I have really been enjoying Doug Glanville’s posts on Substack. You can follow them here if you choose. This weekend he had one on the passing of some players he knew or knew of, and in the midst of that reflection was this…
“But in baseball, to live up to that destiny, you have to stay young in the game. You must feel like you can never run out of time to fulfill your destiny. You have to remember the Wiffle ball games at dusk with your brother or playing Little League for Joey’s Children Wear. The voices of the game from our childhood have to echo—whether from a radio or a high-def screen. And for those lucky enough to play on baseball’s biggest stage, youth must always be front and center—to stay relevant, healthy, and relatable to its future.”
The value again of staying young and relevant in thought and action. Obviously harder, impossible, to do on the field of play in professional sports…as the line in Moneyball goes…”We love playing the child’s game, sometimes we get to play it for a few years, some of us for decades, but we can’t play it forever.”…but in our daily actions, our lifetime of curious learning and growing should always continue.
I write this because there is a passion of mine…one that is hard to focus on because it is so unwieldy…might finally after years be coming around to bear fruit in places, and I thought by sharing it maybe others may know of seeds that have been planted elsewhere that can grow together into this orchard I have in mind.
Those who do follow my wanderings may know about my curious interest in learning, and that is tied to the time I spend not just in the classrooms in places like Columbia and Fordham but in conversations as well with so many young people. It comes from the past I believe, especially my father Vinny, who never met a question he couldn’t ask, and was a gatherer of facts, figures and oddities far and wide. That gene I guess has been passed to at least me.
Part of that gathering and learning from younger folks came from the classes I did first t Columbia and then at The School of the NY Times in summers past, laying out a program and then listening and learning from young people for periods of two to three weeks about the business of sports. While I have not done those classes in several years…although I gladly will go and speak and listen as guest to almost anyone who asks…the young people who I was honored to have known when they were 15,16,17 and have know grown in to leaders of industry and thought a decade or more later are literally living proof that those planted seeds grow into vast trees, and that the time spent was, and always is, worthwhile and mutually beneficial.
I constantly run into people who were in those classes, and I can safely say the pleasure is, and will always be, mine, to listen and learn from them as much today as it was then.
I raise all this because this “thing” I have been chasing is a unification of sorts of all these smart young minds and their mentors. While I believe that some of these summer programs and even many “sports business” programs don’t bring tremendous value, I do believe that those leading them have a dedicated commitment for growth to help young people learn about a path forward. It’s not for me to judge who does it well and who doesn’t.
However here is the goal, and what I seek. A way to better connect all these groups, these classes, these young curious minds, into a network of sharing and learning not just for them, but for our business and society as well. I recently have been contacted by several HIGH SCHOOLS who have started either “sports business” clubs or programs as a course of study, and most say the same thing…we know we have kids, especially a growing number of girls…who are interested in a field, but we have no idea how to do this. Can you help? The answer is yes.
This ties to another theory I have chased for years, and recently had it reignited after reading a story about Chuck Todd’s latest endeavor tied to local news, which you can read here. What if you took these local clubs and classes, married them with kids who are interested in media, in stats, in production, and were able to literally build a network for both high school and college where there was a platform to give them the ability to both do hyper local real life learnings, but also from time to time brought in national opportunities for coverage and engagement? During the Pandemic, we tested the idea, taking some of our SONYT students who created local clubs in NY, Texas, Pennsylvania and California, and did a Zoom call with colleagues like Mike Breen and Andy Dolich, who gave an hour of their time for these kids. It was amazing the interaction that was smart and to the point.
Of course, those ideas without focus move on, maybe they were too early in a process, but the concept was proved.
And maybe, the time is now to re-start the idea as a next chapter. Now what I don’t want this to be is a for-profit land grab. There are groups who reach out in the for-profit education space that are a mile wide and an inch deep and promise on a great deal for big dollars and deliver very little. No interest in doing that. I have no interest in stealing from kids and parents and teachers and coaches.
What I do have an interest in is helping unite these kids, these clubs, these aspiring media types, and seeing where it goes. If it turns into a business great, if it is for Karmic good that I can out some time towards, that’s OK too, it’s much more about the journey and meeting these people and learning than it is about the rush for dollars. At least that’s what I have found.
So, here’s the question. If you know of a club or a class or a school on any level that is looking to build a learning network, let me know. Just email me at joefavorito1@yahoo.com. The recent outreach tells me there is a trend starting to grow, and maybe, maybe the time is right to pull them all together and prove a larger concept. Maybe we build a network of Next Gen media people, team owners, and groundskeepers. Maybe not.
If we don’t try to learn, we may never know.
Fertilize the seeds, and let’s see what sprouts.
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