2025 RISING STAR AWARDS C. J. BUCK
C. J. Buck
TERRITORY MANAGER, HARRELL’ S
Soccer has always been a part of life for SportsField Management Rising Star Award Winner C. J. Buck.“ I started playing soccer when I was four or five and never looked back,” he said.“ I wasn’ t good enough to go anywhere with it after high school; but I always enjoyed playing, and it stuck with me. Soccer is always on the television— whether it’ s live games, or replays, or me playing FIFA or whatever— it’ s always around. I just can’ t get enough of it. I’ m addicted to it.”
Despite his passion for soccer, however, Buck did not set out with a sports field management career in mind. Originally from Suffolk, Virginia, in the southeast part of the state, Buck did not grow up on a farm, but was always surrounded by agriculture. That led to an interest in animal science and an opportunity to work with pigs at the Virginia Tech Agriculture Research and Extension Center while still in high school.
Buck’ s goal of being a veterinarian changed with a tour of Virginia Tech’ s Lane Stadium led by Nick McKenna, CSFM. He went on to take turfgrass classes led by Dr. Erik Ervin, and from then on knew he wanted to be in the turfgrass industry.
“ Virginia Tech was really the only program in the state that interested me,” he said.“ Once I got there, Dr. Ervin had me working in the turf research labs with Dr. Zhang doing stress trials on bentgrass, cutting grass with scissors, and growth chambers.”
From there, Buck worked with Chad Kropff on the Virginia Tech rec fields as Kropff’ s assistant for 18 months.
“ That was kind of a stay-at-home internship, and then I swapped over to the D-1 facilities where I worked for Andy McReynolds,” said Buck.“ He meant a lot to my journey.
“ I got a taste of a little bit of everything at Virginia Tech— the research, the rec fields and D-1,” Buck added.“ I really enjoyed my four years there. It’ s a second home to me, and I’ ve always enjoyed going back.”
While still at Virginia Tech, Buck interned with the Salem Red Sox. Then, following graduation, he went to Louisville to work for Tom Nielsen before returning to work with the staff at Virginia Tech.
Prior to the 2017 STMA Conference, Buck emailed every Major League Soccer( MLS) groundskeeper east of Kansas City to introduce himself and express his interest in soccer.
“ I was 98 % certain I was going to be in MLS for the greater part of my career,” said Buck.“ Half of them didn’ t e-mail me back, a bunch did that didn’ t have anything open.”
However, two people emailed Buck back to express interest in meeting him. The first was Dan Bergstrom, CSFM, of the Houston Dynamo who had a position open for an assistant. The other was John Torres of the Philadelphia Union, who didn’ t have any openings but still wanted to talk. Buck met with both during the conference and took the job with Bergstrom for the remainder of 2017. Then, in the fall of 2017, Torres reached out regarding an open position as his assistant, which led Buck to Philadelphia.
“ My girlfriend at the time, now wife, got into grad school back east, so it made sense to go to Philly,” said Buck.“ I spent exactly six years there, and grew from John’ s first assistant to head sports turf manager. I was still under John, because he’ s still there, but his role grew as the Union grew and expanded its footprint. I took over the day-to-day operations and became head sports turf manager while John became director of grounds.” sportsfieldmanagementonline. com October 2025 | SportsField Management
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