Beyond the mound: Landscape architecture alumnus provide

Wednesday, May 21, 2025

Media Contact: Sophia Fahleson | Digital Communications Specialist | 405-744-7063 | sophia.fahleson@okstate.edu

Sometimes, the mark of a player is not determined by strikes or home runs. Success can be measured by how a player handles the curveballs of life.

Kyle Waters, senior associate athletic director of facilities for Oklahoma State University, has experienced a few curveballs firsthand.

Growing up in Stillwater, Oklahoma, Waters spent most of his days with his best friend Josh Holliday in the dugout at Allie P. Reynolds Stadium, home of the OSU Baseball Team.

“Everything Josh would do, Kyle would do,” said Tom Holliday, head coach for the OSU Baseball Team from 1997 to 2003. “He was at our house every day. If the weather was good, they would go outside and hit baseballs, throw footballs around, shoot some hoops, or go fishing. Kyle never had to knock on the door.”

In fall 1995, Waters became a walk-on pitcher for the OSU Baseball Team, but then, the curveballs of life started coming. After three shoulder surgeries and three years without stepping on the field, Waters decided to pursue a different dream, he said.

“I became the equipment manager in the spring of 1997,” Waters said. “After all the surgeries, I could never throw without shoulder pain, much less with any velocity.”

Spring 1998, however, brought a life change. Waters was placed on academic suspension from OSU and had a bursar bill to pay.

“It was good and bad, depending on how you look at it,” Waters said. “I was working at Coney Island, the Wormy Dog Saloon and The Barn while still working as the equipment manager. I had more time to work on the field.”

During that time, Waters made connections and proved his value on the field in a different way, he said.

“I had the highest level of trust in him, and he was like my third kid,” Tom Holliday said. “He reported to the coach. He liked working on the field and was good at handling the equipment we had. We never had to worry about Kyle.

“He wanted to be a manager, but I did not want that for him,” Tom Holliday added.

In the fall of 1998, Dean and Sue McCraw paid $850 for Waters’ bursar bill to be cleared, and he was able to return to school. Dean McCraw was an OSU Extension horticulturist in the OSU Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture.

“Dr. McCraw was a huge influence in getting me back on the right path,” Waters said. “I remember talking to Greg Bell, who was my academic adviser, and Dennis Martin, horticulture and landscape architecture professor,  about taking horticulture and turfgrass courses, and I never looked back.”

In December 2002, Waters took a job in Buffalo, New York, as a groundskeeper for the Buffalo Bisons, a Triple-A baseball team.

“I was one class short of graduating,” Waters said. “I ended up taking it online and graduating in the Spring 2003 instead of Fall 2002.”

Waters earned a degree in horticulture and landscape architecture with emphasis in turf management.

In September 2003, Waters accepted a job in Los Angeles for Anschutz Entertainment Group.

For the next 13 years, Waters worked his way up from the sports turf and grounds director to facilities director to vice president of operations assessment at the soccer complex.

“I learned a lot at AEG,” Waters said. “We were challenged to generate revenue from what facilities we had. We had as many as 200 events per year and needed to make $100,000. In addition, I learned how to communicate our goal with people — security, event staff, sponsors and guest services. I then learned to combine all the steps to have a successful event.”

Waters gained experience hosting major events such as major league soccer matches, tennis matches, music festivals, major league soccer cup and the ESPN X Games.

“We would push the field to the brink and then re-sod it,” Waters said. “We finished the X Games on a Sunday, moved the dirt Monday through Tuesday, laser-leveled the field on Wednesday, laid new sod on the field on Thursday, and had a soccer game
on Saturday.

“I still talk to my colleagues in California,” he added. “When you’re laying sod at midnight, the bonds with your team become strong.”

Then, Waters experienced the biggest curveball of his career during the spring of 2016.

“Former OSU Athletic Director Mike Holder called and asked me to come back to OSU,” Waters said. “I told him I didn’t think he needed a guy like me. He said, ‘I would like to talk to you about an opportunity.’”

After much thought and a call from Josh Holliday, who had become head coach for OSU Baseball, Waters accepted the job.

On April 1, 2016, Waters returned to Stillwater and became OSU’s senior associate athletic director of facilities.

“This was our ticket home,” said Kate Waters, Kyle’s wife. “We were going to be able to be close to our family, dirt roads, and the wide-open spaces that were hard to find in L.A.”

Once back at OSU, Kyle Waters oversaw the construction of Neal Patterson Stadium for the OSU Women’s Soccer Team in 2018 and O’Brate Stadium for the OSU Baseball Team in 2020.

“His job is unique, very critical and never understood,” Tom Holliday said. “Clean and beautiful ballparks are important to fans.”

Kyle Waters’ latest project was preparing and overseeing the 2025 Boys from Oklahoma concert. For him, though, the event was more than just a concert, he said.

“My relationships with the bands started when I was working at the Wormy Dog Saloon and with OSU Athletics,” Kyle Waters said. “At the Wormy Dog, Shannon Canada was my boss for four months. I used to see Cody Canada every Tuesday night.”

Shannon Canada and Kyle Waters kept in contact after she went to work full time for Cross Canadian Ragweed.

“Shannon and I worked hand-in-hand on the concert,” Kyle Waters said.

When the time comes to move on, Kyle Waters wants to leave a legacy of empowerment, he said, and ensure OSU Athletics can continue to run well because of its great staff in facilities, events and operations, he added.

“I started with no idea what I wanted to do but eventually found something I truly enjoyed,” Kyle Waters said. “I love organizing live events and building a team.

“A lot of people didn’t give up on me even when I assumed skipping class consistently would help me in earning a degree,” Kyle Waters added, “but it’s not how you start something. It’s how you finish.

“Sometimes finding a passion then starting that process is the hardest part,” he said. “I am not ashamed of how I started because I learned life lessons, but I am proud of how I finished. Without people like Tom Holliday, Mike Holder, or Dean and Sue McCraw, Kate and I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to be back. I am forever grateful for that.”