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And we tell stories about everything here on this show, from the arts to sports and from business to history, and everything in between, including your stories. Send them. ouramericanstories.com. They're some of our favorites. But now Alex Cortez brings us the life story of Ken Kendrick, the principal owner and managing general partner.
of the Arizona Diamondbacks, the baseball team, a gig he probably didn't expect to have. As a child, Here's Alex. Uh Ken Kendrick grew up in the small town of Princeton, West Virginia. I had the great good fortune when you look back on your life when you're my age. And I know that I had great fortune in growing up in a small town.
not a place of wealth. but it was a place of great comfort to have great friends that you started out and I even today have my group of friends from that time called my sandbox friends. And we celebrated as a group. our 75th birthdays, all from the same little town, the same little kindergarten, the same 12 grades until we all went off to college. And I'll give you one story that's one of my great now that I'm in the world of sports.
One of my Greatest Sports Exploits Which Once I tell this, you will realize I didn't have very many great sports exploits. Was as a 14-year-old, Our baseball team is a pony leg, 13 and 14 year old. Was a pretty darn good team. And we competed to go to the World Series. And we were in a double elimination tournament one game away.
from going to the World Series. Of the Pony League, which would have been when Washington, Pennsylvania was where they played their Lake Williamsport to Little League, Washington, PA is to the Pony League.
So we're in the final. We now have the game where we're playing a team. They've already been defeated once. And we have to beat them once to go, and they have to beat us twice. There were three of us that were the core guys on the team.
My one friend was the catcher, I was the first baseman, and our third friend. Was the pitcher, and our pitcher was really good. He was geared to be the pitcher, so we were gonna win the game. And sure enough, We get to the last inning and we're ahead five to two. All we have to do is get them out.
And all of a sudden, My friend the pitcher can't throw the ball over the plate. And he just goes completely wild. He can't throw it over the plate. Eventually, they load the paces. With walks, And of course.
The next guy hits a Grand Slam home run and we lose the game. Six to five. I lose my temper. as a result of this, and I go after my dear friend. and I had evil in my heart.
and my friend the catcher, Got in between us and looked me in the eye. We're 14 years old, and he said to me, Can. We wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Wayne. Get your act together. We got another game to play.
And unfortunately, we lost that other game. But it was as close as I ever got to any real great success as a player in sports. And those two guys were my lifetime friends. Sadly, the catcher, the guy that was Wise beyond his ears, Don. passed away some years ago with ALS.
but my friend Wayne and I are still in close touch. Even this morning, we were texting.
So that's a story of childhood that, you know, could have come out of some other place. But it came out of that town that I grew up in and left a big impression on me, especially the maturity of a 14-year-old boy. My friend Dawn. And I spoke at Dons Memorial. and honored him by telling that story.
because, you know, it was really an important thing for him to do. because maybe my friendships would have been fractured. because I was very angry and very upset. and felt like I had to blame my other friend, which was wrong. And I went through a whole iteration of things that I learned from sports.
In that same era, The baseball team In these towns, they have all-star teams that compete in these tournaments. And so we had an all-star team. and it was very good and I was their coach. And I had this group of young guys that really looked up to me. I now know they did, but I didn't think about it much then.
I'm just trying to make them play as well as. And I had a lot of rules. I was very hard. coach may be hard to play for. And Several years ago after I'm involved in Major League Baseball, I get a package in the mail.
And a letter. And uh It's from one of the kids that played on my team. when they were 12 and 13 years of age. And he said, I'm completing my bucket list. and there is a baseball I want you to sign for me.
and return to be a part of my bucket list. And he said, the reason that I want it is that you taught me one of my great life's lessons when you were my coach. He went on in his letter to explain that the lesson was That He pitched a... Perfect game, no hitter. with me as his coach.
And He's facing the very last batter, And he gets an 0-2 count on him. And he said, I threw my very best fastball right down the middle. And he swung and missed. and I had a perfect game no hitter and everybody was so excited. But you weren't.
He said, I saw you standing over to the side not celebrating. And finally, I came over and I said, coach. Why aren't you celebrating? he said. Bobby?
What did I teach you? And I taught him what you should always Do as a pitcher. When you have an 0-2 account on the batter, you've got him under control. You don't throw the ball right down the middle. And I had taught him never to do that, and he did it.
And even though he was successful, I didn't even know. And he said, I've always carried that through my whole life. And he said, I just, I feel like I need your name on a baseball to put in my bucket list. Uh And you're listening to Ken Kendrick tell his story. Growing up in a small town, Princeton, West Virginia, not a place of wealth.
But a place, he said. of great comfort when we come back. More of the story of Ken Kendrick. Here on Our American Stories. Folks, if you love the great American stories we tell and love America like we do, We're asking you to become a part of the Our American Stories family.
If you agree that America is a good and great country, please. Make a donation. A monthly gift of $17.76 is fast becoming a favorite option for supporters. Go to ouramericanstories.com now and go to the donate button and help us keep the great American stories coming. That's ouramericanstories.com.
This is Matt Altmix from How to Money, and we are all about comparing prices to save money on so many things in life.
So, why wouldn't you compare prices for your next ride share? Taking a few seconds to check Lyft can save you real money on your next ride. And I did this last time I caught a ride home from the airport after some travel, and guess who came out on top? Lyft.
So don't just price check with flights and phone planes and your groceries. Comparing ride share prices will help you to save money every time you ride. Save money, check lift. Hi, my name is Lisa and I'm a licensed psychotherapist, which means my work doesn't magically end when the session does. There are notes to write, appointments to manage, billing, insurance follow-ups, and somehow all that admin used to creep into my nights and weekends.
That's why I switched to Simple Practice. Simple Practice is an all-in-one electronic health record built specifically for therapists with HIPAA compliant tools and high trust certification.
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These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. And we continue with our American stories and the story of Ken Kendrick. who just so happens now to be the principal owner and general managing partner. Of the Arizona Diamondbacks, but how did that happen? Here is Ken talking about the story of his life.
and him becoming an entrepreneur.
Well. It's it's been a long and windy road. I started out. In my very early years out of college, I worked for the IBM company.
Well, it was a subsidiary of the IBM company. It was when they were first getting into the software world. They had a subsidiary company and I was employed in sales. learned an enormous amount. It was my graduate school.
You worked out of a local office, but you went off for training, you would come back. And it went over 16 months or something.
So, time in the office, time in the classroom. And, you know, it's a little bit like you're going to go to live in Spain, and if you can just speak some of the language. You're better than if you speak none of it.
So I learned the technology side of the business at the level of a broken Spanish, but it was helpful. because I could identify with the things that needed to happen to design a system to do whatever process my business client needed. I benefited more from that than I would have benefited from going to business school. I've never looked back to go to business school, so it's just my conclusion of what they taught me. I was able to go out and be successful early on with the IBM company and built enough confidence that allowed me to say, hey, I think I could maybe succeed in my own business.
And of course I didn't know what I didn't know and ran into a lot of obstacles. I always remember My exit interview. in our office with the Wazand veteran You know, he seemed very old to me because I'm in my 25. This fellow's in his 60s and he's the senior citizen in the office. Bruce Smith was his name.
He was a wonderful man. And he called me in and he said, look, Ken, he said, I I want him. Tell you I I uh Think you have a lot of skills. You've done a great job for us. He said, I want you to understand that often People starting their own business don't succeed.
And I hope that you will. but I want you to know you would have a home here. if you wanted to come back. And then he said, and I want to give you some advice. About being in business.
He said it you're you're gonna have a lot of Dark days. And he said, The thing that I would tell you you need to learn to do. is manage your time. Because There's going to be a lot of demands on you. And he said, you know, Tom, Time has two measurements.
Length and intensity. And he said, I would advise you. to be intense about how you use your time. I think he was a wise man. And He wished me well and I think it was really valuable to me.
to know that I was well enough respected there that I could come crawling back if it didn't work out. Uh Which is a huge gift to an aspiring entrepreneur, a sense of security that many don't have. This would be more than 50 years ago. It's why I remember the conversation just like it was yesterday and the vividness of that advice he gave to me. Yeah.
The software world was just really getting started. The word software was not born. You know, it was hardware, programming, and systems design, et cetera, morphed into the word software.
So My friend. Yeah. that we could go out and start our own software company. And we did. And It was a struggle from Day two.
I think we celebrated on day one, but on day two, It began the reality of what starting and operating a business really is. Within a year, my friend who had a family and was very capable guy. You know, we were struggling financially. He got an opportunity to go with a very large banking company in their technology group. And he decided to leave, and so here I am.
stuck, you know, now without my original partner. and a group of people who backed us. And we were on the edge of failure. And I felt a sense of duty, you know, that I couldn't really give up. And so in year two of my company, I called the staff together and and did two things, went to the staff and said, look, we have to make some real sacrifices here.
We need to all look at ourselves and determine What pay cuts we can take. to keep this going. and I will agree for the next year to work for free. I won't take a salary. And each of the rest of you, I would like you to think what you can.
Do I then was able to go to my outside investors and say, look, here's where we are. Here's what we all have agreed to do. and I need each of you to consider whether you will make another investment to give us a chance to make it. And most of them did. and we continue to operate.
And, you know, hard work. tends to pay off. And within the second year, We hit on a client relationship with a substantial local company who signed to be a customer, a very large customer, and that kind of got us to the point where we were in the black. and we operated for a couple years and then I met. My now more than 50-year partner who had a similar story, and we decided.
the two small businesses Made a merger of a 50-50 deal. It's now A world-renowned software company, the largest company in the world, providing enterprise software to run colleges and universities. A company called Datatel with thousands of employees worldwide. Later, Ken became one of the founding investors of the Arizona Diamondbacks, who achieved their greatest triumph of winning the 2001 World Series against a Yankees team whose city just endured their greatest tragedy of the September 11th terrorist attacks. One of the saddest and yet most rewarding.
My World Series ring. And the inscription on the inside says 91101 never forget. And of course that was the Diamondbacks One World Championship. And, you know, I was proud to be on the edges of that. And there were so many.
things that were memorable searing vivid memory, some of which the entirety of the country watched. The sports part of it was the rebirth of sports. tied into 9-11. you know, the baseball I think took a great lead in. and the first World Series game played in New York City and George Bush throwing out the first pitch.
The president of the United States. And prior to the first pitch, he's down under the stadium. You know, there's uh pitching areas and hitting areas under these stadiums.
So he's under the stadium in the Yankee side of the stadium. warming up, throwing some pitches, and providing And Derek Jeter comes in. And seizing, walks through and he sees him and so he comes over being the most prominent Yankee player and he comes over and Yeah, so hello Mr. President, glad you're here. Glad you're going to be throwing the first pitch.
By the way, Mr. President. Are you going to stand on the rubber? On the mound? And a present said, Yeah, I guess so.
He said, You better. If you don't, they will boo you. Because most of these celebrities You don't get up on the mound because it's tough if you're not used to it. You stand down in front on the flat ground and then throwing a ball on the flat ground, you know, I can do that.
So all of a sudden the President, he said, It just hit me like a ton of bricks. And he said, I froze up. And he goes out. And you don't know that you're there watching, of course, as a fan, you don't know this has happened. You just see him walk out, you know, and the crowd's just one of these emotional moments.
marches right up onto the pitcher's mound. throws a perfect strike. And it was a searing moment. with intense Drama. And Unbelievable security in the ballpark.
I mean, it's hard to communicate. how uptight everybody was. believing that an attack could occur. on the ballpark. When we come back, more of this remarkable life story, Ken Kendrick's story, here.
on our American stories. This is Matt Altmix from How to Money, and we are all about comparing prices to save money on so many things in life.
So, why wouldn't you compare prices for your next ride share? Taking a few seconds to check Lyft can save you real money on your next ride. And I did this last time I caught a ride home from the airport after some travel, and guess who came out on top? Lyft.
So don't just price check with flights and phone planes and your groceries. Comparing ride share prices will help you to save money every time you ride. Save money, check lift. Hi, my name is Lisa and I'm a licensed psychotherapist, which means my work doesn't magically end when the session does. There are notes to write, appointments to manage, billing, insurance follow-ups, and somehow all that admin used to creep into my nights and weekends.
That's why I switched to Simple Practice. Simple Practice is an all-in-one electronic health record built specifically for therapists with HIPAA compliant tools and high trust certification.
So I don't have to worry about juggling systems or cutting corners just to keep things running. Scheduling, documentation, billing, insurance, client communications, even automated appointment reminders, it all lives in one place. And if you're starting or growing a practice, Simple Practice also offers a credentialing service that helps simplify insurance enrollment, which can be a huge lift when you're starting to scale. Right now, Simple Practice is celebrating Mental Health Provider Day with an exclusive offer, up to 70% off for one year. Yes, up to 70% off for one year.
But hurry, offer ends May 15th at simplepractice.com. Simplepractice.com. The first ever X Games League Championship is going down live and New Orleans has the call. Three days of elite action sports, a season's worth of competition coming down to one final weekend. Watch July 24th through 26th on ABC, ESPN, and ESPN2.
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These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. And we continue with our American stories and the final portion of Ken Kendrick's remarkable life story. And Ken now tells the story of his great hobby. that his mom helped inspire. Yeah.
The thing my mother did better than any other, and all of my friends from childhood would now agree. Was every one of us as young boys got into collecting baseball cards because that's what you do when you're a certain age. And we would. march down to the five and ten cents store with a quarter in hand, buy five packs of baseball cards, and we would eat the bubblegum and trade the baseball cards. And then we would bring them home and.
You eventually grow out of doing that, and mostly those cards disappear somehow. But we now have acknowledged that my mother was the best mom ever. because she kept my baseball cards. And I still have my baseball cards and none of my friends have theirs. And of course, they say theirs were better than mine, but we will never know because I have mine thanks to my mother.
So I decided after I got my cards. and realized there was value there and I begot enamored.
So I began to look for... valuable cards and I have near 50. and what my collection has become. is unquestionably the most well recognized elite card collection in the world. And includes the Honus Wagner card, which has a whole book written about it called The Card, and has been titled The Mona Lisa of Cards.
They're fewer than 30 of them known to exist. Cards are more than 100 years old. A lot of folklore about why there are so few, and the era of Honus Wagner. who was a player in the early 1900s and one of the original members of the Baseball Hall of Fame. Cards were produced by tobacco companies.
and they were inserted into the packs of tobacco, either tins of tobacco or I guess wrappers. I'm not sure I know exactly. Anyway, as you bought your tobacco product, You got a card and the advertising on the back. is the they didn't put the players performance data as they do in later years than in the old days. The tobacco companies used it for advertising.
And that happens to be Piedmont, who was one of the prominent cigarette or tobacco companies because they sold a lot of loose tobacco in those days in the early 1900s. And the popular legend is that there's not a lot of Honus Wagner cards because he was opposed to tobacco and told them to stop making the card. Yeah. That is a story, it's a part of the legend, but I think I know enough about it. He was a cigar smoker.
So he was a smoker. But this tobacco company The belief now is that the legend of him being anti-tobacco was not true. but that they, the tobacco company, wasn't willing to pay him what he thought was a fair amount to to use his image and he required them to stop printing. Therefore, a scarcity of these cards versus others of his peers in those days. Yeah.
Yeah. What I have gotten to do, and I did it even today. I help other people. who have collections And don't know anything about what to do to monetize them. Generally, they're older people who have inherited from some Now long deceased family member, example.
I'm working with a family right now. who has a collection. from their grandfather for Grand Children. of a gentleman born in 1896. who, based on his age, collected all of these very prominent cards in the era of Honus Wagner and Christy Matheson.
and Walter Johnson and all that great collected these tobacco cards as a kid. And This family has inherited his collection, been in the family all these years, went through their parents. who are now gone to the siblings. and the cards have never been graded. They really don't know what they have.
Exactly. They know something about it. And they have A collection of nearly three thousand cards most all of which are a hundred years old.
Now the cards are not of the highest grade because I've seen them digitize photos. But Anything in baseball that's from 100 years old has some value.
Well, they called me. They read a story about me. And I didn't know what to do. And they called me out of the blue. You didn't know them?
I've never, no, I don't, I've never met them yet. I know their names. And I've texted and emailed and phone called, but I've been working with them for about a month or a little longer. helping them learn. the setting that their inheritance is.
so that when they go to the professionals, to monetize because that's what they want to do. They will be Not as naïve. as they started. And I've sent him a couple of books and spent more hours than I probably should have. But I just think, wow, man, I want these guys to get every penny that what they have is worth.
I've done this 50 times. Why do I do it?
Well, I love the game. I love the collecting. I love that people have things. you know, that I can help them. learn about and benefit from that I don't want someone because there are many people who would take advantage of them.
And I don't want to see that happen to somebody. And I do that as something that I think it's my duty to try to help people to a point. I can't Give my life over to doing it, and I don't have a sign out, although, now that you're gonna. Publish what I'm telling you. I may start a new business and become a broker.
Yeah. And now, Ken shares a final sports story about his son Cal when he was 11 years old. Uh He's a little league ball player. He's on a very, very competitive team. Really, really good team.
Good coaching. outstanding players and you know he's a decent player on the team. And I go to their games and I make it a absolute solemn promise to myself. I will never make criticisms. Of these kids, you know, because I'm in the business I'm in and I'm a parent, but I, you know, if I say something like parents are always.
chirping at the coach, chirping at the players. I never do that. I just... Enjoy watching. I'm proud of them.
I'm glad he does well. and I cringe when he doesn't. And so this one. game was a night game. And now we're in the car, and it's fairly late, and we're driving home.
He's in the back seat. And I start talking. out of the blue inexplicably I began to analyze his horrible performance. And I say, I can't believe that guy struck you out. And I can't, you know, and it's like.
I get on a rent. and he's totally silent. And Fanice's uh daddy. I said Yachal. He said You do understand.
I'm not going to ever do this for a living. Da da da da da And, you know, back to the young person, you know, in the anyway, the young person's wisdom. Overcoming maybe the older person's kind of losing touch with what. He or she may be doing, maybe should be doing. In this case, me.
I shouldn't have been ranting on my son's performance.
So, anyway, he's a. Very special young man and I'm proud of him as I am my daughter. Yeah. And you've been listening to Ken Kendrick. Great job, as always, to Alex for finding the story, doing the introductions and the interviews.
And great job to Robbie on the production. And what a voice you just heard. And that's what we love doing here on the show. We just tell folks stories, whether they own a baseball team or a body shop. Uh it doesn't matter to us.
Everyone's the same. People live their lives differently. And beautifully, so many of them. I love that last story about his son Cal. Dad, you do understand I'm not going to do this for a living.
and sometimes our kids. have wisdom and teach us stuff. I know mine does. Ken Kendrick's story, a beauty, here. on our American stories.
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The championship starts July 24th. Don't miss the moment. It becomes history. Mm-hmm.
