On an uncharacteristically warm April afternoon in East Lansing, Michigan State University's campus is bustling with students, professors and locals enjoying the weather in between classes and work. McLane Stadium, home to the MSU baseball team, is humming with excited shouts and the loud cracks of a bat, the sounds of a college baseball practice. The outfielders are catching fly balls from a machine and the pitchers and infielders are working on fielding. Tommy Merlo sits in the dugout and observes it all, ensuring that the practice he helped plan is going smoothly.
 
Three years ago, Merlo wasn't involved with the MSU baseball program at all, now he holds the title director of baseball operations for a Big Ten program. Merlo's quick rise took hard work, dedication, and wouldn't have been possible if he didn't get his foot in the door of the baseball world by being a student manager his senior year at MSU.
 
"I would say that my time as a student manager really set me up for what I hope to be a career in baseball," said Merlo.
 
Across the country, college students who are hardworking and passionate about sports sacrifice their valuable time for little to no pay, for the privilege of doing the many jobs of a student manager. Many students do the difficult job of manager hoping to end up like Merlo, making a living involved with a sport they love at a high level.
 
Inside the double life of a student manager.
Next door to McLane Stadium at Old College Field sits DeMartin Stadium, which hosts MSU men and women's soccer.
 
The men's soccer team also employees a team of ambitious managers, who similarly to Merlo, are looking to parlay their student manager jobs into careers in coaching or sports management. Jeffrey Vanhorn, a junior, has been a student manager for the entirety of his time at MSU. Vanhorn was a high school soccer player, but multiple knee injuries cut his playing career short. When he enrolled at MSU, his former teammate and now MSU goalkeeper Zac Kelly reached out to Vanhorn asking him if he wanted to be a student manager for the men's team.
 
Vanhorn says student manager is a fancy term for glue guy. At times he is the liaison between the players and coaching staff, other times he is a perfectionist, guaranteeing the complex drills he sets up go to plan. Vanhorn needs communication skills and the ability to be flexible when a coach needs a drill changed at the last minute. He must be technologically savvy, setting up the team's film for practices and games.
 
"I do a bunch of things to make the coaches' lives easier. They have a difficult enough job so we just do whatever we can do to help them," said Vanhorn.
 
Vanhorn also needs to possess an in-depth knowledge of the game of soccer. After games and practices, Vanhorn watches back film the day's activities and tracks advanced statistics like possession, passing statistics during games, and during spring practices Vanhorn fills out spreadsheets to evaluate the players' performance during scrimmages.
 
"When we're in season, we usually have one off day per week, so we're practicing six days a week. On a day-to-day basis training usually runs around two hours, but we have to get there an hour early and it takes us about a half hour to clean everything up. It's a minimum of three and a half hours every day we train," said Vanhorn.
 
Outside of his duties on the pitch, Vanhorn orders food for the team when they travel, helps to set up team meals when they're at home, and drives to the airport to pick up recruits.
 
Now that he's moved into the head manager role for the men's soccer team, he also travels with the team when they play away games. In the changing landscape of college athletics, the Big Ten soccer schedule could include trips to Oregon, California and Washington during the upcoming 2024 season, which takes place in the middle of the fall semester classes.
 
"It can be difficult to get everything done during the season, but being a manager makes you use your time more efficiently. A lot of my free time is used on school, but it makes me appreciate the time you have with your friends more than I did," said Vanhorn.
 
While student managers work behind the scenes, the coaches and players notice their contributions to the team and recognize how important they are to the team's success.
 
"The managers do a countless number of things for us, they're a huge part of why our practices run so smoothly," said junior catcher Noah Bright. "They do all sorts of sheets and handle our data. They do unbelievable things around here that people don't see. It's work that nobody really wants to do, but I know as a team we're extremely appreciative of how hard they work for us."
 
The grind of student management can pay off.
After the loud cracks of the bat conclude, Merlo drags a hose from McLane's equipment shed to begin the post-practice field maintenance. While head coach Jake Boss Jr. sprays down the field, Merlo reshapes the pitcher's mound after a long day of wear and tear.
 
Two years prior, Merlo decided he wanted to get involved with something on MSU's campus. After the COVID-19 pandemic he searched for an organization to join, but wanted to join a group involved in something he was passionate about. Merlo was lucky enough to hear about a general interest meeting for anyone wanting to be a student manager for the baseball team, something that has always been a huge part of Merlo's life.
 
From there he was offered the position of student manager, and Merlo threw himself into the countless duties managers are tasked with.
 
"Literally anything that has to do with the program, those guys kind of help take care of so it's a little bit of a grind for those guys, but they do a nice job," MSU baseball assistant coach Andrew Stone said.
 
Merlo was a sponge during his season as a student manager, soaking up any and all information he could about working in baseball.
 
"Being around Coach Boss, being around the rest of the staff, that year for me was so informative. I got so much out of Coach Stone learning about scouting reports, field prep, field maintenance, day to day practice, anything really you name it," said Merlo. "I didn't really have any experience working in baseball, so I really started at nothing. My experience as a manager really built me up to see what this life was like, and see that it's something I'm interested in."
 
After his lone season of student management, Merlo graduated from MSU in 2022 with a bachelor's degree in special education and a concentration in learning disabilities. He moved back home to Pennsylvania and while back home Merlo took what he learned at MSU to become the director of baseball operations at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania.
 
Merlo was a substitute teacher in the mornings to make ends meet, because even though Merlo was working in baseball, the job at Lafayette was unpaid. After teaching for half a day, Merlo would hop in his car and drive an hour to Easton to handle the behind the scenes work for the smaller Patriot League baseball program. After working two jobs he would drive an hour home to sleep and do it all again the next day. In that year Merlo learned a lot about himself and his willingness to do whatever it takes to make it in baseball.
 
"Looking back on it, I guess it was kind of a lot, but I enjoyed the grind. I love it. I enjoyed getting to do both things. And at that time, that was what allowed me to continue my career in baseball," said Merlo.
 
In the fall of 2023, all of Merlo's hard work paid off. When the same job opened at MSU, the coaching staff that worked with Merlo when he was a student manager kept an eye on him while he was working hard in Pennsylvania and had Merlo at the top of their list of candidates.
 
"I certainly kept hearing good things about him. When our job opened up this fall, he was somebody that we were like, well, maybe we should give Tommy a call," said Stone.
 
After two long years starting from the bottom, Merlo was finally working full-time in baseball. He is making a living doing so at his alma mater, which Merlo says is a dream come true.
 
"It's not often somebody who never played baseball gets to come back to where they went to school and put on a baseball jersey. So, I'm just grateful for that and want to help however I can," said Merlo.
 
The secret to making a career in sports
As the players file out of McLane stadium after practice, only the coaching and support staff remain. Merlo and the rest of the staff haul the rest of the equipment off the freshly manicured field, and the sounds of practice give way to the sounds of a tractor finishing up work on the infield dirt.
 
Like the men's soccer team and most other Division I programs, MSU baseball practice takes place almost every day the team isn't playing games during the season. Merlo helps with field maintenance after every practice, helps the coaches organize practices in a time efficient manner and helps clean up anything that goes astray.
 
He also oversees the current group of student managers, mentoring people who wear the same shoes Merlo wore a short time ago, helping them navigate their double life in baseball and as students. 
 
Merlo organizes the logistics of road trips, coordinates the team's use of technology and ensures MSU baseball has quality film of their games, rain or shine. Merlo says his job is a million little things that eventually show their value when everything goes smoothly on a road trip, or a practice goes off without a hitch. The Spartans also have a group of managers that take photos and videos during practices and games.
 
All those tasks add up, and like most people who have a career in sports, Merlo's job takes up the majority of his time. Merlo believes that he's right where he belongs, and his love for the game and his willingness to show up every day are the keys to his success. That sentiment is echoed by Merlo's coworkers.
 
"I think it shows somebody that wants to be around. They're not counting the hours that are in the office who just want to be around something," said Stone. "Like if you put in the work if you put in the hours, like people are going to notice. Tommy's a great example of that."
 
Most people who make a career in sports, whether it be a coach, a scout, or someone who works behind the scenes, have a tremendous work ethic. Coach Stone says that student managers that display those qualities stand out.
 
"You have to be okay with working a ton of hours. If you're counting how many hours you're in the building, you're probably in the wrong line of business. So that's probably the number one thing is being willing to put in the hours," said Stone. "The other thing is just being willing to be the person that if stuff needs to get done, you are that person. That's what I look for in our student managers and in coaches. We want somebody that no matter what it is, big or small, they're going to get something done."
 
At times it seems that student managers work long and hard hours for little to no reward, but the managers that show up every day ready to work and love being around the team get noticed. The reward for student managers that excel is the opportunity to move up in the sports world and try to make a career in a field they're passionate about.
 
"We have two guys (former managers) that are currently working on Major League coaching staffs right now. We've got a guy with Cincinnati. We got a guy with Detroit, and we've got Tommy," Stone said with a chuckle. "So yeah, managers run the world man."


The Spartans are hosting Nebraska this weekend in a three-game B1G weekend series, that opened Thursday night, and continued Friday night, before wrapping up Saturday. The series finale and MSU's season finale on Saturday, May 18 will now start at 12:02 p.m. ET.

Saturday is also MSU's Spartan Senior Day Celebration, presented by Health Alliance Plan (HAP), as the Spartans will honor their senior players and managers in a pre-game ceremony. Fans are encouraged to arrive early to join in the celebration.

It is also Fan Appreciation Weekend the entire weekend, as Spartan Baseball thanks their fans for their support throughout the regular season.

Fans can visit https://sprtns.co/MSUBSBTix to purchase tickets to Spartan baseball games, or visit https://sprtns.co/24BSBPromoSched for complete promotion information.

For those fans that can't make it in person, they can follow this week's MSU baseball action with "Watch Live," "Listen Live" and "Live Stats" links at MSUSpartans.com.  

Michigan State's schedule is subject to change, stay tuned to MSUSpartans.com and @MSUBaseball on X/Twitter for schedule updates.