It’s 10:15 on a Saturday morning and Green Quad Field 3 at Cornerstone Park in Starkville is a beehive of baseball activity.
In the infield, a group of 6- and 7-year-olds are practicing; fielding – or attempting to field – ground ball after ground ball amid shouts of encouragement.
“Shuffle, shuffle. Good! Let’s go.”
“Show me that arm, we wanna see it!”
The encourager-in-chief is the man in the red baseball cap with the fungo bat, longtime youth coach and owner of Bull Baseball Club, Chancy Rogers.
Rogers and a group of volunteer coaches are hosting a travel-ball tryout on this muggy Saturday morning, and his energy is infectious.
“I enjoy baseball, number one, but when I was little, when I played in high school, and in college, too, I was energy,” Rogers told The Dispatch. “I was a lot of energy. I was smaller than everyone else, but I liked getting after it and always wanted to make the big play.”
Rogers, a Leakesville native, was an All-State second baseman at Greene County High School, before matriculating to Jones College and moving to shortstop. After his playing career ended, Rogers chased his other dream – music – spending time in Nashville and Austin writing songs and trying to get noticed. But baseball was always in the back of his mind.
“After I played baseball in college, everybody wanted me to coach,” he said. “I had some buddies that went into coaching and it just looked like it was a terrible life to me. You had to drive a bus…the hours you put in. I just ran away from it.”
No matter how far he ran, he couldn’t escape that old familiar pull of life on the diamond.
Every time I’d come home, I’d always go to the high school and see the up-and-coming players out there,” Rogers said. “I’d go out there and throw BP, help kids on the fly, hit ‘em ground balls and I just enjoyed that. … So, it was always in the back of my mind, if I had a chance to go do baseball, I’d almost do it for free.”
Rogers eventually reconnected with a friend in St. Louis, who was working for Rawlings Prospects, and made the move to the River City.
“I was single, no kids,” Rogers said. “I just kind of went on a gamble to see what it was like, and when I got St. Louis, it was crazy.”
In St. Louis, he was exposed to the business side of youth baseball, which includes private lessons, club teams, and hundreds of parents willing to pay for their boys to get those experiences. It “opened his eyes,” he said, and he stayed a year before moving to Hattiesburg and working with his dad’s indoor air quality company in an effort to pay the bills while he pursued a career path in baseball.
And, in 2013, everything changed when he launched Bull Baseball Training, which eventually morphed into the Bull Baseball Club organization he runs now. His reputation as a teacher, coach and organizer spread, and his classes and individual coaching sessions were soon in high demand.
“Baseball just totally exploded to where I didn’t have time to do anything else,” Rogers said. “And I was making enough to sustain doing it full time.”
A baseball family
Rogers’ wife, Allison, said she understands what it means to be a full-time baseball wife and mother. The couple have one son, Nolan, who also loves baseball.
“I knew long before we tied the knot that this was the life I was signing up for – I even mentioned it in my wedding vows,” Allison Rogers said. “We both love to travel and baseball has taken us to some incredible places. It’s all about how I’ve chosen to perceive it – and it’s been a beautiful ride so far.”
But Chancy Rogers is not immune to the criticisms of travel ball that exist in some circles; is it too much, too soon?
“I always compare it to, if you have a daughter who does gymnastics, it’s not just something she can do in the backyard,” he said. “She has to be a part of a program. … They practice more than our baseball boys, I promise you.”
He believes the key is balance – allowing youth players to explore opportunities outside of rec leagues while emphasizing fun and growth.
“Let them experience everything. Kids need to be kids, and we don’t need to just try to make them pro players at 5, 6, 7 years old,” Rogers said. “But they do need to also understand that you can’t just show up and be as good as everybody else who is doing something every day or every week.”
Baseball, maybe more so than other sports, is a metaphor for life. Success requires discipline, patience and consistency, and all that comes easier if you’re having fun.
“Life is hard, you’ve got to make adjustments every day. You’ve got to enjoy the work part,” he said. “Showing up and playing the games are fun, but to be really good at it, you have to enjoy the work. You have to be aware for long periods of time without a lot of action going on. Life’s like that sometimes.”
Despite his best efforts, Rogers can’t seem to quit baseball. Or, maybe it can’t quit him. Either way, he finds joy in helping his players get better.
“I don’t know if it’s cockiness or just a lot of confidence that by the end of the year they’re going to get better because we put time and energy into it,” Rogers said. “And that’s a kind of a rush, a high for me.”
Rogers doesn’t know where this ride will take him. His wife’s job – she works as an assistant director of counseling and sport psychology for Mississippi State University athletics, brought them, and Bull Baseball, to Starkville, and the Rogers have made a home in the Golden Triangle. For now, he’s content with expanding his company and working with a new crop of players in a new area.
“I always just call it a bonus. I get paid to do this, but I get a bonus when I see the kids get better,” Rogers said. “So, I enjoy that. I think it just came from playing that way, you know, I wanted to make the big play and now I want them to make the big play. And I think maybe that shows.”
It certainly does.
Philip Poe is sports editor.
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