Florida Atlantic University has one of the better baseball programs in the nation, but their facilities don’t reflect that. They currently sit a top the Sun Belt Conference, but every player has to sit atop the same throne when they need to take a dump. In an era where Division-I players in the most elite programs workout and practice in multimillion-dollar facilities, 30-plus FAU players have to share a single outhouse.
“It sucks,” senior second baseman Mike Albaladejo said according to University Press. “It smells sometimes. You could only imagine 35 people sharing one Porta-potty. The stench that comes out at the end of the weekend. The only rule that we have is nobody does the number two in there.”
So where do they do the number two? And how much asparagus are these dudes eating that a porta-potty where people only take a pee smells that badly? The stench is apparently real, and senior outfielder Alex Hudak is jealous that other schools don’t have to put up with it.
“Dude, we’ve got a Porta-potty and it stinks,” Hudak said. “Man, it smells bad. That’s disappointing. With baseball down here, and having the reputation of a winner, just looking at other Sun Belt Conference schools and schools around the nation, you should have bathrooms. Hopefully, the winning translates to some bathrooms and extra dollars. I don’t think bathrooms cost that much. They’ve got them everywhere, right?”
Former head coach Kevin Cooney called the bathroom situation an “absolute disgrace” and said it is a battle he lost many times with the university. In fact, Cooney insists that the lack of new and nicer facilities has cost the program recruits.
“We don’t have a bathroom — for the public or the players,” Cooney explained. “The big upgrade that I got for that facility was, I talked them into putting porta-johns behind the dugouts. I used to go to the bathroom underneath the grandstand against the wall, hoping that people walking down the steps didn’t see me. We ended up losing very good players in the recruiting process. We still got good players, but we lost some really good players because of our facilities.”
If your head coach taking a leak against a wall and hoping fans don’t see him isn’t enough to inspire a school to build some new bathrooms, I don’t know what is. Make no mistake about it, that stuff makes a huge impact on players when they’re choosing a school to attend. It’s one thing to not have a $5 million facility with a cafeteria and hot tubs, but it’s another to be sharing a porta-potty with all of your teammates. Heck, I think we even had two or three when I played Little League.
H/T @Cortes via The Big Lead
