Imagine your childhood dream. Now imagine it came true.
It happened to Princeton head baseball coach Scott Bradley when he made it to the major leagues in 1985 to play for the team he loved as a child.
A native of Essex Fells in northern New Jersey, Bradley grew up playing baseball and going to watch the Yankees play in New York.
"I can remember my dad coming over to the field and calling us up, saying we had tickets to see the Yankees play the Minnesota Twins," Bradley said. "Tony Oliva was coming into town and he wanted us to see him play."
Bradley credits his father and the environment he grew up in for getting him involved in the game.
"I grew up in a family with two brothers, a dad who played ball and a mom who loved baseball," he said. "I can't ever remember a time in my life where having a bat, a ball and a mitt wasn't a regular routine.
"My dad was instrumental in not only teaching all of us how to play, but appreciating athletics."
Bradley took that appreciation to play baseball at North Carolina, where he graduated in 1982. After being drafted by the Yankees, he spent two years in the minor leagues before making the major league roster.
"It's tough to even describe what a feeling [making it to the big leagues as a Yankee] was," he said. "My biggest thrill in baseball was Opening Day 1985 when I knew that I had made the Yankees out of spring training. I was introduced as a member of the team, and having family and friends in the same ballpark as we were in as kids [was an unbelievable feeling].
"Wearing Yankee pinstripes was something I'll never forget — I never played in the game and all I did was sit in the dugout and watch. But it was a much better seat than I had when I was a kid."
Even during his playing days with the Yankees, White Sox and Mariners, Bradley knew he wanted to go into coaching.
In New York, he learned from several current or former managers, such as Jeff Torborg, Johnny Oates and especially Don Baylor.
"As a young player in the Yankee clubhouse, you could see the respect [Baylor] commanded," Bradley remembered. "That's the way I tried to act. When he got that look of desire and his tone of voice changed, you had better start to listen."
As his playing career wound down, Bradley began thinking about his future and observing different parts of the game.
"I always knew I'd end up in coaching — it was going to happen," he said. "I was able to lay some groundwork and I tried to watch, to learn, to pick up as much as I could. Instead of watching players to see how they do things, I started watching managers — the way they ran ballgames, the way they treated people."
After a few years coaching in the minor leagues, Bradley came to Princeton in 1997. He took over a program that had a firm hold on the Gehrig Division, but Bradley was interested in improving.
He used the connections he had made as a player to help the recruiting process.
"If someone inquires about Princeton, I'm able to gather information pretty quickly on those kids," he said.
One of the main ways to improve a team is to recruit high-end pitching.
"Guys like [senior] Chris Young, [junior] David Boehle, [freshmen] Ross Ohlendorf, Jason Vaughan, and [sophomore] Thomas Pauly have helped us raise that bar."
Not only has Bradley helped the program, but he has seen the rewards of the college game, too.
"The most rewarding thing for me is to see our players improve," he said. Evidence of that improvement could be seen in last year's first NCAA Tournament victory since 1965.
"We've created an environment where our kids play for the right reasons. They play because they want to get better," he said.
"I can see myself right here for quite a while."
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