So a few weeks ago, I made mention that my future plans included a year-long stint at Florida State University as I pursued a Masters in Sports Management. Well...a funny thing happened on the way to Tallahassee and that is no longer the plan. I have been spending the last week back home in Morganton getting ready for this major new development, one that came in one whirlwind week back in July.
The month of July was pretty stressful, to say the least. I had to deal with the stresses of figuring out to pay for school by working countless double shifts at the Bistro and trying to find an assistantship that would cover part of my tuition for the fall. At the same time, I’m also dealing with finding a place to live in a city I have never visited and contemplating the logistics of such a move. To say the least, I was a little stressed out. But as my assistantship spot disappeared and I was growing more and more weary of serving snooty restaurant-goers, life threw me a curve-ball out of nowhere and I think I may have hit that one out of the park.
Completely out of the blue, I was offered a job. Not a part-time job, not a work study job, but a legit, big-boy-pants-wearing job with a company called DVSport, a company I had worked with while at the ACC. This is the company that provided the video capture that I used every Saturday in the Operations Center, but they also offer the same services to all the ACC schools, Big East Schools, and half of the NFL. After about two days of decision-making, I put in my notice as a waiter, celebrated the fact I won’t have to go to sit in a classroom again anytime soon and took the position of N.C. Account Manager for DVSport, Inc. Now at this point you are probably asking, “Gee, Zach. With this new job, will you still be able to put a column together (almost) every week?” The answer to that question is “Why yes, Little Jimmy. With all my new material, I can’t afford not to.”
My job requires me to perform equipment installs, offer customer support, and train school/team employees on how to use the programs. The best perk of the job is that I have no office in Charlotte so I will constantly be “on location” when I’m on the clock. I have been employed for a 10 days and in that time I have visited Gardner-Webb University, Roush-Fenway Racing HQ, and Carolina Panthers Training Camp and in the next month I am scheduled for most of the ACC schools and even a trip up to Pittsburgh to check out how the Steelers run their system. With this sort of work schedule, I can give a perspective that most sports pages can’t offer.
In what began as a column about the life of the student-athlete, this weekly feature will now give an inside look at the roles behind-the-scene workers have in big time sports. Sportscenter will some time lead you to believe that the hardest-working people in a sports franchise are the athletes but in the short time I have been with DVSport, I have seen that there are countless, unnamed staff members who help get these teams up and running. While a video coordinator may never make the evening highlights, at least someone like that can get a shout out in the blog or in the Morganton News Herald.
Speaking of shout-outs, I once again would like to thank everyone for their continued support of this column. I assure you every compliment that you give my parents is passed right on to me and I am truly thankful that you enjoy reading my weekly musings (I wish some of my college professors had felt the same way). So as you drink your morning coffee, I ask that you raise your cup and make a toast to the future. It can truly change in an instant but when it does, it is usually the start of something great.
(Note: This article was written for the Morganton News Herald in June 2011)
One of my favorite parts about writing this blog last year was the therapy that went along with it. During my senior year at Guilford, it offered the opportunity to frame both my successes and stresses that accompanied the day-to-day life as a student athlete. The good times got to be relived/re-imagined and the not-so-good times were able to be put into perspective. In the two months that have passed since my student-athlete life ended, I still feel like I’m still on the same roller coaster with my life having many ups and downs over the last two months.
My original plan for the post-Guilford life was to stay in Greensboro for the summer, work a part time job, then find a full-time gig while making a little cash on the side. Let’s just say that that plan didn’t exactly come to fruition. Anyone else who is currently seeking a job knows how tough it is to get hired in today’s job market. So not only was I getting no job opportunities on the full-time front but I was struggling to even find a part-time job. Following applications to Best Buy, the Apple Store, Dicks, seven different GameStop stores being passed over, I was able to utilize a connection to enter a whole new world of employment: Food Service.
The closest thing I have ever done to waiting tables was running the lemonade stand I used to have at the Valdese Waldensian Festival, so this was uncharted territory for me. Working at the Print Works Bistro in Greensboro requires a strong knowledge of not only the menu, but also the 50+ wines that we offer by the glass. This requires a ton of studying, almost-daily training tests, and then working as a part of a large team. Waiting has been a very different experience for me but the lifestyle that goes along with it is very similar to that of a student-athlete. I’ve been working long hours for unusually low tips just trying to make enough cash to live on for the Fall months for the next big step in my life.
During this time that I’ve been cramming food ingredients and fine wines into my brain, I’ve also been doing lots of academic work in preparing for my post-graduate education. When my prospects for a full-time job evaporated, I began studying for the GRE test and searching for grad schools to attend for either an MBA or Sports Management track. Luckily, I was able to get a solid score despite only having 12 days to prepare. As of this writing, I have been accepted to and plan on attending Florida State University in the Fall for a masters in Sports Management. With all my experience working for the ACC, choosing a school in the conference made the most sense to pursue. However, my Gator-loving brother-in-law obviously disagrees with this logic. A few more steps have to be made before this is 100% confirmed but things are looking pretty good right now.
I’m pumped for the next big adventure my life has waiting for me as it will be a great reward for the amount of work I’m putting in at the Bistro. Lots of double shifts, teenagers stiffing me on tabs, and exhausting opening and closing shifts are giving me some great new skills but definitely challenging my body and mind. I just have to convince myself that I am more than willing to work a job right now that isn’t perfect for me in order to put me in position to find what my real career will be.
On May 7th, 2011, four years of studying, stressing, and occasional sleepless nights all came to its stunning conclusion as I, along with over 400 classmates and nine of my teammates, received our degrees from Guilford College. The entire weekend was an emotional one as I was thrilled to have this chapter of my life come to an end but also sad in that all the friends I had met in the last four years would all be headed off in different directions. To be honest, all of those sad feelings came a few days later as the time spent on Saturday was spent reflecting on how great the school had been to me.
In the four years I spent at Guilford, I went from being an 18-year old whose sole purpose in life was to become a pro baseball player to a well-rounded 22-year old who sees a future in a number of different fields. I owe that all to the Liberal Arts atmosphere of the college. Because there are only around 1,200 traditional students at Guilford, one student can have the chance to make an impact in a variety of different departments. As a student at Guilford, I also served as a radio DJ, sports broadcaster, stat-keeper, PA announcer, campus tour guide, an the president of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee. The opportunities are there for anyone who attends the school and it’s just a matter of how willing you are to seek out the opportunities. It’s scary to think that it would have been fully possible that I never would have been able to have those opportunities.
When I was college-searching Guilford was not my first choice. Despite this fact, the first time I set foot on the campus and took a look around, there was an intangible feeling that the school “felt right.” After being wait-listed at a few other schools I was considering, I had no reservations in choosing to attend school and play baseball as a Guilford Quaker. Even though my baseball career didn’t pan out in the way that I had hoped, if I had to make the decision again, Guilford would be at the top of my list.
I am thankful for baseball leading me to Guilford because it was the number one reason for me attending the school. There were times when baseball wasn’t going so well that I began questioning what would have happened if I had taken a risk in going to a different school. Sure, the what-if’s for baseball could have been better, but when I thought about the stuff that really mattered pertaining my education and my post-baseball life, I was crazy to ever think about going anywhere else. Here are the answers I have come up with to the question, “What if I had never gone to Guilford?”
-I would have never had the chance to make the friends I made.
-I would have never had a friendship with the college’s President to the point we exchanged a secret handshake at graduation before he handed me my degree.
-I would have never started interning with the ACC.
-I would have never travelled to Tampa for the ACC Tournament or to Dallas for an NCAA conference.
-I would have never successfully petitioned for a racquetball court to be built on campus.
-I would have never been able to double-major-I would have never met Erin Andrews, Jen Brown, Reese Davis and other ESPN personalities.
and most importantly,
-I would have never had been asked to write a blog that would become a weekly article in the Morganton News Herald...
Guilford College offered me such a wide variety of opportunities while I attended the school and the degree I have received is starting to open doors for me off of its campus. Graduation made me more thankful for all the time I spent practicing baseball as I was growing up because had I never spent those 100 degree July afternoons taking batting practice, then I never would have had the chance to have a secret handshake with President Kent Chabotar on that perfect, 70 degree morning in May.
Four years is a long time. I’ve been fortunate that my time at Guilford has not had the eternal feeling that loomed over my four years of high school. With less than a month left before I graduate from college, I am spending about half that time preparing for my final round of exams and the other half closing all the doors I opened during my Guilford career. Considering that baseball was the primary reason that I ever found out Guilford College existed, it’s fitting that one of the first door I had to close involved playing one more baseball game at McBane Field.
Compared to the Senior Day I had at Freedom where I was able to knock a grand slam in my final high school at-bat, this time around the performance was not nearly as memorable. A series of unfortunate, only-in-baseball, events surrounded my start in the final game of the season where I threw well in my farewell appearance but the opposing team simply had my number that day. For myself and my senior teammates it was a special day but to the Baseball Gods it was just another day of madness.
Unfortunately, we dropped two games to the league-leading Bridgewater College but the redeeming factor of this sweep was that due to action around the league, we clinched the #5 spot in our conference tournament. Considering that were were the first Guilford team to make the tournament since 2006, this accomplishment put a festive spin on the two losses. The day demonstrated another example of how baseball is a crazy game while also showing me another example of how special my time at Guilford has been.
The first example that comes to mind came during the pregame ceremony for the senior class. After my name had been called and I was watching the rest of my teammates be recognized, standing next to myself and my family was the president of my college. Kent Chabotar, who was escorting his nephew who is also a senior, made a rare appearance out of a three-piece suit (Seriously, the man almost always wears a suit!) to fill in for my teammate’s parents. As he was standing there with his nephew, he wasn’t just waiting for the ceremony to end but instead was talking my Dad’s ear off about the photographer that the school hired for the event. Kent is not the kind of president who watches the school run itself from an ivory tower but a man who is involved in every facet of the institution. Just a reminder of how the man cares about every student who attends the school as well as the parents who support them.
Easily, the most special part of this season has been having the opportunity to spend 40 games and countless practices with one of the best collections of people I have ever been associated with. My teammates are truly a unique group of people, all of whom I love to death. This was a team that had my back on and off the field and featured a wide variety of personalities that made the time on the field and in the dugout just fly by. With a common love of baseball, I was able to become great friends with all the younger players while becoming brothers with my fellow seniors. When the season is all over, it will be the people that I miss the most.
Luckily for me and my fellow seniors, unlike the three classes we saw end their careers on senior day, our ODAC tournament berth has extended our Guilford careers for at least another week. This allowed Senior Day to be more of a celebration of our time with the team, rather than a mourning over the end of baseball careers. With that said, I am aware that the end is coming soon and I can say with total honesty that I am not sure If I am ready for it to end. I guess we’ll find out soon...
As I mentioned in the intro to last weeks article, I spent last weekend making a five-and-a-half hour trip to Atlanta with two of my friends to attend what is considered to be the Super Bowl of professional wrestling. While I’m sure some of you may be laughing right now and asking why I would travel so far and spend the money to attend an event that is simply the climax of a steroid-enhanced soap opera. The simple answer: It’s Wrestlemania.
I became a fan of professional wrestling back in the 90’s when the business was at it’s absolute peak. However, unlike most of my friends who were watching Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock duke it out on WWF’s Monday Night Raw, I was watching their competitor WCW. There were two reasons behind this choice. 1: My brother turned me into a huge Ric Flair Fan (WHOOOOOOO!) and that was the only show where I could see the Nature Boy and 2: My parents wouldn’t let me watch the raunchy, over-the-top antics of the WWF. Even as a kid, I was fully aware of the scripted nature of the shows but one thing my brother told me was able to keep my interest in the product. He told me that all the non-title matches were fake but when a championship was on the line they were real. If you have a kid/sibling who likes pro wrestling, I highly recommend using that line to ween them into knowing the truth behind the product.
After WCW was bought out by the WWF in 2001 I lost interest for a while but I started watching the renamed WWE around 2004 when WCW mainstay Goldberg joined the company. SInce then I’ve been a casual fan, occasionally watching the shows but mostly just reading the news and results online. When my friends and I found out that Wrestlemania XXVII was being held in the Georgia Dome last year, we decided that we needed to make the trip since Atlanta would most likely be the closest that Wrestlemania would ever be held in relation to NC. Throw in the fact that The Rock was making his return to the show after 7 years in Hollywood and we were fully sold.
Simply put, the trip was amazing. When we got to the Georgia Dome they had just opened the doors to the building and we immediately filed in. Seeing the huge stage setup, the ring in the middle of a football field and the thousands of empty seats that were soon to be filled was an amazing sight. With our seats in the upper deck, we could take the time to appreciate how intricate the lighting setup, stage and other features were and realizing that it probably took several months to make the arena ready for the show. Bell time was 7pm and by then the crowd was buzzing and ready for the show.
In all honesty, the show itself was not too impressive. The Undertaker had a great match with Triple H and the main event of the show between John Cena and the Miz nearly ended in a double-countout draw. Throw in some underwhelming undercard matches and the show could have been considered a disappointment to some fans. Luckily, the event itself is what was worth the price of admission. We were in a building holding 71,816 wrestling fans who had travelled from all over the world to see this event. I met people from Great Britain, Denmark, and Australia who spent thousands to come see this event. Just the buzz around the show and the atmosphere within made the show worthwhile. It’s kind of like if you paid to go to the Super Bowl but the actual game wasn’t competitive...just being there is half the fun.
Despite all it’s gimmicks and silliness, professional wrestling is a very intriguing business and it is simply amazing how Vince McMahon took the wrestling industry out of dark armory buildings and has kept it on a worldwide stage for nearly 30 years. The business is a lot like running a sports franchise with the perk of being able to control what happens in front of the camera. Baseball, football, and basketball (Butler/UConn is a good example) can’t do that. Whenever a man is able to convince over 71,000 fans to pay to attend a scripted event that will guarantee some quality action, you realize that Mr. McMahon must be doing something right. Afterall, with Wrestlemania XXVII being held in Miami next year, the man already has my friends and I pondering another trip to WWE’s “Grandest Stage of Them All.”
