Black History Month Alumni Series: Jeremy Waller

Jeremy Waller grew up in the baseball world. For 20 years, his dad ran the San Diego School of Baseball, which was a baseball camp where professional players would work with kids. The camp was held at Palomar. Because of this, Waller knew of Bob Vetter, the then head coach of Palomar's baseball program.

Waller wanted to play for Vetter because he liked and respected him. Coming from Scripps Ranch High School, Waller came to Palomar in 2004 where he redshirted. Well, that was Vetter's last year as the head coach. Waller finished his time at Palomar as a right fielder, occasionally playing first base.

"We had a lot of talent. It was a dog fight for playing time and opportunities, but you know that's what you look for, a competitive environment that's going to challenge you mentally, emotionally, and physically both on and off the field," Waller said. "That's the experience I had and there was a lot of growth that occurred because of that."

He was then fortunate enough to get a scholarship to play at San Diego Christian University to continue playing with several teammates. After one season he decided to discontinue his baseball career.

"I grew up very involved in the game," Waller said. "I realized your whole life you spend all this time, effort, and energy pursuing a goal or vision of who you're going to become, and when you get to the sunset of that career you ask yourself, 'Well what do I want to do?'"

That's when he became an entrepreneur. His first couple of businesses didn't work out, but in 2014 Sandlot Gamez was founded. Sandlot Gamez was a game and tournament scheduling website for coaches and umpires.

That business venture lasted seven years. Waller is now the Vice President of Business Development for Sports Channel Media, which is a video and content producer company. They live stream games from Little League to high school to community centers.

Around the time he started his business ventures, Waller wanted to stay involved in the game, so he got into coaching. He's been coaching travel baseball for about 14 years and in 2011, he joined the Grossmont College coaching staff. In 2017 they won the California Community College Athletic Association State Championship and that's when he left the school due to his businesses gaining traction.

"That's how I got my fix," Waller said. "I wanted to be around the game, I no longer wanted to pursue the game for myself personally, but it was more important for me to step in and provide the information I could about my experiences and my development and try to see if I could help others go further than I did by avoiding mistakes and enhance their experience by making certain decisions, whether developmentally or academically."