Latest / Rick Outzen: (we don’t) color on the dog / Ray Palmer's Last Day
Transcript
- Rick Outzen: Welcome back. Rick Outson. This is Rick's Blog Live. Thank you for watching. has been fun. We have now done our first quarter of shows. whole, you know, started in June and we're still going strong. You look the community and you look at how things have changed. When I moved in the 1980s, Pensacola Sports Association at the time, it was a golf If you were a you would join it. That was all it did was golf. Maybe some other things, but that's primarily what it did. Shirley Cronley came in as the new executive director and really started taking it in a different direction. ⁓ Double Bridge Run began with Shirley. She started looking at soccer, at at other opportunities. I think they did, we did water ⁓ waterboarding, skiing. tournament we did a lot of different things and Shirley was willing to ex experiment ⁓ those things and it took us out of ⁓ just golf into broader sports association. Then came Palmer and Ray took it beyond that I think anyone's thought sports could be. With went got back plugged into school sports, runs, basketball, connections with huge events. ⁓ ⁓ we're taking while we're taping the show is September 30th. It's Ray Palmer's last day as CEO ⁓ Pentacola Sports. ⁓ I asked my friend if this would be the last thing he did on his job and he agreed. Ray Palmer: Absolutely. And it is such an honor. I was so excited when you called. I was originalized I was mentioned I was going to play golf. And when you called and said, Would you do two o'clock on Wednesday? I was like, this is the perfect way to up. We've been dear friends, you've been part of Pensacola Sports Association, Penskola Sports, all of supportive from day one. And yeah, ⁓ it I be more honored to wrap it up here. Well it Rick Outzen: It's it's I I appreciate your friendship. You know that. You have always been when everybody in the world would be on my ass, would meet me in the post office and say, Rick, it's not that bad. You're doing good. I like what you're doing. ⁓ ⁓ he would might be the only person that day that would say something kind to me. Ray Palmer: You know, that went two ways too. There wasn't I wasn't always the most loved at some of the meetings of the powers to be as well. And and you also shared that that support. Well Rick Outzen: I you know, I'm gonna take up for good people and my and my friends. But I you know, it is been fascinating to me to watch how it's gone from a primarily sports a golf association to the the transition that Shirley put it through, to now you look at we an SEC women's soccer championship here that and and we've got teams who wanna come and play exhibition games. Because they love the field so much. That's right. And and then you've we've got this long running relationship with Sunbelt, started a basketball tournament here during COVID. they're staying with us. A of the changes at Brosningham Field up on in in central part of the county was driven by because that gave ⁓ the co commissioners incentive ⁓ to do, and it's driving, hopefully we'll drive more changes at the base center. s ⁓ is tourism has become a big deal, hasn't it? Well Ray Palmer: Absolutely. In fact, if you look in the tourism industry today, go to just about any community ⁓ the country. And they are to figure out how to tap into that sports tourism. ⁓ It become the shining star of tourism. It has shown growth consistently ⁓ through all financial times. After COVID, was the first back in to you know really show signs of. health and growth and reactivation because people could go and play outside. They weren't gonna go to a conference. You're not going to a conference in a convention center of a thousand people when you're scared to death of catching anything. But you would go play out on a soccer field at something out or a event or whatever it may be. And tourism industry has the only one that's continues to show growth. ⁓ We have very lucky our tourist development council has recognized it. Our Board of County Commissioners have recognized it and they've given us an opportunity to make Pensacola and Escambia counter a player this industry. Rick Outzen: Yeah, it's been funny because we've we've argued and fought for indoor sports facility. We still don't have it. ⁓ we we ⁓ every year, every time, every two or three years we do a new study or we do a new and we've done this. you have you have sat in my office and we have talked about it. And every there's some naysayer that comes up and says, It's dead. It's dead. It's built out. You got OA, you got things going over in in Bay County. It's dead. There we we're behind the curve. And then the next study comes in and it's grown even more. That's right. You know, it it it hasn't it's it's it is an evergreen deal. It's better than the convention business, it's better and and it throughout the community because they will even they're Brothingham, ⁓ they'll stay on beach. They will you don't have to hotels around the fields. ⁓ Ray Palmer: They don't care where they wanna play. They want to come play at a nice place with good officiating in a good facility. The John R. Jones Project is a perfect example. Those were old fields that got a lot of use. We have com very strong competition on both ends of this, both east and west and north, with very nice venues. But we're gonna put twenty two new turf fields on an existing field the calls ⁓ There are unbelievable of the people who already want ⁓ can I get that field booked for weeks next July? They don't care how much a hotel room costs. Our beaches are there, but they're also willing to come in January. ⁓ the beaches are not, they need that business. And that's what makes sports such a unique opportunity for our community. Rick Outzen: So so Ray, when you look back at this, what would what would you say your the your proudest moment, the thing that you really that you're proud that y'all accomplished? Ray Palmer: I think we've changed the attitude of a lot of people in this community of what sports can mean to it. We've always of the other things is I'm proud of the relationship we've been able to build and establish and maintain with our agencies, partner tourism agencies. ⁓ Because I around the country and have seen organizations where their agency, their visit Pensacola. or their ace their and their Pensacola Sports, fight over dollars. And we did that for a while. We used to fight over dollars. And we said with the assistance of the Board of County Commissioners, once you guys get together, we're gonna focus, let you guys kind of be the main agencies. We still have other partner agencies that still work with us. But we along so well, you know, I could call Visit Pensacola and say we've got this opportunity, whether it be Sunbelt Conference basketball, where it came in, we needed Sunbelt, we needed the base center, we needed the county, we needed the city, and we needed Pensacola Sports. And we all had to come together to agree to bring Sunbelt Conference basketball here. I had been chasing Conference for their baseball event for a number of years. I'd been multiple trips to New Orleans and sat down with them and said, ⁓ they were still at up at home home fields on campus. championships, someday they were gonna go and go to a neutral site. When they got a new commissioner, then they started looking and he loves neutral site things. ⁓ when that I think that's probably the proudest is that ⁓ I can call visit Pensacola and I know we are going to have support from them. I can call the Board of County Commissioners. I can call the Tourist Development Council and they believe that we're gonna work together. And I and many around the country Do not have that relationship. Well Rick Outzen: I your accomplishments are well known. It it has been you're still my subject matter expert. So you still will be get the foot the text messages ⁓ the phone calls and we'll we'll go grab a beer or have a cup of coffee or or you know, as this all comes out, but you deserve to rest. ⁓ Ray Palmer: I look forward to being that call because I I'm I'm stepping aside but I'm not going away. Rick Outzen: Great. thank you so much for coming on. ⁓ always, ⁓ you, buddy. Ray Palmer: What a pleasure. Love two, man. It it's been great. Rick Outzen: It has. Well go ahead and take a break. We'll be right back with Rick's Blog Live.