in anybody's favor. That being said, I came there to get a job, so that's what I do. I take a look, put three packets in the box they set up, and off I went.

The next day was when everything started getting going. That's when there was 500 people in the convention hall at the same time. It was also when you got down to business and started networking. It was cool because all you had to do was sit down and you'd see somebody just waiting. Nothing really changed for that first day. You'd go look at the job postings in the job room, you'd go put a resume in the box for that job, and then you'd wait for the job posting to go up for interviews. It was tireless, but in the meantime, it allowed you to kinda relax and just talk to people. There was this group of people from Indiana University there, about 25 of them, and a lot of us stragglers sat down together and just talked up stuff. A lot of them were there in lieu of classes, and were pushing it right up to finals time, which is pretty crazy. I commend them for getting out there and looking for a job that they could get as soon as school is over, though. This was also the day where I discovered the absolutely horrible pain that comes when you have to break in new shoes by walking around everywhere. Yeah, not good. The blisters on my Achilles started forming and it wasn't looking good.

It was about the end of the day when I saw an old friend of mine walk up who I hadn't seen in a good year, Mike Nielsen, who works in ticket sales for the Blue Jays. I got to talking to him for a bit and he told me about the communications job, and that's when the wheels started turning. Perhaps, I thought, maybe this wasn't the time to be totally about the play-by-play jobs where the odds were against me. Of course, you put in for them, but know you have enough on your plate to try other stuff. This job was right up my alley. He added me to the interview list for Tuesday and he told me to bring writing samples. No problem, I said.

Tuesday was "moving day" as you might say. Since everybody had an idea as to what the fair was like at this point, a couple of us decided to get up and walk around and check out the sites, including the Trade Fair, where you could get a bunch of stuff for free. So myself and my new buddy Sean Rosales from IU decided to walk over. When we got there, we were about 10 minutes early, so we went to Starbucks to bide the time. Turned out to be a blessing in disguise. We were looking at that whole Illinois governor stuff that was going on and we were commenting on it, when a guy in front of us had one of the passes we had for the Winter Meetings. Turns out he was the co-owner of the Billings Mustangs. I mentioned that I have family in Billings (Hi, Uncle Bob and Aunt Julie!) and we got to talking a bit. The guy in front of him then turned around and joined in. Turns out he was the co-GM of the San Antonio Missions. Sean was happy because he grew up in Texas before going to IU. So the four of us got to talking a bit about a bunch of random stuff, including what the cities were like and what they did with the teams and such.

After we got our drinks, the guy from the Missions called us over and we talk with him for about a half hour while we suck down our contributions to capitalism. It was neat to hear him talk about all the players he got to see come through there, as it's the AA team for the San Diego Padres. He was a great guy to talk to and he had some great insight into a lot of players. As a co-GM, there's some personnel decisions you have to make that could make or break your team, so this was pretty nice. Who would have figured one of the best experiences we had would have been at a Starbucks? After the drinks were done, we said our goodbyes and went to the Trade Show, where you could get you some free stuff. I got a couple of hats and that was about it.

So then Sean and I came back and I got word from Mike about an interview in the afternoon with him and a co-worker, Janette, who works with gameday operations. Mike shows up, but Janette can't make it because of a previous interview. So Mike and I basically chitchat for an hour and I give him the writing samples that I went and printed out as another guy that I met down there, Bill. He says that we'll meet again on Wednesday with him, Janette and the GM. So this is a HUGE deal for me, mainly because the other jobs I posted for haven't panned out. I went after 14 jobs and 3 didn't take me (including a weird one where a broadcasting internship had only two interviews and they were both from the Japanese contingent that was at the meetings) and the others were taking a long time to decide on, which was fine. I knew the broadcasting jobs needed to be reviewed thoroughly because it was more than just looking at a resume. So I finished out Tuesday as the blisters got so bad I could barely walk.

Wednesday, I threw a changeup to my Achilles: I went with my MJ's. Yep, went to casual shoes, but luckily, after my second trip to the Trade Show (WHERE I MET GEORGE BRETT! No, no word on the "pine tar incident" as he was there just selling stuff for his bat company.) I picked up a bag to hold some of my free stuff. So, I just put my dress shoes in the bag so that the non-broken in shoes didn't kill my heels anymore. I just decided to slide them on when the interview came. Turned out it worked. While it was still hard to walk, the shoes allowed me to breathe a bit, so then when it came to switch up, it wasn't TOO bad.

So here came the trio that could decide my fate. Shook their hands and basically forced myself to walk as fast as they could back inside to the table. I sat down, and they conducted the interview. The GM, Shelby, liked what he saw and I thought the interview went well. So I go back and sit down with the IU people. The other guy, someone named Graham (who was from Hercules) went over and he had his interview. I looked over a couple of times to see what was going on, but I just kind of sat and waited to see what they were going to do. Graham left a few minutes later and I just went about my business. Then, Mike came over and called me back. That's when Shelby offered me the job. I asked how long I had to give him an answer, and he said Monday. I called Blake and told him to come pick me up because we needed to celebrate with pancakes. That's what we promised! I then called my mom and nearly cried when I told her the news (I'm a softy. So what!) and she couldn't believe it herself. I think it was about as pumped up as I ever could be. I had a job in professional baseball.

Now, I'm two weeks away from being on the road east to my new adventure, and I start this blog with the idea that you will all stay tuned to the next episode in my life! Next, Tim and Blake do Vegas big. Then small. Then big again. Then small. Then smaller.