Jordan Rangel played baseball when attending the University of Wisconsin – Whitewater while he was pursuing a degree in business and marketing. He also played semi-pro and later coached the game. His youngest son is nine now, but Jordan has coached baseball for the last 15 years. His story of baseball, though, began many years prior.
Jordan’s father started a travel baseball organization for children with only one team in 1991. Jordan eventually took over for his dad and the non-profit organization now has 17 baseball teams and 13 softballs teams. They have their own baseball complex with eight diamonds that their own teams call “home,” and they hold tournaments there on the weekends. The complex hosts 250-300 teams per year.
“I was seven-years old,” Jordan remembered, when he started little league. “Nothing competitive,” he added. “My dad and a couple of his buddies from work threw a team together to see where it went. It kept getting bigger and bigger. The longest running baseball organization in the Quad Cities area.”
In 1996, Jordan’s father was tragically killed in a work accident. Since taking over for this father in the organization, in its 31st year, they now serve 280-320 kids per year and have impacted 5,000 to 6,000 children.
“We think about that all the time,” Jordan said of the impact the organization has made on kids. “From 5:30 a.m. until 9 p.m., I think about it all the time. To give back to the youth of the community … it’s pretty special to us.”
“Marine Credit Union’s (MCU) core values fit into what I do in my life,” Jordan shared. Whether it’s coaching or at work, “year after year,” Jordan said, “It’s about impacting people’s lives. It ties in pretty well with MCU and it why I’m so passionate about my job as well.”
At seven years, old, Jordan said he had “no idea” the impact of his father’s dream to grow the organization and have the complex would have on him and the community. “Everything he set out to do was accomplished. Family and friends kept his legacy growing.”
Jordan Rangel is the MCU Business Development Officer for the Quad Cities market. He works remotely from home and also spends days on the road visiting with ex- or prospective partners.
The “big thing” for him working with community partners, “is seeing the back channels where lenders find ways to say yes working with people who might have had financial struggles in the past. We want to help them and put them in a better financial situation.” He said this is what motivates him at work.
At home, Jordan and his wife Holly have 5 children, from the ages of 24 down to eight-years-old – Blake, Emma, Evan, Brooks and Ellie Mae. They have a very active family, all involved in sports, including baseball and softball.
When asked by his boss whey he is so excited in the morning, Jordan shared he doesn’t drink any caffeine, he stays up late and is up early with his kids. “There is no point in being grim and gloomy,” he responded with a smile.
