Meet Dr. Phillips High's guy behind the grass -- Observer Preps

DR. PHILLIPS When the Dr. Phillips Panthers take the field Friday night against the Oak Ridge Pioneers, they will do so — as they always do — on one of the best-kept playing surfaces in Central Florida.

From the care of the field to its artful logos and lining, Athletic Director Russell Wambles said visiting athletic directors and coaches constantly alert him to how amazing the field looks at Bill Spoone Stadium each Friday.

The man responsible for that field, though, is usually in the shower when a lot of this happens.

Mark Seelig, who has been taking care of the fields at Dr. Phillips High since 1994, likes to work right up until game time before showering off the dirt that signifies a job well done and heading out to enjoy the game from his golf cart in the north end zone.

Unfortunately, with a program such as the Panthers’ that routinely wins by a large margin, missing the first few minutes often means missing all the fun.

“Sometimes I get out here and the score is 14-0 already,” Seelig said with a laugh. “I can hear (public address announcer John) Magrino with the foghorn, and I know that we scored while I’m in the shower.”

For Seelig, it’s all part of a routine that officially dates back to 1990, when he was a teacher at Apopka High — but unofficially goes back to his days as a kicker at both Apopka High and the University of Miami.

In high school for the Blue Darters, Seelig said that, as the kicker, he was one of the favorite choices of then-coach Chip Gierke to help with mowing and maintaining the field.

“I’m the low man on the totem pole, so coach would say, ‘Mark, cut the grass,’” Seelig recalled, adding he would also help with top-dressing the field during the summer. “I used to get in the back of his truck, he’d fill his truck up with sand, and I’d sling sand going down the field.”

In college as a kicker for the University of Miami, Seelig struck up a friendship with Kevin Harty, the Hurricanes’ field manager at the time. That friendship led to the two partnering to keep the small practice field for the kickers in tip-top shape — and dugout seats for Seelig with the grounds crew during Miami baseball games.

When Seelig returned to Central Florida in 1990 and got into teaching — he currently teaches history at Dr. Phillips — he again returned to a budding passion for keeping fields pristine.

The would-be side job for Seelig is often as intensive as his actual job as a teacher. Seelig takes care of the field at the stadium at Dr. Phillips in addition to the school’s softball field and practices fields. He sometimes lends a hand to baseball coach Mike Bradley, who maintains the Panthers’ baseball diamond — and Bradley has been known to help out Seelig, as well.

The maintenance includes several mowings each week — as many as five times if the Panthers have a home football game — repairing the field and lining it ahead of games.

During the summer, when usage is low, Seelig goes to work full-time on top-dressing.

“I have a very understanding wife,” Seelig said of his wife, Janet. “There are a lot of times in the summer when I’m up here 60 or 80 hours a week.”

Seelig — who has a son, Brett, at Florida Atlantic and a daughter, Gretchen, who attends Dr. Phillips — also plays a large role in helping to schedule out field availability. One of the key ways to keep a field looking fresh is to limit who is on it and when — a task that can be difficult. Especially in the coming weeks, with football and marching band ongoing and soccer starting up, the task can be a tall one.

“Everybody is begging for space, and Mark is the guy that makes sure they have some place to go,” Wambles said.

On game weeks, Seelig paints the field for the varsity game starting on Thursday during his planning period (seventh period) and into Friday, where he has a longstanding permission to take the day off.

“Between Larry Payne, Gene Trochinski and Dr. Suzanne Knight, they have given me the day off on Friday when we have home games,” an appreciative Seelig explained.

Seelig enjoys being outside, but mostly he does what he does for the kids. He is known to put a small wrinkle in his design each week — shading the white numbers with a different color, for instance — to see if the players notice. 

“I do it up kind of like a college, and the main reason is for the kids,” Seelig said.

Contact Steven Ryzewski at [email protected].