{"id":7505,"date":"2010-04-11T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-04-11T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=7505"},"modified":"2010-04-13T07:10:03","modified_gmt":"2010-04-13T06:10:03","slug":"the-man-with-the-weight-of-great-britain-on-his-shoulders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=7505","title":{"rendered":"The Man With The Weight Of Great Britain On His Shoulders"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"JGreenberg\"

GB General Manager Jason Greenberg. Photo courtesy of BaseballSoftballUK.com<\/p><\/div>\n

Not many managers of national sports teams have to worry about how to raise the money so that their team can travel to a major\u00c2\u00a0international\u00c2\u00a0tournament.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0It is certainly not something that would keep Fabio Capello up at night.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

H<\/span><\/em>owever this is one of the many things that Jason Greenberg, the new General Manager for the Great Britain Senior Baseball team, has to contend with.\u00c2\u00a0 He recently spent some time talking to BaseballGB about the challenges and opportunities that\u00c2\u00a0are on the horizon for\u00c2\u00a0the British national team.\u00c2\u00a0 See the\u00c2\u00a0end of this post to listen to the\u00c2\u00a0full audio of the 25-minute\u00c2\u00a0interview.<\/em><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Little League memories<\/span><\/h3>\n

Jason is a lifelong Mariners fan who recently took over<\/a> the GB General Manager post.\u00c2\u00a0 He has always had a passion for baseball. His early boyhood life in Seattle was spent playing baseball and eating Big League Chew and this experience has stayed with him ever since.\u00c2\u00a0 As\u00c2\u00a0Jason explains, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I never forget playing Little League. The Little League complex [in the States], that is the thing I am most jealous of … that is the biggest difference between baseball there and what it could be here.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Jason\u00c2\u00a0moved across the pond to the UK five years ago. \u00c2\u00a0He was looking for a baseball club to play for and that is when he hooked up with Herts Baseball club. It was from that day his involvement with British baseball was sealed. Baseball is Jason\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s life. As well as being\u00c2\u00a0the GB General Manger he still helps with Herts Baseball club and works full time for BaseballSoftballUK.<\/p>\n

Funding the national team<\/h3>\n

Taking over from Alan Smith as\u00c2\u00a0the Team GB General Manager was always going to be a challenge, even if it was just working with the off-field politics that can surround the national team, but the biggest challenge of all is funding. As Jason explains, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Imagine how successful the Yankees or Red Sox would be if they were not sure where the money is coming from?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d The national team gets no money from the UK government and that means the team has to raise all the money itself via donations and sponsorship.<\/p>\n

The\u00c2\u00a0British team have several ideas on how they\u00c2\u00a0can\u00c2\u00a0start to combat the lack of funding, with Jason noting that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the cogs are turning. There are lots people concerned about funding issues, not just in the lead up to the European championships but in the long term”.\u00c2\u00a0 Fans can now make their own\u00c2\u00a0donations to the cause<\/a> and the team are also looking for any innovative fund-raising\u00c2\u00a0ideas fans may have.<\/p>\n

Goals for the future<\/h3>\n

Getting to the European Baseball\u00c2\u00a0Championships in Germany later this year and achieving a high placement is an important short-term goal for the senior team.\u00c2\u00a0 Building on the 2007 silver medal is a\u00c2\u00a0sizeable\u00c2\u00a0target in itself, but potentially there is an even bigger prize to play for.\u00c2\u00a0 It is very likely that the\u00c2\u00a0World Baseball Classic, fully funded by MLB,\u00c2\u00a0will expand to 24 teams for the 2013 edition. Britain currently sit 21st<\/sup> in the IBAF world rankings and a good showing in the Euros will give them a decent chance of playing in what is now the most high-profile international baseball tournament in the world.\u00c2\u00a0 The benefits that this would bring are unparallelled, not simply for those taking part in the event\u00c2\u00a0but the publicity it would generate for British baseball.\u00c2\u00a0 However, this would only be a possibility if a competitive and well-prepared team can travel to Germany and they need to raise \u00c2\u00a330,000 to make this happen.<\/p>\n

Still, Jason is positive for the future, particularly when it comes to the advances that are being made with youth coaching in Britain. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I am impressed with guys who coach the cadet and junior teams … the players have been guided very well … We have got a good farm system that will feed into the senior team.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

And for all the off-field challenges\u00c2\u00a0that he faces as GM,\u00c2\u00a0Jason is relishing the role because he recognises what all the hard work is truly for: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Baseball, we all have to remember, is about what is played between the foul lines.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

Listen to the full interview with Jason Greenberg<\/a><\/p>\n

Please let us know what you thought of the interview. Is this something you want to see more of at BaseballGB?<\/p>\n

BaseballGB thanks Jason Greenberg for his time in conducting the interview.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BaseballGB sits down with Jason Greenberg, the newly appointed General Manager for the Great Britain Senior Baseball team. The post includes an exclusive audio interview recorded especially for BaseballGB.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[195,556,63,194],"class_list":["post-7505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-british-baseball-2","tag-audio","tag-british-baseball","tag-great-britain","tag-interview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7505"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7526,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7505\/revisions\/7526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}