Tom King

He was brought in as a mid-season solution to a problem back in 2016, as third base was a real issue for the Nashua Silver Knights then.

Who knew when the team signed Cam Cook, a Nichols College infielder, that it was naming the guy who years later would steer the franchise during one of the toughest times for any sports franchise, a pandemic.

It was more than just the education of general manager. It was baptism under fire. And the world was burning.

But Cook and assistant general manager Katie Arend steered the Silver Knights through the flames. The franchise had flourished under a previous tandem, Ronnie Wallace and his assistant GM Cheryl Lindner, and now this is another dynamic duo with its own strengths.

Cook was brought in first by then new owner John Creedon, Jr. as stadium operations manager. Then, after another front office change, he was elevated to GM after one season.

And his first season as the day-to-day boss, after he and Arend had worked their you-know-whats off to enhance the brand, the rug got pulled out from under them by this villain called COVID. But Cook came up with a plan that absolutely floored city officials in its detail and attention to health and safety. It was Game On.

“It’s kind of one of those things, it’s life in general, right?” Cook said recently. “Where I stand now I look back to where I was in 2019 and 2020 and it’s like holy crap, I can’t believe I got through everything the way I did.”

That was then, and this is now. Cook sees the difference. If you’ve been around the franchise long enough, you’ll also see the difference, it started to show itself a year ago. Yours truly would joke with Cook that he was finally talking like a general manager.

But there was truth in that.The baseball player still likes to talk about the team on the field, but the days of when he didn’t know what he didn’t know about the business side are over.

Cook has been a fast learner, and he admits that even his own perception of the job has changed.

“A lot of people, and I can’t blame them, you think of general manager of the Nashua Silver Knights and you think it’s maybe three, five months of work, there isn’t that much too it, you just kind of roll the baseballs out, people show up,” Cook said. “That’s very much not the case.”

No, it isn’t, not in the world of running a Futures Collegiate League franchise. They are run as a business, for profit. So there’s always been pressure on Cook, but a lot of it he admits he put on himself.

He also admits ownership has removed some of the shackles, letting him make more decisions on his own.

Don’t get us wrong, this isn’t absentee ownership. This is really the first year the Creedons can fully put their stamp on things, because a lot of the pandemic uncertainty is gone; the schedule came out in late fall so everyone was able to roll up their sleeves and get to work with a more legitimate off-season.

But that part of the Creedon stamp has been to let Cook and Arend do their thing.

“My growth has been in conviction and decisions, kind of not being super uptight about certain things,” Cook said. “At the end of the day, my job is to make 1,000 – 2,000 people just have fun.

“When you put it in super basic terms like that, it makes things a lot easier, right? To run up more beer to a suite that runs out, it doesn’t cost us (that much). The kids on the field, the in-game activities, the first pitches, the National Anthems, all these things that are really cool for those kids, it costs us nothing.”

This is not what you’d hear from Cook the player or even Cook the stadium operations manager.

His job was to get on base and score runs, play good defense at third, and then make sure the lights came on on time and there was enough food at the concession stands.

But don’t get us wrong. At this level, the job is a young person’s. Energy. Creativity.

That’s why Cook and Arend have been a great fit. Which is why they want to make the community smile.

“Oh yeah, and that’s the community in the sense of the city of Nashua, the season ticket holders, Cal Ripken, Little League, Nashua Little League,” Cook said. “Without them, would we go belly up? No, but we need them here. They’re going to be future Silver Knights, future season ticket holders.

“It’s crazy to think the Silver Knights are going to be in their 12th season, and there’s guys that played for the Silver Knights now that remember watching Chris Shaw, and Ryan Sullivan (as kids).”

And Cam Cook.

“It’s stressful, but I like it a lot,” Cook said. “It bothers me a bit, a lot of people are throwing around the phrase, ‘Baseball is dying.’ I don’t necessarily believe that. You could make the argument every sport is dying other than football. The NBA, they’re starting to figure some things out, they’ve altered things. MLB is doing it. The NHL is kind of fizzled, we’re all in a football struggle.”

But the job is no longer a struggle for Cam Cook. It’s not really a job any longer, it’s who he is. Nashua Silver Knights general manager.

The guy who once worked the hot corner at Holman now has the stadium’s corner office.

Really, going back to 2016, who knew?

Tom King can be reached at tking@nashuatelegraph.com, or on twitter @Telegraph _TomK.