Terry Clifford is the Jack of All Trades
It's 7am at Falcon Park and Terry Clifford is already hard at work. He's updating the Doubledays' team store, editing the website itself to show the newest Doubleday gear available for purchase.A quick look at the process already appears complicated - dimensions to manipulate, code to process, layouts to readjust.
It's 7am at Falcon Park and Terry Clifford is already hard at work. He's updating the Doubledays' team store, editing the website itself to show the newest Doubleday gear available for purchase.
A quick look at the process already appears complicated - dimensions to manipulate, code to process, layouts to readjust. It looks damn near impossible to navigate to those who have never taken a computer science course in their life.
But that's no problem for Terry. He's in charge of all merchandise that goes in and out of Falcon Park.
Oh, and he's 65.
While most grandparents don't know how to make a call on a phone that doesn't have a line connected to it, Terry is in charge of a website that gets thousands of page views per week.
"I tried to teach my grandma how to text and it was like trying to teach my dog how to drive a car," says voice of the Doubledays Drew Carter. "Terry is an artist with the team website even though he was born around the same time as Leonardo da Vinci."
Being the Head of Merchandise, Terry makes sure that the merchandise is stocked and keeps a running inventory of everything. Anything that is purchased online gets shipped by him through FedEx.
After he's done updating the website, Terry will continue on with his work day and clean up the home clubhouse at Falcon Park. Then take inventory of the uniforms. Then do a quick sweep of the office and clean up any mess.
Terry Clifford is the Doubledays' jack of all trades.
Terry received a well earned retirement after 32 years as a New York State Department of Correctional Services officer. Between roaming the notorious Auburn Prison for 27 years and Five Points Correctional Facility for five, one would think Terry would want to live the easy life - kicking up his feet and ironically watch an episode of Prison Break or three before heading to bed and doing it all over again the next day.
But Terry couldn't stay retired for long after living such an active lifestyle for over three decades. Working as a corrections officer required him to be active at all time, as someone was always keeping an eye on him wherever he went.
Terry spent the first seven years of his retirement volunteering around town and bounced from coaching gig to coaching gig to pass the time. A Doubledays fan since the team's inception in 1996, Terry went to some games but couldn't go to many since he was often on the road with his sons during hockey season.
But when an opportunity with the Doubledays popped up from an old friend, Terry suddenly found himself more work than he could handle.
"Sitting around the house and doing nothing is very boring to me being that I was working at the jail so many years," Terry said. "And when Adam became the general manager I figured it was a good opportunity to help out."
Adam Winslow had known Terry since he was seven years old playing hockey with his three sons. He would ride with Adam and his dad to games during the summer, so he had plenty of time to get to know the Winslow family.
Fast forward to 2012 and little Adam is the general manager of the Auburn Doubledays. Now in charge of an entire minor league baseball team, he suddenly needed some reliable help that could be available at any given time.
And Terry Clifford, who had been struggling to keep busy since retiring, was the first person he called.
"Adam called me up one day out of the blue and asked me if I was busy," Terry says. "I said 'Not right now' and he said 'Could you meet me down at Sunset Restaurant for lunch?' I said 'Sure, I'll be right down."
It turned out to be one of the more memorable lunches Terry had enjoyed in a while, as Adam offered him a position as the team's clubhouse manager.
The position finally gave Terry an opportunity to get out of the house and do something meaningful with his time, but from the get-go it seemed like he had bitten off more than he could chew.
Once privileged with all the time in the world, Terry now struggled to work in any time to himself. The long hours spent inside the clubhouses made him appreciate the time he had when he would coach kids hockey and baseball.
It got to the point that the sheer amount of work would force him to spend entire nights at Falcon Park.
"It was an unimaginable amount of hours," Terry says. "I was actually living here for about two weeks, going home for about half an hour a day, and I lived in the clubhouse sleeping in a chair because there was so much to do."
The daily tasks of managing the Falcon Park clubhouses quickly became too much for Terry to handle. Something had to give, and unfortunately, it was him.
"So I went up to him and said 'Adam I just can't do it.'"
But even if he couldn't handle being the team's clubhouse manager, Adam knew that keeping Terry around would be in the best interest of the front office. He was just too handy to not be doing something.
So Terry went from managing clubhouses to managing the stats on the field as the team's official scorekeeper. On some days he'd be asked to announce the game on the PA system, and then on others he'd be asked to help tidy up the front office.
At that moment, Terry the Gopher was born.
I think the title that Adam decided to give me is 'Special Assistant to the GM', which is a polite way of saying 'Thank you for being a gopher,'" Terry says through a chuckle. "Go-for this, go-for that. It's very complimentary."
You won't know where Terry is before you walk into the Doubledays' front office in the morning. He could updating the team's online shop at his desk, or he could be dragging patio furniture from under the grandstands to just outside the visitor's clubhouse.
On game day he could either be in the press box keeping score or down in the concession stand serving up Hofmann hot dogs to hungry fans.
But that's what comes with being a jack of all trades.
Just like the utilitymen that play on the field, Terry is ready for anything and everything that his manager throws at him. He's the Ben Zobrist of the Doubledays front office - starting the game at shortstop only to finish playing in right field. And if needed, he'll pull a Bert Campaneris and play all nine positions in one game.
But whatever the task is at hand, utilityman Terry Clifford is just happy to be getting some playing time.
"I enjoy volunteering, I enjoy the Doubledays and giving back to the community and helping out Adam, (and assistant general managers) Andy (Collier), and Shane (Truman)," Terry says. "My favorite thing to do is probably just contributing and finding ways to contribute to the Doubledays organization and helping out the guys who work down here."
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