91̽»¨

With the concert crowd at T-Mobile Park worked into an ecstasy, recording artist Post Malone made his way backstage when he crossed paths with Liz Sword, ‘18, the venue’s person responsible for making sure the concert went off without a hitch. 

“Good job, Liz!”

“We definitely always keep it professional, but it is really cool,” says Sword, the Seattle Mariners manager of ballpark operations, taking a break from her workday to sit behind home plate in a virtually empty T-Mobile Park.

As the lawnmower crew runs their daily laps across the outfield, making sure the turf is perpetually manicured for the home team, Sword reflects on saving being starstruck for later. “Sometimes you have to wait until you get home and you’re like, ‘Wow, did that really happen? Did Post Malone just say my name and say, good job?’ That’s cool, but in the moment you’re just like, ‘OK, thanks.’”

That’s because Sword’s job is to orchestrate the transformation of a stadium meant for a professional baseball club into a concert stage or commencement amphitheater, sometimes fitting 8,000 people onto the field. 

Basically, any event that takes place at the stadium when the Mariners aren’t playing is Sword’s job to coordinate. With her two employees, Sword is responsible for working with the other departments at T-Mobile to make sure everything from sufficient restrooms and security is available to ensuring the cranes, stages and equipment that go into mounting a concert move in and out through a 12-foot-wide tunnel onto the field.

And then there’s the million other details that go into a music star’s performance. Recently, she even pushed the button to set into motion—slow motion, that is—the stadium’s retractable roof.

“That’s what I love. I think I would get bored if it was one specific thing, but we get to do a little bit of everything,” she says.

Sword can trace her path to the spot she is sitting at behind home plate to working for Virginia’s College of William and Mary, her first job after graduating, to the NFL’s Washington Commanders, a position she held before returning home to work for the Mariners. There were also the internships with the Seattle Sounders and Seattle Reign she landed while an 91̽»¨ student. However, her first real foray into the world of the business of sports goes back to August 2015 when she arrived on campus for her sophomore year and started working for 91̽»¨ Athletics.

“I didn’t know this job existed really until I went to 91̽»¨ and was working part-time in the Athletics Department,” she says.

If everything goes as planned, the fans who turned out to see Post Malone will go home never thinking of the effort and legions who transformed T-Mobile Park that evening. Conversely, baseball fans will never know a throng of music fans had just packed in the space.

It’s a job held by few—Sword calls it “niche.” One day she could be managing the logistics of a front office meeting leading up to the major league draft, the next a high school or college graduation. Another day might bring a commercial shoot with star M’s outfielder Julio Rodriguez and the next day a concert. She even scouts performers before they arrive in Seattle, like when she flew to Boston to see the folk-rock band the Lumineers perform ahead of their August show at T-Mobile.

Hailing from the Renton Highlands, as a kid Sword took her first windfall of cash to buy Mariners tickets for her family—she points out the seats in the stadium where they sat—and started 91̽»¨ as a walk-on high jumper on the track team majoring in finance.

Neither the major or her time as an athlete lasted long. Sword insists there is no false modesty in saying she wasn’t blessed with on-field talent, but there is no doubt the talent she discovered for staging massive and high-stakes performances coupled with a passion for the business of sports. In 2018 she graduated with a degree in business administration from the Albers School of Business and Economics (Albers now offers an MBA in Sports and Entertainment Management).

“If you’re not truly passionate and love something, you’re not going to give it 110 percent and you’re not going to be as successful as you should be,” she says.

Though she has long loved sports and was captain of the track team during her last two years at Hazen High School, Sword’s origin story starts when she got a student job as a game operations assistant for 91̽»¨ Athletics. At first, she didn’t think much of it, but over time, as she helped erect the goals on the soccer field, set up chairs, make sure the scoreboard functions and even obtained her food handlers permit to work in the concession stands during baseball games, a vision of her future emerged.

“I did that for about a year and a half before I realized, ‘Oh wait, this is an actual career I could do full time.’ And then I just wanted to keep moving up,” Sword says.

But what helped to pull it all together was the mentorship and role models she encountered in Athletics. In as powerful moment as when a pop star compliments her, she can remember helping prepare for a Redhawks basketball game when her attention was drawn to former Associate Athletic Director for Facilities and Operations Rebekah Ray.

Sword watched as Ray walked across the court, ensuring the pre-game work was being done and was in awe, transfixed by the confidence and control Ray projected.

“She had her coffee in her hand, she was the boss,” Sword recalls. “I remember thinking, ‘I want to be like her, I want to do what she does.’”

Sword adds: “That’s the feeling I get now, doing what I’m doing.” Ray, now the commissioner for the Western Athletic Conference, was touched to hear that she had that kind of impact on Sword.

“I always had a cup of coffee in my hand,” she says with a laugh, adding, “I love that she felt that way about it and that those are the memories that she’s taking away and not setting up the soccer goals in the rain and the concession stand grind.”

For Ray, that memory is why she and others devote themselves to college athletics.

“That is the college experience in my opinion,” she says. “Not to discount what happens in the classroom, but so much of college and careers in today’s industry and environment are the connections you make and the people you’re learning from, whether it’s your professor or your advisor or your internship lead.”

Though she has become a master of planning, don’t expect Sword to be the one coordinating parties and vacations in her spare time. She prefers taking her bulldog, Chloe, to the dog park, getting dinner with friends, visiting family in Renton or having them over to her place in West Seattle.

“I’m definitely not as a meticulous planner in my regular life,” she says. “When I do go on vacation I just want to sit and read a book by the pool.”