Sports
Gearing Up
At home or away, the equipment staff gets everything game-ready.
Good thing Mark Peeler is a detail person.
As equipment manager for the football Badgers, Peeler makes sure that the team’s 120 student athletes and their coaches have everything they need during countless hours of practice and for game day — whether it’s held at Camp Randall or an opponent’s stadium. With each player requiring a helmet, kneepads, a jersey, cleats, mouth guards, and more, it adds up to an astounding amount of gear. The team goes through one thousand pairs of socks and nearly as many shoes in a year.
During the season, Peeler keeps that inventory under control, describing his job as “taking care of these guys, always keeping up with the equipment maintenance, cleaning, and storing everything, and doing all the preventative checks necessary to avoid any breakdowns during games or practices.”
To meet the steady demands, Peeler and his assistant also count on fifteen student workers who, he says, “spend as much time here as the guys on the team.”
Good thing Mark Peeler is a detail person.
As equipment manager for the football Badgers, Peeler makes sure that the team’s 120 student athletes and their coaches have everything they need during countless hours of practice and for game day — whether it’s held at Camp Randall or an opponent’s stadium. With each player requiring a helmet, kneepads, a jersey, cleats, mouth guards, and more, it adds up to an astounding amount of gear. The team goes through one thousand pairs of socks and nearly as many shoes in a year.
During the season, Peeler keeps that inventory under control, describing his job as “taking care of these guys, always keeping up with the equipment maintenance, cleaning, and storing everything, and doing all the preventative checks necessary to avoid any breakdowns during games or practices.”
To meet the steady demands, Peeler and his assistant also count on fifteen student workers who, he says, “spend as much time here as the guys on the team.”
The football team’s practice and game schedule sets the pace for Peeler and his crew. Even during the off season, when the team only holds practices, the equipment staff still has plenty to do. Hours before practice, they start to unload the gear and set up the field, then stay behind when practice ends to clean, repair, and properly store everything. Cleaning dirty uniforms alone averages five loads per day in two industrial-sized washers, and the crew gives special attention to jerseys and pants, carefully examining them and treating all stains and paint from the field markings. Rainy days and mud, of course, offer their own challenges.
On game day, it’s even more intense. Maintenance personnel help set up the field for games, but Peeler and his assistants get started four hours before kickoff, precisely laying out all pieces of the uniforms to ensure that they are ready when the players start to arrive in the locker room around two hours before the game. Emphasizing the importance of preparation, Peeler says that if he’s done his job right, he experiences a little down time while the game is being played. “If we hear somebody yell ‘Equipment!’ during the game, that’s usually a bad sign,” he says. “It’s one of those things where I hope nobody notices us — because you don’t get noticed unless you mess up.”
Preparation also allows the equipment staff to respond as quickly as possible when a player suddenly exits the game motioning to a ripped shoe or a warped helmet. Football is a high-speed and high-contact sport, and even the strongest pieces of equipment can break down.
On game day, it’s even more intense. Maintenance personnel help set up the field for games, but Peeler and his assistants get started four hours before kickoff, precisely laying out all pieces of the uniforms to ensure that they are ready when the players start to arrive in the locker room around two hours before the game. Emphasizing the importance of preparation, Peeler says that if he’s done his job right, he experiences a little down time while the game is being played. “If we hear somebody yell ‘Equipment!’ during the game, that’s usually a bad sign,” he says. “It’s one of those things where I hope nobody notices us — because you don’t get noticed unless you mess up.”
Preparation also allows the equipment staff to respond as quickly as possible when a player suddenly exits the game motioning to a ripped shoe or a warped helmet. Football is a high-speed and high-contact sport, and even the strongest pieces of equipment can break down.
“I’ve seen a cracked helmet or two before, and we’ve had some seriously bent masks,” Peeler says as he takes out a facemask that he keeps in his office. “This one happened when I was just starting out with the Badgers. A guy was on defense, and he got smacked, and he came off the field to change his mask. The other team had just scored, and they’re kicking off, so we’re thinking we have some time to fix this thing. But then we return the kickoff for a touchdown, and he’s got to get out on the field, because he’s on our kickoff team.”
With some players, Peeler says, equipment failure is more a matter of when than if. The linebackers and interior linemen are taking hits all day, and running backs such as sophomore P.J. Hill are often carrying the ball thirty-plus times a game, with a style of running defined by collisions. “P.J. always has a backup helmet,” he says. “He needs to be ready all day, but he takes a lot of hits, and we can’t have him missing plays because of us.”
The equipment staff’s to-do list may be long during the regular season, but it’s nothing compared to bowl season, if the Badgers earn an invitation — which has been a lock during the Barry Alvarez–Bret Bielema era. Layers of complexity are added as arrangements are made to move the team’s equipment and the administrative offices to a distant location. The equipment staff uses a semi donated to the UW Department of Athletics and fills it to the brim with items ranging from office materials to weights for the players to a generator, just in case there’s a power loss. Working with the coach and some of the seniors, Peeler even helps select the mementos that the players receive for making it to a bowl game.
While Peeler logs seventy-five hours of work a week during the season, he loves his job. “I enjoy watching these kids grow,” he says. “I don’t mind taking care of them.”
— Ben Sayre MA’06
With some players, Peeler says, equipment failure is more a matter of when than if. The linebackers and interior linemen are taking hits all day, and running backs such as sophomore P.J. Hill are often carrying the ball thirty-plus times a game, with a style of running defined by collisions. “P.J. always has a backup helmet,” he says. “He needs to be ready all day, but he takes a lot of hits, and we can’t have him missing plays because of us.”
The equipment staff’s to-do list may be long during the regular season, but it’s nothing compared to bowl season, if the Badgers earn an invitation — which has been a lock during the Barry Alvarez–Bret Bielema era. Layers of complexity are added as arrangements are made to move the team’s equipment and the administrative offices to a distant location. The equipment staff uses a semi donated to the UW Department of Athletics and fills it to the brim with items ranging from office materials to weights for the players to a generator, just in case there’s a power loss. Working with the coach and some of the seniors, Peeler even helps select the mementos that the players receive for making it to a bowl game.
While Peeler logs seventy-five hours of work a week during the season, he loves his job. “I enjoy watching these kids grow,” he says. “I don’t mind taking care of them.”
— Ben Sayre MA’06
