Hunter Seidler ’22: This summer, I’ve had the privilege of working with Professor Todd McDorman toresearch Indiana’s baseball history. Over the first couple of weeks, I collected 48 scholarlyarticles covering the exploits of Pete Rose and his recent attempts to achieve reinstatement tothe MLB. In addition, I compiled a comprehensive list of 380 professional baseball players, pastand present, from Indiana. After completing this, I selected a player from my list who did notpossess a biography on the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) website: CraigCounsell. Counsell spent 16 seasons in the majors, but many in the Midwest may know himbetter as the current manager of the Milwaukee Brewers. After contacting a few members of theBrewers’ front office, I secured a 30-minute interview with Counsell; it is exceptionally rare for aperson without media credentials–much less a college student–to get access to such ahigh-level sports personality, so I was very grateful for the opportunity.
After probing the Internet for articles and statistics, I worked on writing the biography forthe entirety of June and into July. After some revisions, I presented the biography to SABR’seditors and ultimately published it to the SABR website.
I thoroughly enjoyed this internship for a few reasons. First, the process of compilingscholarly articles, amassing extensive lists and publishing a biography improved my ability asboth a researcher and a writer. Second, gaining membership to the Society for AmericanBaseball Research afforded me access to an incredible amount of information about one of myfavorite sports and allowed me to deeply explore the history of the game. Third, while Wabashoffers many opportunities to improve performance as an interviewee, this internship improvedmy skills as an interviewer. The Craig Counsell interview forced me to step out of my comfortzone, as it was the first time I had conducted an interview and I felt a fair amount of pressure tomake sure it went smoothly.
I’d like to sincerely thank Professor McDorman and the Wabash College RhetoricDepartment for making this experience possible. While this was a summer without sports formany, I got to appreciate a game I love from a new perspective while honing professional skills.This internship was truly a game-changer.
