"I DON’T KNOW IF WE’D BE ABLE TO DO THIS WITHOUT THEM": HOW HOST FAMILIES HELP SHAPE THE THUNDERBOLTS

By Zach Browning

Before the Windy City ThunderBolts can fill out a lineup card, set a pitching rotation or prepare for Opening Day, they have to answer a much more fundamental question: Where is everyone going to live?

Every season, players arrive in Crestwood from across the country hoping to continue their professional baseball careers. For many of them, that opportunity begins not in the clubhouse at Ozinga Field, but in the homes of the families throughout the south suburbs.

For Johnny Sole, the ThunderBolts’ director of community relations, making those housing arrangements is one of the organization’s most important responsibilities.

The process begins once the Opening Day roster begins to take shape after spring training. Returning players are usually paired back with host families they’ve lived with before, while new players fill out questionnaires that help Sole determine the best fit. By Opening Day, every player who needs housing has a place to stay.

Without those host families, though, there wouldn’t be much to coordinate.

“I don’t know if we’d be able to do this without them,” Sole said. “I don’t think the operation would continue to exist really without the host families.”

Independent baseball depends on community members opening their homes. For the ThunderBolts, host families aren’t simply a tradition or a nice gesture. They’re one of the foundations that allows the season to happen.

The ThunderBolts don’t rely exclusively on host families. About 10 players each season stay in a player apartment owned by a local resident, while roughly a dozen more live with host families throughout the area. A handful of local players have their own housing.

Finding enough places for players to live each spring is part puzzle and part matchmaking. Fortunately for Sole, he doesn’t have to start from scratch every season.

Every year, a handful of host families return to welcome players back into their homes. Likewise, several returning ThunderBolts move back in with the same families they stayed with the previous summer. Those reunions are the easy decisions.

The rest of the roster takes more work.

Every new player who needs housing fills out a questionnaire. Sole isn’t just looking for an empty bedroom. He’s trying to make the best fit possible for both the player and the family.

Some of the questions are practical. Does the player have a car to get to Ozinga Field? Are there allergies to dogs, cats or other pets? Others simply help Sole understand where a player might fit best.

Once the questionnaires are complete, Sole begins piecing everything together.

One ThunderBolts host family houses four players. Three others regularly host two at a time, while several more open their homes to one player each. Combined with the ThunderBolts’ player apartment, the organization is able to house nearly its entire roster before Opening Day.

Most years, by the time the season begins, every player has a place to call home. Keeping them there, however, is another challenge entirely.

Baseball rosters are constantly changing. Players are released. Others are traded. Injuries can derail a season. New players arrive with little notice, all needing a place to stay almost immediately. While Sole is able to personally introduce players and host families before the season begins, those midseason additions often happen much more quickly.

“We tell the host families at the beginning of the year that any player you might get at the beginning of the year, the goal is that you’ll still have them for the whole year,” Sole said. “But obviously during the season, things happen.”

When a roster move forces a player to leave, Sole’s first call is usually to the host family.

How soon can another player move in?

More often than not, the answer is simple. The room just needs to be cleaned, the bedding washed and everything reset for the next player.

If the turnaround can’t happen immediately, the ThunderBolts will often put the incoming player in a hotel for a night or two until the family is ready.

“Usually it’s quick,” Sole said.

The constant movement is simply part of life in the Frontier League. While fans see roster moves on a transaction wire or social media, Sole sees another bedroom that suddenly needs to be filled.

For as much time as Sole spends coordinating housing assignments, he believes the relationships that develop between players and host families are what make the program special.

“They develop a bond with the player,” Sole said. “Even players that come and go, a lot of host families still communicate with them. They’re basically part of the family.”

That bond is one of the reasons host families continue to volunteer year after year.

Sole points to ThunderBolts pitcher Carsen Plumadore and the Kotel family as one example. This summer, Plumadore returned to the same host family for a second consecutive season, while his wife, Avery, has also spent time with the family during the summer. Over time, the relationship has grown beyond simply providing a place to stay.

For the Kotel family’s 12-year-old son, Max, Sole said the experience has become something akin to gaining an older sibling each summer.

“We tell them this is going to be like an older brother to you,” Sole said. “There’s always that kind of older brother bond.”

Host families often recommend the experience to friends and neighbors, helping introduce new families to the program.

Even families that eventually stop hosting rarely do so because they didn’t enjoy it. More often, Sole said, changing family circumstances simply make it difficult to continue.

To show their appreciation, the ThunderBolts provide host families with season tickets, complimentary non-alcoholic concessions and invitations to team events throughout the season, including a preseason dinner where players are able to meet their host families before Opening Day.

“We take care of them,” Sole said. “Anything we can do for them, it doesn’t ever seem like enough.”

Every night at Ozinga Field, fans see the ThunderBolts take the field for another Frontier League game. What they don’t see are the homes throughout the south suburbs that help make it possible.

Behind every player staying with a host family is someone who opened a spare bedroom, adjusted to late-night arrivals after road trips and welcomed a stranger into their home for the summer. Behind every roster move is another phone call, another housing arrangement and another reminder of just how much the ThunderBolts rely on the community around them.

For Sole, that’s what makes the host family program so rewarding.

“I love working with them,” Sole said. “It’s nice seeing that bond between the players and the families. It kind of fits my community relations job description pretty well. It’s a fun part of the job.”

Without the host families, there could still be baseball in Crestwood. There just might not be a ThunderBolts team to play it.