Ex-Aquasox GM Busy, Happy -- Tucker Active In Business Side Of Sports

The office in Melody Tucker's Lake Stickney home is in a major state of disarray.

Piles of paper stacked as far as the eye can see. File cabinets stuffed beyond capacity.

What color is the top of Tucker's desk?

Can't tell. The desk is covered.

That is the way Tucker likes it.

"Part of my personality is, the more things on my desk, the more I try to get done. The busier I am, the busier I try to be," she said.

These are busy times for Tucker, who resigned this month as general manager of the Everett AquaSox to re-start her business.

Melody Tucker & Associates specializes in marketing, promotions and advertising, and has two other full-time employees.

Tucker started her business in 1984, and one of her first clients was the Everett Giants.

She put the business on hold when she joined the Giants as GM in 1989. At the time, she was the second woman general manager in minor-league baseball. Five women are now GMs, Tucker said.

"I enjoyed the variety of work - in sales, working with the players, ordering equipment, worrying about the rain delays," she said.

Tucker worked in the marketing, public relations and broadcast service departments of the Seattle Mariners from 1977-84.

Tucker, a 1967 graduate of Ingraham High School, said she was just a baseball fan thrilled to work in her favorite sport.

One of her first - and best - childhood memories is going with her father, Bill, to a Seattle Rainier game when she was 3.

"I really don't look at myself as a pioneer," she said. "It was an opportunity given to me, and I took it and ran with it."

After working 13 years in baseball, Tucker decided it was time to focus her considerable energy on her business.

She's invigorated with the idea of working with someone instead of for someone.

Among her clients: The Everett AquaSox. She will sell stadium and program advertising during the offseason. She has other clients from the banking, restaurant, hotel and radio industries.

Radio is something Tucker knows about. She's been an in-studio producer for University of Washington football broadcasts for 14 seasons.

Tucker reports to work about three hours before kickoff. She updates scores and edits audio clips for the halftime show.

She edits game highlights and screens calls for host Bob Rondeau on the postgame call-in show. She always has a finger on the edit button in case callers get a bit too, um, colorful with their language.

"She's done everything for us back in the studio," said Rondeau, the Huskies' play-by-play announcer. "She's been invaluable to us."

Rondeau does not see Tucker during the game - he is at the stadium, she is at KOMO's studios. But he is thankful Tucker is at the other end of his headset.

"She's been a trooper with us throughout the years," he said. "It's a great comfort to have her back in the studio because you know things will get done, and get done right. I don't know where we'd be without her."

Working as a producer was a logical fit for Tucker, given her interest in sports and her family's background in radio. Mother Claire and brother Skip worked in radio. Sister Penny Coyne started her radio career in Everett and is a DJ at a Seattle country music station.

Tucker works for visiting professional sports teams, helping with their telecasts. She also produces syndicated radio shows and has done some freelance writing. She was in Los Angeles this week, putting on a seminar for a client.

Being busy. That's the way she likes it.

Tucker graduated with a secondary education degree from Central Washington in 1971.

Teaching jobs were scarce. The only offer she received in 1971 was from a tiny school on the Colville Reservation, teaching all grades.

"They said, `You'd live in the back room (of the school) and you'll have to buy your own chalk. Do you want the job?' " she recalled.

She turned it down.

That led to her degree in communications from Central in 1972.

Thus, her winding path through the sports and advertising world has come full circle.

"The way things turned out, I have no regrets," she said. "Now, it's time to go to work. You can't rest on your laurels."