The following takes place between seven pm and eight pm.
All right, let's go seven oh eight, seven hundred WLW Welcome in RNL Carrier Sports Talk presented by Kelsey Chevrolet Avliance Cavlister. How you doing, Thanks for making your way here. We've got two hours to get it done tonight. I can tell you upfront. Coming up at about fifteen minutes, we're going to start some pretty in depth Kyle Schwerber conversation and reaction on your part to what is transpired over the last twenty four hours or so. And then we'll have a fun topic we'll toss in in the
eight o'clock hour as well. But let's start first right here. My first guest is from Middletown. No, he's not Kyle Schwarber. He created something really cool though, years ago, the MLB Ballpark Passport. Think of a book to officially stamp your
visit to a ballpark. Well, this idea, this product has grown so big and has had such an impact on baseball fans across the country that the Baseball Hall of Fame has voted to induct the original first print of the Major League Baseball Ballpark Passport to be put on display in the museum, and I said, how cool is that? Because I had this next guest on way back when let's find out all about it. Welcome in, Tim Barks. How are you, hey, Lan?
How you doing?
I am fantastic.
Let's do this.
Let's backtrack a little bit for those who may not know of the idea, just kind of describe the passport, what it looks like and how it works.
Well back in twenty ten, I had the idea, you know of in the recording your memories and your visits to the ballparks. And when I got back, you know, I had the prototype made and and everything, and I called up Phil Cassolini of the Reds and said, hey, Phil, I got this pretty neat idea. I want to show you and see what you think. And he said, sure, Tim, come on down to the ballpark. And so he loved it, and he took it to Major League Baseball at the winter meetings.
That was fifteen years ago. Wow.
And and he came back and called me and said, Tim, come.
On down to the ballpark.
We have a conference call with MLB. They love your idea. And the rest is history. And that year it was the Red season Passport which if you recall, I was on your show prior to opening day discussing the first book, and I know Casey had one and he got one to use. And you know, we were all such short notice that we didn't have a chance to design and make the MLB Ballpark Passport Book, which was for visiting
all thirty ballparks. And so that's what we did, you know, the whole summer and in winter was creating and developing that book for release in twenty twelve. And I just want to say real quick that without Phil Casalwini, none of this ever would have happened, because he took that to MLB on his on the cord, had an offline meeting with MLB and Phil just you know, it never the day of light they've had it been for him. I just want to tell him thanks, if he's listening.
And Tim, if I remember correctly, this all kind of popped into your head because you you had kind of a quest to visit you wanted to visit all thirty Major League parks to begin with.
Correct, Yes, I was already doing it.
I was already doing it, and uh I drove to uh the Arctic Circle back in twenty ten, and we'd already been to a number of ballparks and and of course, you know, watching the Reds.
Play as much as we could on the road, and uh, you know.
When you drive to Alaska, you know, yeah, a lot of time to think. And I started thinking about growing up with the big Red machine when I was, you know, thirteen years old in the seventy five, and I said, you know, I've got no memories at all.
No ticket stubs, nothing, no anything to.
Remember all the visits that I had, you know, to the ballpark with my with my dad and brothers and sisters and in church groups and youth groups and things, and I had nothing. And I said, I want to throw something out there. And I would get back to the hotel and I'd do some search, you know, on my phone online and couldn't find anything. And so it's just amazing that you know, a guy from Middletown had
an idea. Yeah, and you know that I went with and you know, I was the first one to come up with this idea for baseball and pathboards.
And so tim, if if someone has a passport, say that they order the passport from you kind of walks like when you walk into a stadium. What happens or how is it used? Explain it for someone who might not understand it.
Yeah, so you have the book, and so inside the book it lists all what we call them validation stations at all the Major League ballparks. And so what happens when fantomes in they look inside their book they see where the valuation stations are located inside the ballpark.
There's multiple locations.
At all thirty stadiums, and so like the red for example, the Reds have I think seven or eight different stamping locations listed and Dodger Stadium has like ten. So it was grown from one, you know, from one stamping location for ballpark to you know, seven, eight, nine, tens stamping locations.
It's kind of crazy. And so fans will present their book.
And they'll ask for the stamp and they'll turn to their you know, to to the team page in the book, and uh, the staff will roll the date to the date that you're there, and they'll hand you the stamp and you'll ink it up, test it, then stamp your book and it has the name of the ballpark, city, stton, zip code to the ballpark, and then the date you were there, and so once you stamp that it's ink the paper, it's there forever.
Tell me the Hall of Fame news. Tell me how you got the news, and tell me how exciting this is.
Yes, it was so unreal.
I've been thinking for a while because you know, next year is the fifteenth year of the MLB ball Park Passport Book. We released it at the All Star Game in Kansas City in twenty twelve, and we only took you know, we brought like something like, you know, one hundred and fifty one hundred and seventy five books, and we got the joking on the way in that hey, well what if we don't sell any books.
And never been done before? You know, no one had ever done before.
So there was no blueprint for it, and I knew on the second day there at Fantast we sold out of our inventory and we took orders for another I.
Think it was three hundred and some.
Orders for the next print, and we told them up front that hey, it might be three four five months before we have another rundowe, and they said, we don't care, we want the book. And it was at that time that I knew that we had, you know, something special, and so I have to thinking about the fifteenth year and coinciding with that.
And I said, you know, I said, I said, I wonder if the Hall of Fame would be, you know, interested in this book.
And since it was the first you know, I kept the first book off this off the press and got the first stamp at Great American Ballpark in it on April fifth of twenty twelve, and so, you know, I thought, you know, this is this is a part of baseball history, and you know, I'll contact the Hall of Fame and see what they think. And so I called and got ahold of a very nice lady, Cassidy Lynt, who is
the library director at the Hall of Fame. And I told her I had the original first print, first book, first stamp MLB Ballpark passport book, and if the Hall of Fame would be interested in it. And then so then she pertea to tell me she's like Tim bat the Hall of Fame Committee Board on Historical Artifacts. It's scheduled to have a meet on the I think it was the first Wednesday in November. And she said, I'll
take this information about your books. She she knew about the book the Hall of Fame has sold it from the very beginning. They've been a part of it. And she said, I'll see what they think, and she's all get back to you. And so it was, you know, several weeks that passed and and then I'm you know, in the back of my mind, I had November fifth on the calendar, you know.
So so on November seventh, I got the call and uh yeah, and so you know, and I was nervous.
You know, my my heart kind dropped my stomach because I I didn't I didn't think he would go anywhere, you know, And so uh, she said, Jim, she said, the board voted to have have your book put into the Hall of Fame.
Unbelievable, so cool.
Yeah, so I mean it's like a baseball player gave him the call. But that's how you really felt like it.
Yeah, you know, yeah it was. Yeah, it was so cool. Tim.
For for those wondering who I want to learn more about it does and kind of explain the inventory here would would if somebody wants to hit like minor league ballparks or spring training ballparks. Is there a version of that for the ballpark passport?
Yes, you you talked a little about before, you know, the program has grown where we now have stamped in two hundred and twenty four stadiums and and museums and in ballparks all over the country. So we have the MLB ball Park Passport Book, which is of course pro visiting all thirty ballparks. It's a binder, so and the most often question I get asked is about what there's a new stadium built. It's a binder, so you can add new stadium as the build. The book never becomes outdated.
We have a Game day Book which took the place of the Red Season Passport book. That is for season ticket holders and people who frequent, you know, multiple games, so you can stamp every game you go to. And we have the Spring training Passport, we have the minor league Passport, and then then we have this the new Baseball Attractions Passport that was created here about a year and a half, which has fifty non MLB venues in it. So the Jackie Robinson Museum, yeah, Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame.
The list goes on and on all right, So.
This would be great, This would be great for the holidays, A great stocking stuffer for a kid who's starting out as a baseball fan or an older adult who's a baseball fan. Tell listeners how they can find out more. What's the website to get more information on the MLB Ballpark passport.
Yes, it's an MLB Ballpark Passport dot com and it's on there. We have an awesome Facebook group also that for they want some real, live, you know, working information. It's the Facebook group is Ballpark Stampeders, and it's a wonderful group. They poster stamps from all over the country every night, and I think now we have people coming in from all over the world to ballgames with the book. Oh it's just uh yeah. And we're small business. We don't advertise at all, and so we we've been award
of mouth. And I appreciate you so much for you having me on your program.
You got it when it started.
Absolutely, man, those were great days. And I'm just so happy and excited for you. And shout out to all the stam Peters listening. Shout out to our guy Bill Bray who's listening, and congrats on all this and and keep it rolling and keep me posted on stuff unfolding, all right, I sure will, brother, Thank you, Thanks Tim, Take care