Two Years' Worth of Sincere Appreciation & Gratitude

This originally appeared on my Medium and Twitter (@BFBaumgartner) accounts on March 18, 2024.

Nine days after marking the first anniversary of his unexpected passing, my thoughts returned back to my first really close childhood friend: Chris Lee.

Ever the positive voice through numerous text messages, he always understood where my passion lied and the tight needle I was trying to thread amid some unique and difficult circumstances (cerebral palsy) within a cutthroat and uber-competitive industry.

Chris, born six days before my twin brother, Brett, and I back in April 1983, served in Iraq with the 101st Airborne Division during the mid-to-late 2000s and his perspective was one I sought frequently amid my career pursuits.

He left us on March 12, 2021 — exactly a month shy of his 38th Birthday. Three hundred seventy four days later, I began my journey at ESPN on March 21, 2022.

I couldn’t help but wonder how excited he would have been for me in getting the opportunity to write for the Worldwide Leader and the chance to show what I was capable of to a much wider audience outside of Naperville, Illinois.

For two years, I hustled, put my head down and did the best I could with keeping up with some of the best high school football players in the country as a member of the college football group on the digital side for ESPN.com.

I filed news stories on blue-chip recruits who are going to play at Alabama, Georgia, Clemson, Ohio State, Notre Dame, LSU, Texas, Oregon, Florida State, Florida, Oklahoma and Miami, among numerous other schools.

While I was mainly zeroed in on the recruiting news cycle, the one time I had the opportunity to show off my writing chops on a deeper level forever stands out.

On the Friday of Labor Day weekend in 2022, Jeff and Payton Thorne entrusted me with telling their family’s story — from Naperville Central High School (Illinois) to burgeoning Division III football power North Central College (Illinois) and eventually to Michigan State — ahead of father (Jeff) and son (Payton) competing on opposing sidelines during Western Michigan’s visit to East Lansing, Michigan.

I had covered Payton during his two years at Naperville Central, my alma mater, knew well of his family’s deep roots within the Illinois football community (grandfather John coaching at Wheaton Warrenville South High School and North Central College; father Jeff playing at Wheaton Central High School and Eastern Illinois and then coaching at North Central College).

It was a privilege to have the opportunity to share it with a much wider audience.

I tried to help in any way I could on the college side of things when opportunities arose and I didn’t shy away from anything that my bosses asked me to do.

An opportunity to pen on Ohio State stud wide receiver Marvin Harrison, Jr. declaring for the 2024 NFL Draft in the middle of January even came my way, one of the few times my byline hit the front page of ESPN.com.

For a kid who was born 2 ½ months early, weighing just two pounds and grew up finding any way to stay involved with sports despite not being able to play, that’s not too shabby.

I’m as hard on myself as anyone because I have always had high expectations and have believed the Good Lord had big plans for someone who’s extremely fortunate to be here, given where modern medicine was in 1983.

I found out in January that my contract wasn’t going to be renewed and while I’m sad because I enjoyed immensely having that ESPN byline next to my name, I know I gave it my all, I’m proud of the work I did and I did it the right way.

I leave extremely grateful, appreciative and thankful to many people inside and outside of the college football group.

That list begins with ESPN’s lead NBA play-by-play voice Mike Breen, ESPN’s senior NBA insider Adrian Wojnarowski, ESPN’s Executive Editor and Head of Event and Studio Production Norby Williamson, ESPN’s Vice President, Executive Editor of ESPN Digital Lauren Reynolds and ESPN’s College Football Deputy Editor Ryan Canner-O’Mealy.

A pair of former ESPN HR stalwarts, Leslie Cummings, whom I first met in April 2019 while in Bristol interviewing for a job in SIG, and Jason Williams never gave up on me.

Neither did Breen, an introduction facilitated by Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame writer Peter Vecsey in Feb. 2019, Wojnarowski after a pair of conversations at 2020 NBA All-Star Weekend in Chicago and Williamson, who took an interest in the story of someone anxious, ready and able to do what some people said wasn’t possible.

My professional journey with cerebral palsy hasn’t been easy and I suspect will never be that way. There are mental scars from a few prospective employers from the past that will never go away. That’s just the nature of the beast of having a lifelong disability and dealing with perceptions that come with that.

Which is why ESPN and the people there that I had the pleasure of getting to know and work alongside will always have a special place in my heart — even if I never get the chance to return.

They collectively looked at what I could do (write) as opposed to what I couldn’t (drive and not get around easily).

They went out on a limb for someone who has been fighting the good fight for nearly 41 years and for someone who has a lot to prove, not only to himself but to others that may doubt what he’s capable of.

I got thrown into the deep end of the pool with college football recruiting, a very difficult and unpredictable beat.

I was able to keep my head above water and find my footing with the help of ESPN recruiting and transfer portal ace Tom VanHaaren. For how welcoming he and the rest of the college football group were to me, I won’t soon forget.

They collectively showed grace and patience as someone new to the crazy world that’s college football recruiting got up to speed and attacked it the best way he knew how by meticulously reaching out to those highly regarded players in hopes they’d provide perspective on their respective choices.

That’s all I was trying to do: serve the audience that eats, drinks and sleeps recruiting. I wanted to give readers coming to the site something to take away from a commitment newser and educate them on a particular player.

I was never going to be pleased with my batting average on that score, but I pursued and tried to live up and promote the ESPN standard to the fullest.

I was hell-bent on making the most of this opportunity and not letting those people (Breen, Williamson, Wojnarowski, Reynolds, Cummings and Williams) down. I sincerely hope I did that.

Equal opportunity is something we all strive for and isn’t guaranteed. I know that first-hand. And that’s why I’ll be eternally grateful to ESPN because they didn’t judge my book by its cover.

Stability is all anyone can ask in any aspect of their lives. After freelancing on the prep beat in my hometown for many years, ESPN was the first place to give me a sense of that.

I can never repay the people I had the opportunity to work with and work for during the last two years enough for that.

I’ve been upfront with people in and out of the industry about the fact I’m going to need a lot of help.

Not saying that to be flip. I sincerely mean it. My situation and circumstances are unique. They always have been and always will be.

And there are few people around me that truly understand that. That’s okay. People shouldn’t.

However I’ve built a strong enough network that, hopefully and God willing, is there to pick me up when I need it most.

It’s really hard changing the perception of what people with disabilities are capable of. I hope I’ve done that the last two years and can find a new home somewhere.

Just need to find people willing to listen and get to the right person.

But make no mistake about the following: I can write and I’m good at it.

I’m open to consider whatever possibly could come my way next. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared about my future.

I didn’t come this far up the mountain just to come this far up the mountain that is the uber-competitive media landscape.

Above all else, I just want things to be okay.

Goals and dreams remain to be accomplished after nearly 20 years of writing within the high school realm for most of my time post-graduation from Michigan State in May 2005.

A desire to get some exposure outside of that world is at the top of that list. I want to prove to myself and to others that I am indeed more than just “the high school guy.”

Will I get there? I have no clue.

But I’m willing to try and that may be all that matters.

And as a cousin of mine once told me when it comes to getting a door to open: “You did it once. You can do it again.”

I sincerely hope she’s right.