The Man Behind Bethel's Baseball Revival

ARDEN HILLS, Minn. (WCCO) -- What do Tom Kelly, Lou Piniella, Don Baylor and Joe Torre all have in common -- besides being legendary managers?

Brian Raabe played for them all.

It begins to explain the success Raabe has brought to Bethel University.

"It's been great, baseball's been awesome to me," Raabe said. "A great way for me to become a manager here was to learn under all those people. "

Prior to Raabe's arrival in 2012, Bethel hadn't made the MIAC playoffs since 2000.

Now not only have they made it six of his seven years at the helm, but they've won the regular season championship twice.

"It's more than recruiting, it's all about developing the players that you get," Rabbe said. "You've gotta be a coach, you've gotta develop the players. And that's the one thing about D-III baseball that I think that a lot of people might miss, is that down here, you have to take the players that you get, and develop them into very, very good baseball players, and that's exciting for me, I enjoy that part."

And a lot of that part has come from drawing on his own experience and the men he played for.

Raabe was an All-American for the Gophers, and a six-time minor league All-Star, even winning the Triple-A batting title in 1996.

That kind of performance earned him multiple call-ups to the major leagues over three seasons, playing infield for the Twins, Mariners and Rockies…and also in Spring Training with the Yankees.

"I was a student of the game," Raabe said. "I had to be."

Yet for all his success, there's one white whale Raabe's still chasing: Bethel has never made an NCAA Tournament.

But he believes this just might be the team to finally do it.

"It would be a breakthrough moment for our program," he said.

Bethel will have either the two or the three-seed for the upcoming MIAC tournament.

The tournament winner gets an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.