FIELD OF THE YEAR PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL
SportsField Management ( SFM ): Congratulations on the Field of the Year win . What are you most proud of with this win , and / or what do you think stands out most about the winning field ? Mitch Hooten : This is going to be a two-part answer . First , I am proud of the staff that worked this past year and every year that I have been with the West Michigan Whitecaps . The crew wanted to go above and beyond what they usually did in years past , and “ detail , detail , detail ” was established early in the year on everything we did . From trimming the grass around drain caps to precise mound and plate work , the crew this year did a phenomenal job .
The second thing I am most proud of is the field itself . This field has gone through a lot in the seven years I have been here . Concerts , Nitro Circus , soccer matches , football games ( high school and college ), baseball games ( professional , college , high school and travel ), corporate picnics , corporate batting practices and award ceremonies , just to name a few . This field has always taken a lot of abuse and has come back for more . With the new PDL , we are scheduled to replace the field in the fall of 2024 ; so , it ’ s only fitting that this field gets the recognition that , in my opinion , it deserves .
The thing that stands out the most about this field is that it still has its original soil from 1993 when the stadium was built , and sod from 2012 when it was last resurfaced . With hard work and time , we eventually turned this old field into two Midwest League Field of the Year wins , one Class-A Field of the Year win , and now SFMA Professional Field of the Year .
SFM : What attracted you to a career in sports field management , and what has been your career path through the industry ? Hooten : Having a career in sports turf was not what I originally wanted to do . From a young age , I wanted to be a golf course superintendent . But during my first year at Mississippi State , my friend and I participated in the Student Challenge at the 2009 conference in San Jose . It was a complete eye-opening experience , as I did not know that sports turf even existed at the time . Several weeks later , I attended the Golf Industry Show in New Orleans ; and when I got back to school , I knew that golf wasn ’ t for me and that baseball groundskeeping was my calling . I interned with the Toledo Mudhens , and instantly knew this was what I wanted to do . From there , I interned for parts of two seasons with the Detroit Tigers working for Heather Nabozny . The following season , I accepted my final internship with Thomas Trotter and the Nashville Sounds . After completing that internship , I accepted a first assistant position with the Kannapolis Intimidators ( now the Kannapolis Cannon Ballers ) under the direction of Billy Ball . I would go on to spend three seasons in Kannapolis before moving to Beloit , Wisconsin in 2016 to become the head groundskeeper of the Beloit Snappers ( now known as the Beloit Sky Carp ). In March 2017 , I moved on to my current role as head groundskeeper of the West Michigan Whitecaps . Going on eight seasons with the Whitecaps , I am also the current president of the Michigan Sports Field Managers Association and serve on the Michigan Turf Foundation Board of Directors .
14 SportsField Management | March 2024 sportsfieldmanagementonline . com