Wednesday was a sad day. We learned that two good friends are leaving the county.
Mark and Joan Sperandio are selling the Everett AquaSox so they can move back East to be closer to their families.
They’ll be greatly missed. And I mean that sincerely.
It’s been a privilege to know and work with them.
If memory serves, the first time I met Mark, I went back to the office and wrote that the new owner of the AquaSox seemed a very friendly, a very likeable guy.
My first impression was right on.
He was a peach of a guy.
I never saw him when he didn’t have a smile, and he always greeted you with a firm handshake and a genuine interest in how your life was going. You might have just seen him the day before, but you got that handshake, nonetheless.
Sure, it was good business, but more than that, it was just the way he is.
“Very caring,” said Amy Randall, the director of media relations who just completed her sixth year with the club.
Every time you visited with Mark, you came away feeling better than when you sat down with him. He always had a positive attitude, a good outlook on life. Even when his beloved Boston Red Sox didn’t make it to the World Series last year, after a period of mourning, he realized what the Red Sox had done for him.
He got his interest in baseball from watching them, which got him into the business of baseball after college, which brought him to Everett to buy the AquaSox in 1998, which allowed him to meet Joan, which led to their marriage and the blessed event, the birth of their daughter, Cecilia, a year ago.
It’s a happy story.
And a sad one. For us. For the fans who supported the ballclub. For the community the Sperandios supported.
Because we’re losing them.
They gave generously of time and money – to the Boys and Girls Clubs, to the Volunteers of America, to the Sno-Isle Regional Public Library, to the Everett Public Library, to the Cocoon House, to the city of Everett, to the Everett School district to improve Everett Memorial Stadium. And because of their efforts through their “Hit a Home Run Through Reading” program, thousands of kids in Snohomish and Skagit counties were encouraged to read books during the summer. In return, they received tickets to AquaSox games and treats.
Even a couple of schools out East – one in upstate New York, where Mark is from, and another in Pennsylvania – got involved in the reading program. One kid came all the way across the country to redeem his reading certificate at an AquaSox game.
Mark thought that deserved more than a free ticket. The youngster also got to throw out the ceremonial first pitch.
The Sperandios, like the original owners, Bob and Margaret Bavasi, treated fans like guests in their home. They made sure you felt welcome, they put out a good spread, and they provided entertainment from the first pitch to the last. Even if you didn’t much care for baseball, there was enough other stuff going on that you went home feeling like you got your money’s worth and then some.
The ballclub was a good investment – for the Sperandios and for the community.
So you ask, why are they selling it then? In a nutshell, it’s so the grandparents can see their grand daughter grow up. And with Joan’s parents – who are in their seventies – living in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and Mark’s – who are in their sixties – residing in upstate New York, they weren’t going to be able to see Cecilia but maybe a couple of times a year.
“We miss our parents and ever since Cecilia has been born, we just really felt that we need to get back to our families,” Mark said at a press conference Wednesday in Everett. “We gave serious consideration to owning and operating the franchise from the East Coast, and our employees are perfectly capable of doing that, but we just didn’t feel we could. We felt that it was better if we found another family that wanted to operate it.”
And so, they sold it to Peter and Rita Carfagna, who, unlike both the Bavasis and the Sperandios when they came to Everett, actually have some experience in running a minor league team. They own the Lake County Captains, the Class A affiliate of the Cleveland Indians in a suburb of Cleveland.
When Bob Bavasi learned of the new owners, he laughed that he didn’t even know the meaning of cash flow when he brought the ballclub to Everett in 1984.
Perhaps the most taxing lesson both couples learned was that owing a minor league baseball team demands a lot of your time, especially during the season. “It gets in your blood, there’s definitely a part that I’m going to miss,” Mark Sperandio said. “Game day is one of them.”
He doesn’t know what he’ll do in his next life but he can’t see himself putting in the 80-hour work weeks that he did in baseball. “It takes a little bit out of you sometimes,” he said. “You miss it but you’re glad to see the season over so you can get your personal life back. Whatever we do, we’re going to do it well and it’ll be fun.”
You got the impression from watching their employees at Everett Memorial Stadium that the Sperandios were good people to work for. You could tell by the energy and spirit everyone brought to their jobs.
The Sperandios recognized that they were nothing without good employees.
Mark offered a fitting analogy for the entire operation.
He compared the franchise to a classic automobile that he and Joan got to drive for six seasons. But it was the employees – the mechanics – who kept the car shined and running smoothly.
“We took it to the car shows,” Mark said. “Now it’s time to give the keys to a new owner.”
It’s a snazzy product.
Let’s hope the Carfagnas can keep it that way.
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