JOHN W. ADKISSON I The Roanoke Times

Murray Cook, former groundskeeper for Salem Municipal Field, is now one of the most respected people in his profession. Cook, 49, began working at Salem Municipal Field when he was a child shagging home run balls and returning them to then-general manager Pat Mooney for 25 cents each.

The walls of the stadium in Zagreb are scarred with bullet holes.

The scars are not fresh, they are remnants of the Croatia's struggle for independence. With that established, Murray Cook's job is to make sure the rest of the stadium is up to par in time for the International Baseball Federation's World Cup tournament beginning Sept. 9.

Actually, Cook's job is to make sure all 24 ballparks across Europe conform to Major League Baseball's standards for the 22 teams playing in the 19-day tournament. He makes sure everything from the mounds to the padding on the outfield walls to the lighting and even how close the stadium is to the players' hotel -- for security reasons.

He's done it before.

Cook, a 49-year-old Salem native who got his start shagging balls at the old Salem Municipal Field, is Major League Baseball's Venue and Field Advisor for international events. From the Sydney, Athens and Beijing Olympics to exhibition games in Cuba and Mexico, Cook is Major League Baseball's man on the field.

"He's worked some miracles for us. He gets it done, and in short order," said Bob Watson, vice president of Standards and On-field Operations for Major League Baseball.

Cook doesn't do it on his own. Never has.

Even the work ethic that drove him from ball shagger to groundskeeper to field designer and consultant, Cook said, didn't always come naturally.

Cook's family lived near Salem Municipal Field and, though he went to games with his grandad, he made money outside the ballpark running down home run balls and returning them to then-general manager Pat Mooney for 25 cents each.

"Then they found out that I got a lot of balls, a LOT, and thought maybe it would be a good idea to bring me inside the ballpark," Cook said. "So they gave me a job, I was a foul-ball snatcher."

Cook's father died when he was 13 years old, and Cook said the entire Salem public works department, including Jack Burton, Billy Hull and Mike Tyler, took him under their wing.

"Those people looked out for me," Cook said. "They kept an eye on all their kids. They wanted to make sure I didn't go down the wrong path."

He started working with the stadium grounds crew in 1974.

Morris Cregger, by then the general manager and part-owner of the Salem team, used to drive by his house and pick him up every morning at 7 a.m. and put him to work.

"He really instilled a sense of purpose in me, he showed me how to do things," Cook said. "I'd be there cleaning the stadium, brushing off the seats. He was teaching me -- I've since figured out -- the right way. At the time I was thinking 'whatever old man.' "

Cook earned a degree in education from North Carolina Wesleyan. After graduation, though, Cook said he weighed what he was making as a groundskeeper against what he would make as a teacher and stuck with the rake and mower.

He became the head groundskeeper at Salem, but the way to move up in baseball is to move and Cook did, eventually landing the job that made his career "really take off."

In 1988, Cook was hired as the groundskeeper for the combined spring training facility for the Atlanta Braves and the Montreal Expos in West Palm Beach, Fla.

"The place was absolutely a dump. There was no way I could screw up. I mean I could rake the foul lines and it would be an improvement," Cook said. "I went out and started working, which was different from what they had there before, then I finally got a mower and that was it."

That wasn't really it, but that was the start. Cook replaced the infield dirt and clay, built new mounds, and replaced the infield grass. By 1991, Cook was building pitching mounds for the likes of Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, Steve Avery, Pedro Martinez and Randy Johnson.

Not everything was perfect in West Palm Beach. Chad Kropff, a fellow Salemite who went to work for Cook in West Palm Beach in 1989, said the outfields were sand based and surrounded by canals.

"When the canals flooded, the water came back on the field," Kropff said. "Murray bought this super soaker machine that was supposed to suck up the water and put it back in the canals, but I swear that water would just run right back onto the field. ... And those canals had alligators in 'em."

Floods and alligators aside, the Braves liked Cook's work and recommended him to Disney when they built their sports complex.

"This business is a lot of knowledge and experience and what you do, and also those that know what you do," Cook said.

Later Cook joined Peter Kirk's Ballpark Services company, and designed the field portion of what is now Salem Memorial Ballpark along with several other minor-league fields.

"And he still works with us," said Carey Harveycutter, Salem director of civic facilities. "If we have a problem with our grass here in Salem, Virginia, whether he's in the U.S. or if he's overseas, we can call him and he'll help. And it isn't about how much money he can make. It's because he wants it to be good."

When Comcast bought Ballpark Services, Cook moved on to the Brickman Group, where he is president of the Sports Turf Division.

In the meantime, Cook has been working with Major League Baseball's international efforts since the 1990s. He takes U.S. groundskeepers from the majors to the minors overseas not to take over the site, but to teach the existing workers how to do the work themselves.

"He knows his dirt and he knows his grass. He's one of those guys who takes a lot of pride in it. And he's got a good crew," Watson said. "He has good rapport with other groundskeepers, whether their major leagues or minor leagues."

Kropff, who was head groundskeeper for the Botetourt Sports Complex but is the new director of the recreation and intramural fields at Virginia Tech, has been on six trips with Cook, including San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Taiwan, and is going to Amsterdam for the World Cup this week.

"There's major-league groundskeepers, Triple-A, Double-A and spring training," Kropff said. "The expectation of what needs to be done is pretty high."

Tracy Schneweis, Salem Memorial's current head groundskeeper, went to Taiwan with Cook, but likely won't be making the trip to Europe because the Red Sox are in the playoff hunt.

"You learn a lot," Schneweis said. "The other groundskeepers, when they're done with what they're doing at their fields will come over and help you and give you a couple hints. ... Groundskeepers don't keep secrets.

"The things I learned have already helped me on this field."

Having friends, not just in groundskeeping, but in all of baseball, may be Cook's greatest asset.

While Cook was in West Palm Beach, he met Pat O'Conner, who was then the general manager of the Florida State League team in Kissimmee, Fla. O'Conner is now the president of Minor League Baseball. He admitted he didn't think Cook would one day grow up to be an international expert in ballfields.

"All he was doing was turning dirt" back then, O'Conner said with a laugh. "Then again, I'm sure he didn't think I would be president of Minor League Baseball, either."

O'Conner hired Cook to a three-year turf management contract for the newly renovated Durham Athletic Park, home of the movie "Bull Durham," which will be used as a "laboratory and a training center for administrators, umpires, groundskeepers," as well as a home field for North Carolina Central University, O'Conner said.

Cook, O'Conner said, "is the first call you can make."

"He has worked himself into a position to be recognized as one of the premier turf managers in baseball," O'Conner said. "Aside from that, we just like him."