The luck of the draw at Hillsdale College turned into one heck of an opportunity for Jake Howells.
Howells, a Sycamore native, happened to be a roommate of Lou Colletti, son of Los Angeles Dodgers general manager Ned Colletti. The Dodgers happen to be Howells' favorite team and the two struck up a friendship at Hillsdale.
When Howells went to graduate school in California and was an assistant coach for California Baptist, his master's program in sports management required an internship. Partly through his connection, he landed one with the Dodgers under Colletti in the baseball operations department for the summer of 2006.
"I've been a Dodgers fan my whole life and it was just a coincidence that I had this opportunity to work for them," Howells said. "It was maybe the greatest experience of my life, just being able to be in the inner circle or whatever and see how things work and being able just to talk to people who have dedicated their lives to professional baseball and know a ton of stuff.
"Just to be around those people was just an awesome experience."
Each day, Howells updated the status of everyone on every MLB 25- and 40-man roster on a board Colletti uses, put together a packet of boxscores and roundups for all of the Dodgers' minor league affiliates and call scouts and update Los Angeles' draft board with information and player evaluations from the scouts across the country.
"From my dealings with him, he's one of the nicest guys I've ever been around," Colletti said. "He reminds me of my son a lot and he's just a good kid. He's smart, works hard, knows baseball, loves baseball."
One of the major things Howells, who will coach the collegiate DeKalb County Liners this summer, said he learned from the experience is how much goes into running a baseball franchise and how deep that goes compared to what most fans see.
"Obviously those are the guys getting paid but there is so much more that goes into all of that as far as scouting and development and the staff that it takes just to make a successful team or franchise," he said.
And even though he was an intern, Howells said he couldn't have had a better experience working under Colletti.
"He's very passionate about baseball and he's very passionate about running the business well and running the business of baseball well," Howells said. "But he's also very caring. He'll take the time to talk to me or to anybody. He really respects people for who they are as people."
