Building A Baseball Career From The Ground Up

Lots of kids grow up dreaming of being pro athletes. If you love baseball, there's nothing better than dreaming about playing in the Major Leagues.

Lucas Tornow takes a more grounded approach.

Literally.

His roots in baseball run deep. His dad, Ted, has been in baseball management for well over 30 years, the last 25+ as general manager for the Clinton LumberKings. His older brother, Brett, just took on a front office position with the Madison Mallards after two years with Birmingham and another with the Wiscosin Timber Rattlers in Appleton, WI. While Lucas has turned his attention to the field, Brett would like to follow the GM path like his dad.

Lucas Tornow spent this past summer as one of three interns with the grounds crew of the Milwaukee Brewers, mowing, trimming, dragging and preparing the American Family Field for day games and night games. He started his internship April 18th and was with the club until August 2.

"In high school I worked with the grounds crew more as a hobby than a job," explains Tornow. "I enjoy baseball fields. Caring for them, preparing them. Originally, when I went to college, it was for kinesology. I was thinking of getting into strength and conditioning training with pro teams.

"But I enjoyed the grounds crew thing so much, I just thought let's go full steam ahead. One of my best friends from high school, Tanner, was a year ahead of me in school. He worked with me at Clinton then went to Kirkwood (Community College) and did an internship (in Milwaukee). He put in a good word for me (in Milwaukee). I applied and got the position."

Tornow is in his second year at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. His goal now is a major in Turf Management. After he completes his two years at Kirkwood, he looks to enrolling in one of the top-notch programs in the country, like Penn State or Iowa State.

"I have one more semester at Kirkwood. I graduate in the spring (of 2023) and am in the process of looking around for the next step. I'm interested in baseball (as a career), but maybe will expand to other industries."

Caring for a Major League ballfield is not a simple task, even with a big staff (9 or 10 full-time groundskeepers, another 20-25 part-timers and three interns). Days, and nights, could be long.

"For a typical day game (a 1:10 p.m. start) we interns would be there all day. That started at 7 a.m. mowing the outfield and infield (the fields are mowed every morning during the season, taking about 35 minutes for the group. Then clay work, patching the pitching mound and home plate, then the bullpens. Setting up for infield practice and batting practice (BP) follows.

"We would repatch after BP, check moisture contents, drag the infield, paint the foul lines, putting in the bases. Watering the infield would follow. We go out and drag the infield in the third, fifth and seventh innings. The atmosphere on game day was just insane."

Then there's post-game, with duties written on the board in the office the head of the crew keeps. 

"Us interns would be moved around until we hit a niche task. Might be BP, home plate, dragging, patching, tarps, watering. It would be 6 or 7 o'clock before we were done. A 12 or 14 hour day. About the same amount of time for a night game, though we had a night game that went 14 innings, so I didn't get out of the ballpark until 2 a.m. and was right back at 7 that morning."

Night games saw the interns broken up into shifts, with two going in at 8 a.m. and out at the first pitch while the other came in at noon and worked until the shift ended. When the Brewers were on the road, the grounds crew would be in from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Although Tornow said that in the hotter months, July and August, they worked 6 a.m. to noon.

"We worked hard and I loved lit. Overall the experience, the working, the relationships were just amazing. I knew a little bit (about turf management) going in, but I learned a lot from being there. It was a good summer and I enjoyed it a lot. We had a lot of interaction with the players, more than I expected to have.

"I spent a lot of time working in the bullpens and got to know a lot of those pitchers.

"The craziest day we had, the most insane, was after the Kenny Chesney concert. We had 36 hours from the time the concert ended until game's first pitch. Setting up for that, with the club on the road, we worked either a 7 a.m.-3 p.m. shift or 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. We were putting tarp on the infield, stakes and chains around the infield to keep equipment off of it, flooring around the (outfield) warning track so they could bring their equipment out to set up the stage.

"Tear down of the state took until 10 a.m., we worked 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. to re-sod and fix the infield, mow and cut everything since there hadn't been any mowing done in three days."

Tornow was a multiple sport athlete in high school, playing baseball all four years as well as football and giving a shot wrestling, golf and track.

None of those sports prepared him for the ultimate athletic test:  Taking part in the Famous Sausage Race between innings at American Family Field.

"My last month in Milwaukee, the event people came and said they had openings in the race, did any of us interns wanted to take part. I wasn't sure if I did. To be honest, I was afraid of falling or knocking somebody over. But I finally said okay, and had to head out to get ready right after we had dragged the infield.

"I was pulling on the gear and sweating up a storm right before we ran."

Tornow and the other volunteer were given the lighter costumes. Tornow was the Hot Dog.

"They said the Chorizo was the heaviest to wear, along with the Polish. Our's were not too bad, but it's really, really hard to see in those. And my hair was pretty long at the time, so I couldn't wear a hat under the costume. My sweaty hair is in my eyes. I'm inhaling hair, can't see.

"And no, I didn't win. Took third. But it was incredibly fun. I was skeptical about doing it at first, but I'm glad I had a chance to race. It was great."

If it seems like the grounds crews work a lot of hours during the season, it's only because it's true. And that didn't leave much time to explore Milwaukee.

"I usually had my week (40 hours) in by Thursday. After that it was overtime. I didn't get out to see the much of the city. We, the whole grounds crew, did get to an axe-throwing bar one night, then over to an Ian's Pizza. I did get to Summerfest. I didn't know what to expect, but it was great. We would leave work at 11 and head down there every single night."