Brian DeAngelis

You could say Chuck Tanner saw it coming.

Well, sort of.

Brian DeAngelis fondly remembers taking in Pittsburgh Pirates games at Three Rivers Stadium as a child, watching the likes of Jason Kendall, Tony Womack and Brian Giles.

An avid baseball fan, as well, his grandfather, John DeAngelis, had formed a friendship with Tanner, a former major league manager who steered the Bucs to a World Series title in 1979.

To this day, the younger DeAngelis cherishes a ball that Tanner signed for him.

“It actually says, ‘Hey, you’re a future star going on to great success in baseball,’” DeAngelis said. “When I was 10, I thought I was going to the majors. Now, here I am having success in baseball in a different way than I thought.”

In December, DeAngelis was brought on as the President and General Manager of the Winston-Salem Dash, the Chicago White Sox High-A minor league squad. For DeAngelis, who graduated from Butler in 2007 and Slippery Rock University in 2011, it’s the latest step on a career path that began while he interned with the Butler BlueSox.

“Really, in terms of starting in the front office of baseball, that’s actually where I started,” DeAngelis said. “We did everything, like sell the tickets, work the box office, I was an on-field host sometimes. “

Around the time he attained a degree in sports management from SRU, DeAngelis caught a break as an intern with Cal and Bill Ripken’s Ripken Baseball in the Baltimore area.

His work helping organize camps and clinics for the organization led to an opportunity with another one of Cal Ripken’s business ventures, a minor-league crew called the Aberdeen IronBirds in the Baltimore Orioles’ circuit.

After a few seasons there, he got his first director-level gig with the State College Spikes, a club that was at the time associated with the St. Louis Cardinals.

“I was doing sales there and managed my own team for the first time,” DeAngelis said. “We were able to have a lot of success there, which was great. (We) broke some attendance records and I guess put my name on the map for when the Lehigh Valley job opened.”

With the IronPigs, the Triple-A affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies, DeAngelis filled the role of Vice President of Ticket Sales for a team with one of the highest attendance rates at that level of the sport.

Within his five years there, he eventually took the wheel of the sponsorships for Lehigh Valley, which he said does more revenue in that category than any other team in the minor leagues. Following that, he transitioned to a role as a senior vice president and his horizons expanded.

In 2019, DeAngelis was part of a staff that earned the Larry MacPhail Award, which goes to the team with the best promotional effort in Minor League Baseball.

“That got me a taste of everything,” DeAngelis said, including overseeing merchandise, food and beverage, marketing, and operations. “In terms of the next step, which would be to become the general manager and a president of a team, that was what I needed to learn all of the different departments and how the team works.”

Having a family, DeAngelis wasn’t in a rush to climb the ladder. Location and ownership included, he wanted to find somewhere that made the most sense. Winston-Salem fit that ideal.

“What attracted me here, outside of a business perspective only, is they hadn’t really run their team in what I considered the modern-day minor league model,” DeAngelis said. “That, to me, meant there was a lot of opportunity here … Creativity was really key for me.”

What he learned in high school isn’t lost on DeAngelis. Since taking over, he’s filmed advertisement videos and commercials, tracing his knowledge back to the television classes he took with Erik Robbins, who’s taught journalism, TV and radio production, and English at Butler for 16 years.

While many might think of DeAngelis’ job as being related to roster moves and player signings, it involves more of just that, drawing fans in. The aspect of showbiz is particularly important, as things such as comedic skits and zany mascots are woven into the fabric of the minors.

“It’s a live entertainment venue, but my job has, really, nothing to do with baseball on the field,” DeAngelis said. “It’s to entertain everybody while they’re here. How can I do that (on) 66 different nights and keep it fresh? Because some people have season tickets. They’re literally here every night. If I just put on the same product, the odds of them coming back are very low.”

An area in which he has free rein is in the Dash’s ballpark fan engagements. When he arrived at his post in January, the team didn’t have such a schedule, which confounded him.

“This team and this community has not been a leader in promotions or on-field fun and wacky stuff, kind of the stuff that Minor League Baseball is known for,” DeAngelis said. “It’s going to be exciting for me to introduce that to the market.”

The Dash open their campaign with a nine-game homestand that begins on Apr. 8. They’ll look to improve upon their last-place finish in the High-A East South Division finish in 2021.