For baseball fans, it’s not hard to be a little envious of what Brennan Whitley does for a living. When Boston Red Sox fans converge on Fort Myers each spring for pre-season games at sold-out games, Whitley has one of the best seats in the house, so to speak, as the team’s senior manager of Florida business operations.

“To be able to arrive to ‘work’ at a baseball park every day is not a job; it’s a dream,” he says.

Whitley knew he wanted to be in sports management since age 17. He started off his sports career while in high school, volunteering each year since 1999 with the City of Palms Classic Basketball Tournament in Game Day Operations. Throughout college at the University of Tampa, he interned each summer and winter breaks with stints in Florida Gulf Coast University’s Athletic Office and the Fort Myers Miracle. In Winter 2010, he joined the Tampa Bay Rays’ Stadium Operations Department and a year later 2011 came on board with the Sox and assisted with the opening of JetBlue Park at Fenway South in 2012.

Want a job like his? Some advice: “Perseverance. The sports world is one of the most competitive job markets in the country,” he says. “Be ready for long hours and little pay.”

Whitley and his wife, Danielle, have two rescue dogs, Maggie and Mookie. His hobbies include golf and softball.