In extolling the virtues of playing sports, it has long been said that sports builds character. Yet just as often, sports doesn’t build character; it reveals it.
You will likely find no better example of this quality than the story of Jake Mangum’s journey to Major League Baseball.
Mangum, who rivals Dak Prescott as the most beloved athlete in Mississippi State history, was called up by the Tampa Bay Rays on March 29, the culmination of a relentless five-year odyssey through the minor league affiliates of three different major league clubs. As much as anything, his promotion to the major leagues is case study in persistence.
At every level of the game, from youth travel league to high school to Mississippi State, where he became the all-time hits leader in Southeastern Conference, the only thing Mangum had ever done was succeed.
Even so, Mangum simply wasn’t considered to be major league material by those whose livelihoods rely on evaluation players. In today’s game, it’s all about power and home runs. Mangum was a spray hitter, using all fields, but not much of a home run threat. It was a verdict that seemed destined to seal his fate.
For most college players, their prospects of playing in the big leagues are established after their junior season. By then, the players are 20 years old and the clock is running. Most legitimate prospects are drafted and signed after their junior seasons. Mangum was so lightly regarded after his junior season that he wasn’t drafted until the tail end of the major league draft, the 32nd round and 950th player selected. Today, the draft only goes 20 rounds (615 players), so unlikely are the chances of a player taken after that making it to the majors.
Mangum returned for his senior year, where he established himself as the SEC’s hits leader, a bona fide college baseball star, a player affectionately referred to as “The Mayor Of Starkville.”
Conventional wisdom said that’s where his baseball career would end. At age 23, he was already a year or two older than the other prospects he had competed against in college.
But he wasn’t ready to leave the game.
Mangum was the 115th player taken in the 2019 draft (New York Mets) and was traded twice (to the Marlins, then the Rays) as the infamous player-to-be-named-later – quite literally an afterthought.
At any point over the past five years, it would have been understandable, some would say even wise, for Mangum, now approaching age 30, to have given up baseball and pursue a more achievable career.
Instead, he pressed on.
After tearing it up in spring training, Mangum was the last player to be cut from the Rays’ major league roster before the start of the season, yet another disappointment. But just two games into the season, an injury opened the door for his long-awaited promotion to the major leagues.
That Mangum has cashed in on that opportunity should surprise no one who has followed his career. In four games, Mangum collected eight hits in 15 at-bats (.533 batting average), with two doubles, four runs batted in and three stolen bases. No rookie is off to a better start than the player nobody ever seemed to really want.
Mangum’s is one of the stories that make sports special – the story of a player who overcomes a perceived lack of physical talent through an indomitable will to succeed and a work ethic to match. These qualities are called “immeasurables” and they sometimes prove to be more valuable than raw talent.
Those same qualities can be applied not just in sports, but in all walks of life, which makes Mangum’s story relevant to more than baseball.
For kids, sports stars are heroes mainly because of their exceptional talents, yet most of us don’t have exceptional talents in the things we pursue. That is why the far better role model is the player of modest talent, but the immeasurable qualities of character. Hard work and persistence do not require great talent. Anyone can do that. Successful people choose to. That’s a powerful lesson for a kid to embrace.
That’s what makes Jack Mangum’s story all the more inspiring.
The Dispatch Editorial Board is made up of publisher Peter Imes, columnist Slim Smith, managing editor Zack Plair and senior newsroom staff.
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