{"id":944,"date":"2016-04-19T15:40:18","date_gmt":"2016-04-19T15:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/?p=944"},"modified":"2018-02-07T22:06:23","modified_gmt":"2018-02-07T22:06:23","slug":"from-the-ovc-to-the-world-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/from-the-ovc-to-the-world-series\/","title":{"rendered":"From the OVC to the World Series"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Kory Riemensperger<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

One of the first sports memories Drake Fenlon, \u201914 communication, recalls isn\u2019t an unbelievable catch or heartbreaking loss. It\u2019s the puzzled look on his parent\u2019s faces because their son was more invested in Awesome Eagle\u2019s routine than the Tech game.<\/p>\n

\"Fenlon_Drake\"
Drake Fenlon<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This fascination with mascots prompted Fenlon to suit up as Cookeville High School\u2019s Mr. Cavalier and Tech\u2019s Awesome Eagle.<\/p>\n

For this year\u2019s World Series, Fenlon kept the crowd entertained as<\/p>\n

assistant for the winning team\u2019s mascot.<\/p>\n

Fenlon works four part-time mascot jobs for teams in the Kansas City area: the Royals of Major League Baseball, the Chiefs of the National Football League and the Missouri Mavericks, a AA hockey team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI represent a lot of teams, so my schedule is busy, and my apartment is full of mascot body parts,\u201d said Fenlon.<\/p>\n

Royals fans saw their mascot, Sluggerrr the lion, at the 2014 and 2015 World Series. The team lost the first series in seven games, but won this year\u2019s championship in five games.<\/p>\n

Fenlon was there for every home game, the liaison between the production team in the stands and the mascot on the field. His headset connected him to both so he could make sure the mascot was in the right spot at the right time.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone wants a selfie these days, and mascots are a prime target. It\u2019s my job to keep him moving on gameday, and to keep an eye out for rogue bats and balls that could injure audience members.\u201d<\/p>\n

When he first started working for the Royals, Fenlon said he was in awe of the staff\u2019s professionalism and the number of people in the stands. After a full season of looking after Sluggerrr, however, some of that incredulity has worn off.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve become numb to the crowd noise a little bit. I\u2019m still surprised every now and then though. Normally the media pool next to my dugout has five or six photographers, but there were more than 1,000 at each World Series game.\u201d<\/p>\n

With all his time in the spotlight, Fenlon is still proud of his time entertaining audiences as Awesome Eagle.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I think back on it, a lot of what I did for the team at Tech is similar to what I do now. It kind of prepared me in a way for the big leagues.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fenlon\u2019s first year at Tech, the mascot team doubled in size and participated in more national competitions. After each, Fenlon and his team broke down film of other competitors to improve their routine. His last two years at Tech, Awesome Eagle took a first place victory in the Universal Cheerleaders Association\u2019s competition.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, the fans are here to be entertained,\u201d Fenlon said, \u201c so that\u2019s what we try to focus on every night.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Kory Riemensperger One of the first sports memories Drake Fenlon, \u201914 communication, recalls isn\u2019t an unbelievable catch or heartbreaking loss. It\u2019s the puzzled look on his parent\u2019s faces because their son was more invested in Awesome Eagle\u2019s routine than the Tech game. This fascination with mascots prompted Fenlon to suit up as Cookeville High […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-944","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-spring16"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=944"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/944\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1146,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/944\/revisions\/1146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.tntech.edu\/visions\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}