Roanoke Valley native Murry Cook, the world’s most well-respected guru of baseball diamonds, has been busy again this summer. Murray was recently in charge of the fields that hosted big league games in London, England and Birmingham, Alabama.
Cook, President of BrightView Sports Turf Division, is Major League Baseball’s Field and Stadium Consultant. Cook began his trade as groundskeeper at the current Kiwanis Park in Salem and worked his way up to be the most respected person in his field, creating and maintaining diamonds for the Olympics, MLB special events and anywhere a ballgame might be played.
Cook was recently in charge of the field for the two-game series between the Mets and Phillies in London on June 8th and 9th, converting a soccer(football in England) stadium to a big league diamond.
“The 2024 London series was our third transformation of the London stadium that is the home of the West Ham Football Club,” said Cook. “Although it was the third time, we still only had 18 days to flip the venue into an MLB ballpark, which still amazes me. It’s a very sustainable project, as everything from the turf to padding, infield clay, backstop , dugouts etc. goes into a 20,000 square foot storage facility and then reused again. We are going back in 2026.”
After the London games Murray flew to Birmingham to get the field ready for the game between the Giants and Cardinals at historic Rickwood Field. The game was a tribute to the old Negro Leagues and played at a stadium that had been home for many Negro League games. And, it took some doing to get it ready for Major League baseball.
“I basically went directly from London to Birmingham,” said Cook, who had been working on the Rickwood project for quite some time.
“We started looking at Rickwood as a potential site in 2021,” said Cook. “The field needed to be replaced along with dugouts that were basically bunkers. We built the field, fencing, backstop and foul poles.
“We partner with BAam productions and Populous on these builds for MLB. BaAm handles all the back of house temporary build items like locker rooms, media center, hospitality while Populous handles the traffic flow of people, fan plaza etc.”
Cook’s baby is the playing surface itself, and no one does it better.
“The infield crown on the field was so high if you looked out of the old dugout to find your outfielder you could only see him from the chest up,” he said. “Also, the old distance from home plate to the backstop was 85 feet. The average backstop distance in big league parks is about 50 feet. We moved the field back and closed up the wall behind home plate to get to 60 feet.
“The stadium still has one of the original fences behind the wooden fence we replaced. It was used in the 30’s and 40’s and is concrete. The distance on those walls made Salem’s old Municipal centerfield at 420 feet look small. They had 478 feet to center and 405 down the left field line.”
It was anticipated that Willie Mays would be a featured guest at the game, as he grew up there and played at Rickwood for the Negro League Birmingham Black Barons. Unfortunately, Mays passed away just two days before the game.
“When we began building back in the fall there was a lot of talk about Willie being at the game,” said Cook. “Unfortunately he became ill and passed. We painted the 24 behind home plate in his honor.
“It was a moving experience for the players and fans as they escorted the 40 plus Negro League players to the foul lines before the national anthem.”
