There are big tailgate parties and it looks almost like a football crowd. Bertman has no need to, but he takes his team on a season-long Louisiana road show, playing small schools like Northwestern State, where the home team and local fans wait all year to see the national champions. Bertman also has changed the way universities look at baseball, which has long been considered a money drain compared to basketball and football. Bertman was one of the few people in the 1980s to realize the sport didn't have to be a loser at the college level. But if you put a nice ballpark on your campus and the bathrooms are clean and the hot dogs are good, you can make money.
Good players help, too.
Albert Belle, Mike Sirotka, Ben McDonald, Chad Ogea, Jeff Reboulet, Todd Walker and many more players left Bertman's program and ended up in the majors. And his fellow coaches say Bertman's influence ensures that Louisiana will continue producing strong baseball talent in its youth leagues, high schools and colleges. Skip has really changed a generation of kids. Inc. All rights reserved.