The capital city’s collegiate baseball team promises to continue dazzling fans on and off the field

Darren Feller recalls that while he was attending the 2002 winter baseball meetings in Nashville, a prospective employer asked a question right out of the job interview playbook. “So where do you see yourself in five years?” the recruiter asked.

Feller’s response, a most ambitious one, seemed to come from the same text. “To be the general manager of a baseball team,” he said. After a stop with the Appleton (Wisconsin) Timber Rattlers, a Class A minor league baseball team affiliated with the Milwaukee Brewers, and a stint as director of development with the Wisconsin Sports Development Corporation, Feller hit his mark when a friend introduced him to Jesse Bolder, who asked him to run a new collegiate summer wooden bat team he was starting in Springfield called the Sliders.

Naturally Feller jumped at the chance. Not only would the job allow the Oregon, Wis., native to remain in the Midwest close to family and his beloved Brewers, but the situation had all the necessary elements for building a successful ball club — a supportive fan base, available facilities, potential sponsors.

“This area is rich in history with the Cardinals-Cubs rivalry. It reminds me of the rivalry between the Bears and Packers,” Feller says, referring to the professional football teams in Chicago and Green Bay. But while those pro contests are all about bragging rights for the fans, and feature legendary teams that are perennial championship contenders, Feller understands that the Sliders’ success will not rest entirely on what the players do with their bats and gloves. Because of the nature of amateur summer sports leagues, high player turnover is a fact of life. So just as important as what the Sliders do on the field is what happens off the field, between innings, and in the offseason.

For this reason, Feller, who has a master’s degree in sports management from the University of Wisconsin at La Crosse, sleeps with a notebook next to his bed to jot down the promotions ideas he dreams up, like the toilet seat horseshoe contest.

Despite the franchise’s early success on the diamond, the soon-to-be 34-year-old Feller has trained himself to think of the Sliders as more than a baseball team.