You know you're a Madison Mallards' intern when:

You know you’re a Madison Mallards’ intern when:

-You paint everything green, well, “Old Virginia Green” to be exact, and by the first week you’ve changed the words to an LL Cool J song, saying, “You down with OVG? Yeah, you know me.”

-You’ve done three complete circles around the ballpark’s perimeter in trying to find one of the team’s two drills for your project. When that fails you paint something green.

-You’ve named the team’s four-wheeler, “Tammy,” and often use walkie-talkies to sing out phrases like, “Has anyone seen Tammy?” and “I hope Tammy isn’t cheating on me.”

-You move so many kegs that you tweak muscles you never knew existed in the human body. But knowing that so many thousands of people depend on you, and your frothy beverages, you no longer feel pain. “Go on beer man, do your thing,” the people chant.

-You lock your keys in your car prior to donning the Maynard G. Mallard costume for eight hours to go business-to-business with a local radio station. Now that’s a predicament where having a mascot head nearby is handy. Moreover, it’s much less embarrassing when a human-sized duck locks his keys in his car.

-You’ve driven the rented mechanical lift so much that you fantasize about taking it through the Culver’s drive-through just down Northport Drive.

-You’ve had the opportunity to experience home openers for two different baseball organizations.

-You wake up in cold sweats after hearing someone whisper “Hex Head Bit” over and over again. Then you realize it was just you.

-You now love ballpark food, whether you like it or not. And you now know how to make a chicken sandwich 42 different ways. Ever try a Cuban Chicken Sammy?

-You’ve sprayed the ballpark’s pavement enough times that you A) could draw the park’s drainage patterns blind-folded, and B) probably have athlete’s foot. I’d probably be concerned about the former.

-You laugh at your so-called “9-5” friends and family members, as they don’t know that the fun really begins at 7:05 p.m.

-In your first month you bought a cape; went to a craft store; drove to Wisconsin Dells in a 1985 Dodge Minivan, aptly called “Big Blue”; taped a little league game; made an appearance as Maynard in a John Deere commercial; and drove to 170 miles to Wausau to catch a glimpse of the Mallards.

-You probably have bled on the job or have had near severe sunburn. Hey, you win some and you lose some.

Guest Blog Entry - Mr. Michael Schroeder (Media Relations Intern '08)

It’s time for another guest blogger to grace the pages of Maynard’s Musings. I’m Michael Schroeder, and I was the media relations intern for the Mallards last summer. I’m guessing the hard-working front office staff needed to get some more things done around the ballpark as Opening Day approaches, so they went to the bullpen for today’s Musing.

Last summer in Madison was probably the most fun summer of my whole life. You might think that having about five days off the whole summer and working 12-15 hour days sounds awful, but when you realize that you get to spend your summer at the ballpark there really isn’t anything better. With all that time together, the people in the front office and the other interns start to feel like your family. I’m from central Illinois, and after we got past all the “flatland” jokes (I think they finally stopped about the first week of August) that really became the case.

One of the many things I loved about being an intern with the Mallards was that every day brought something different. A new team came to the ballpark, a new promotion was happening and new people were coming to experience a game at the “Duck Pond.” My major duties revolved around helping the media with interview requests and whatever else they needed, plus writing game previews, post-game stories, feature stories and press releases to send to the media and post on the website. I also did a lot of work with statistics and other miscellaneous things for the coaching staff and players. It really solidified in my mind that sports media relations is what I want to do for a career.

If you’ve ever been to a game at the “Duck Pond” (and if you haven’t, you definitely need to this summer), you already know about what a great environment it is to see a game. That’s more of a marketing, promotions and operations thing, so I wanted to talk a little bit about the quality of the team that you’ll see on the field.

I spend the school year as the team manager for the University of Illinois baseball team (home of current Mallards Brandon Wikoff and Nick Chmielewski, and former Mallards Joe Bonadonna and Mike Rohde, among others). I’ve been looking through the roster for this year’s team, and once again, Vern and Coach Thieleke have done a great job of getting quality players from great baseball schools. Some of these guys are dominating the headlines with their performances so far this year, and many of their teams are competing for conference championships and the postseason. It’s quite an assortment of talent from all across the country, so I’m sure the fans will love watching these guys play on a daily basis this summer. It should be another quality Mallards team taking the field and competing for a championship.

I guess I’ll wrap it up for this entry. It was a nice surprise to open my email and see another “assignment” from Jerrad. It brought back memories of last summer and getting one of the tasks that needed to be done or media requests that needed to be handled. I know the “Duck Pond” is going to be rocking again this summer with great family fun and great baseball. Let’s try to get back to the championship series and bring one home this time.

Schmeltzer's 4th Post

Alright folks, so by this time next week we will be right around 100 days until Opening Day here at the "Duck Pond”. It’s unbelievable how quick that day will sneak up us. Every year it seems like we prepare ourselves better, but no matter what we do there are always things we wish we could have done better. After all, he ballpark is old and needs a lot of "TLC." In order to make things “shine” the way they do each and every year we lean heavily on the group of new interns we hire each summer.

The internship position is by no means glamorous, but we look forward to giving each kid a summer experience they will never forget. One fun fact here is that most of us here know what it’s like to be an intern. In fact, five out of current eight full-time employees working in our office had an internship in the Northwoods League at one point in their career. The other three have worked as a part-time employee with the Mallards before they were brought as a full-timer.

The interns are expected to report immediately at the end of their spring semester of school, which is normally the middle of May. This gives us approximately two weeks to educate them on our organization and basically all the “ins and outs” of the ballpark. During this time they will spend the majority of their 9 AM to 5 PM day working in their respective area of concentration. After 5 o’clock everyone pitches in where they can and we work into the wee hours of the night. No one has ever been excused from painting duties. We go through a lot of Old Virginia green paint.

We hire interns in the following areas; marketing, ballpark operations, public relations (PR) and tickets/hospitality. Each spot is an extension of the front office and extremely important in helping to run and maintain a successful team during the summer. The hours we generally work during the summer can range from 60-90 hours on a given week. Although, if you make the most of this opportunity and can have some fun with it, the time really flies.

For me, I will never forget the summer of 2004. I was brought on as a Marketing/Operations Intern. During the day, I spent a lot of time moving beer and taking care of random maintenance tasks around the ballpark. When it was game- time, I was running the on-field promotions. I had a great superior/manager by the name of Eric Bjorling. He taught me all there was to know about the organization and for that, I am forever grateful. Good looking out Phil!

I ate ballpark food for just about every meal, although those meals were few and far between. One is just so busy that you are either to tired, stressed or busy to eat. Did I mention this was probably the best summer I ever had? Honestly, the friendships you make and the people you meet really do make this an unforgettable “career”. I do want to stress that this is a career and not a job. One final note, that I’m sure every intern (male, at least) can relate to is the interaction you have with the owner of the team. Steve is such a popular guy and knows so many people, that the first few times he meets you (or in my case, a month later), there is a good chance he will refer to you as being a “tough guy”. At this time I want to give you a little taste of what the internship experience was like through the eyes of a few former Mallard interns:

Vinnie Cholewa, PR Intern ’04 & PR Manager ’05: The summer internship with the Mallards was amazing, to say the least. There is one night that will forever stick out in my mind. It was the morning (2 AM) of Opening Day and we were trying to put the final touches on what was an 18 hour work day (mind you, we needed to be up and function less than six hours later). There was a load of bark that we had picked up earlier in the day that was sitting in the bed of my truck and we needed to dump it and spread it before the night was done. You can only imagine how thrilled everyone was to start this task at that time. I do know, however, that the mosquitoes loved every minute of it. These things were vicious to say the very least and almost put me over the edge. Following that daunting task was this humungous rolling Pepsi cooler that was at the bottom of a ramp by “needed” to be moved before we went home. There were probably five of us still left at the park at this time and we couldn’t budge the thing. This was the moment in my internship that sparked something in me that gave me a whole new perspective on life. I was so tired, frustrated, irritated that I took it into my own hands and just bust through this rolling cooler with all I had. I single-handedly moved it up the ramp and out of the fire lane. The look on everyone’s faces was priceless. This just proved to me that one can accomplish anything that is set in front of them. The internship in general taught me to overcome adversity and face challenges head on. I truly have the upmost respect for Vern and the organization as a whole.

Vinnie was probably the only intern ever to have a summer internship and not only one, but two jobs! He spent time working for State Street Brats & Verizon that summer as well. Not to mention, he was known to sleep at the ballpark. On more occasion than once, we would get into the office around 8 AM and sure enough Vinnie would be plugging away at his computer. He once a claimed that he had been there since 5 AM dumping garbage and on his fifth Redbull of the morning. If that doesn’t say dedication (or BS) I’m not sure what does! Anyway, Vinnie is currently living down in Arizona working for Careerbuilder.com and going to school for his MBA at ASU. Good luck pal!

Brian Dodge, Operations Intern ’05: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...
Being a die-hard baseball fan, nothing made me happier than getting to go to the ballpark every day for work. The long hours and other minor factors made the position incredibly draining mentally and physically, but in the end you tend to remember all the good things and very few of the bad things. I loved the guys that we worked with that summer and I always felt like we put a good product forward for our consumers.

Aaron Reinen, Tickets/Hospitality Intern ’08: To try and wrap the entire summer into 3-4 sentences is going to be difficult. It was such a great and enjoyable experience, that I really wouldn't know where to start. However, if there is one key skill that I learned and mastered this past summer was the ability to count. You wouldn't think that a skill learned so early in life would leave you, but after many years of using a calculator to do all your math you really do lose some of those skills. For this very reason I will always be in debit to the Mallards, it was this organization that allowed me to find my math self again through counting wristbands!

On a serious note, I do believe the internship is a great starting tool to find out if a job in sports is for you. If you are able to work 938 hours from May to Aug, and still be able to go into work with a smile on your face then you may have found the career path for you. I know it certainly was great for me as I pretty much did a 180 career wise and this past summer really allowed me to get on the right track. I still would like to find a position much like mine last summer, taking care of hospitality/suites and sales. Where and when I'll find something like this is up in the air. Retired (for now) Tarp Crew Member Out!

OK, I am going to wrap up this fairly lengthy blog. I would love to go on and on, because I could write a book with all the things that go on at this ballpark. In fact, I have always wanted to do a reality television series on the Mallards organization.

To be continued…

Mike's 3rd Post - Green Bay memories...

So over the last few months my blog entries have been about the great years I have spent in the Northwoods League and some of the more memorable moments I have experienced. In this final installment, I would like to talk about my time with the Green Bay Bullfrogs and the 2007-2008 seasons.

In the spring of 2007, things were moving a thousand miles a minute as we tried to prepare a ballpark, a staff, and a city for Northwoods League baseball. It was crazy. I was sleeping maybe 5 hours a night. Eating once a day. I would routinely wake up in the middle of the night and write two or three pages worth of notes on things to do the next day or over the weekend. One night, after a usual long and stressful day, I woke up after I realized that I was talking to the lamp on my nightstand trying to sell it season tickets! (As good of a salesman as I thought I was, I could not get the lamp to buy anything from me.)

Thankfully through all of the craziness we had put together a great staff to help accomplish all of the things that needed to be done in trying to make people aware of the Bullfrogs, where and when we played etc, and to also refurbish a ballpark that hadn’t seen renovations in the better part of 30 years! The field needed work, and all of the buildings needed to be gutted, painted, remodeled, etc. The bleachers needed extra work, the press box needed power and internet, and the outsides of all the buildings needed paint. We were basically working off a list that as soon as one project was crossed off, three more appeared.

About a month prior to the start of the season, we had interviewed a young man by the name of Kevin. (To be honest, I think the interview was the last time he was referred to as Kevin, but more on that later). He was a young, impressionable kid, who was willing to do whatever we asked of him to help get things done. We ran on a shoe-string budget at times, so some of the things we did may not have been the safest, however we always came away unscathed with a great story to tell.

Kevin, as it turns out, was once on a basketball team in the 3^rd grade with another kid named Kevin. Somehow, it was decided that he would be called “Lenny” way back then and it stuck with him his whole life. Friends, family, etc people just called him Lenny. Now, he didn’t tell us that, but we found out and from that point on Lenny was the only name we knew to call him.

One Saturday morning, the first item on my list for Lenny and I was to pick up a portable arrow sign from a local business and bring it to the park so we could try and fix it up, make it look presentable and put it on the corner to get our message out to fans. As we got to the business to pick it up, it was made very apparent that it hadn’t been used or moved in quite some time. The legs were rusted together. The trailer lights didn’t work. The tires had air, but looked pretty sketchy. The box of letters didn’t have a bottom on it but rather was placed ever so gently next to the sign. So there we were, trying to figure out how to get this sign across town to the ballpark without injuring ourselves or anyone else on the road.

Lenny and I looked at one another, laughed about the fact the ball-hitch on my truck was smaller then what was on the sign and decided that maybe, just maybe if we strapped it down tight with tow straps we could get to the park. We hooked up the sign and began to drive out of the parking lot, only to see the sign bouncing up and down on the hitch. I told Lenny, “keep your eye on the sign and let me know if it falls off…we’re on the move and not stopping ‘til we get there.” We made our way across town, both of us laughing hysterically as with every bump we hit, we were sure the sign would detach from my truck and slowly drift away. Amazingly, it never happened and somehow we made it and in one piece. As we pulled up and showed the rest of the staff the condition that the sign was in, they too couldn’t help but laugh at what we had just gone through to get this sign across town.

At the end of the season, we brought the sign in from the corner of the city park we had parked it in, but this time I had Lenny stand on the tongue of the sign to keep it from bouncing all over the place. It was quite the site to see as we drove down the road that time.

In another of our famous escapades, Lenny and I went to Menards to pick up PVC piping as we were trying to make a drainage line from behind home plate to the dugout and needed a way to move the water. As we finished loading up the top of my truck with the pipes, we realized, there was nothing to hold them together or on the truck for that matter. One thought hit both of us at the same time…DUCT TAPE and ZIP TIES! (I think our team single-handedly kept Duct Tape and Zip Ties in business that year.) At this point in time, I think the nerves about opening day being only a few days away were starting to get to me. Lenny and I were wrapping things to the best of our ability when I had to stop. A feeling of pure nausea came over me and I couldn’t do anything about it. There I was, middle of the afternoon, crouched over next to my tire in the Menards parking lot, getting sick for no reason at all. It soon passed, I cleaned myself up and again we were headed off across town, with nothing more than Duct Tape and Zip Ties holding 30-40 pipes on top of my car. Again, in another miracle, we made it to the ballpark and everyone was A-OK.

In the end, those were just a preview of some of the other crazy things Lenny and I found ourselves involved in that year and it was one I will always remember.

I can’t wait for the summer of 2009, a new crop of interns and another chance to make some great Northwoods League memories. Baseball is only 137 days away!