By Sommer Hamilton

Aaron Rager has never seen the stars at night. But he has seen them on the sports field.

That’s what drove his dreams as a child diagnosed with a degenerative ocular disease that will one day leave him blind. And it’s what’s driving his dreams now, as he heads to work for a conglomerate of minor-league baseball teams owned and managed by one of the most charismatic baseball promoters in sports history.

Rager, who graduates this week with his MBA from Mays, will move to Charleston to direct community relations for the Charleston Riverdogs under promotions king Mike Veeck.

The job requires Rager to fill some major-league shoes. The Veeck family name is already in the major league owner’s Hall of Fame, but Rager’s new boss has made a name for himself with wild promotions that pack the stands in his group’s 13 minor-league parks. Ever see a flying nun give out massages at a ballpark? Or fans locked out to make it into the Guinness Book of World Records for the lowest game attendance of all time? That’s the fare that has made Veeck, whose partners include comedian Bill Murray and Margaritaville’s Jimmy Buffett, infamous in sports circles.

And it’s what Rager finds himself wanting to do—make sports fun again.

It was a fluke that Rager and Veeck even met. In early 2006, Sports Management Professor Gregg Bennett handed the MBA a copy of Veeck’s book, Fun is Good. The book’s business message, about incorporating fun into work environments, hit home for Rager. But he also discovered that Veeck’s teenaged daughter is going blind from the same ocular disease—retinitis pigmentosa—that he was first diagnosed with at age 14.

The genetic disease affects the rods and cones of the eyes, and for Rager it meant he’s always had trouble seeing at night—in a feeling that’s much like wearing sunglasses in the dark. In more recent years it has affected his daytime peripheral vision and left him with spotty sight. Some people with retinitis see the world as if through a straw as their vision closes in.

Rager always felt he could do it all, despite his changing eyesight. He learned to walk with his toes up, lest he stumble into objects below his line of sight. Sports were a big deal to him: He didn’t give up basketball until high school. But it wasn’t until his junior year as a finance undergrad at the University of Nebraska that it really hit home. He lost a good 15 percent of his vision that year, and this year has been no better, though doctors give him another eight to 10 years before he’ll need Braille.

So, Rager knew he wanted to meet Mike Veeck and Veeck’s daughter. He flew out to Charleston this spring on a mission, to convince Veeck to speak at a Sports Business Forum on the Texas A&M campus. Veeck said yes, and offered him a job in the process.

“When I get an idea to do something, I just do it. I don’t have time to sit around and analyze things,” Rager says. It’s characteristic of his easy approach to life, in spite of the ticking clock on his eyesight. “I try to forget about things I shouldn’t worry about, and worry about things I shouldn’t forget about. Like, how am I going to have fun today, this afternoon? Nobody worries about that enough.”

Rager’s life story—vision aside—is regular enough. He was born and raised in South Sioux City, Nebraska. He earned his BBA in finance from Nebraska in 2002 and moved to Dallas to work as a mortgage underwriter. In 2004, he married his high school sweetheart. But he always knew he wanted more education, and in 2005 he came to Texas A&M to earn an MBA.

At A&M, he worked to recruit students to Mays’ top-15 MBA Program and directed the new student chapter of the Sports Marketing Association, organizing a dodge ball tournament, the Aggie Classic golf tournament and a Sports Business Forum to raise $25,000 this year for the Foundation Fighting Blindness.

Rager has always lived Veeck’s message about interjecting fun into serious work. In the fast-paced and high-stressed 16 months of a compressed MBA program, Rager was the one who would stroll into class with his hat on backwards and crack jokes to keep the class laughing.

Things will change as his sight fades, but Rager is too determined to let vision loss hinder his progress in life. And he now has a boss who understands his disease and his needs.

His only someday plan? To live in Tahiti for a month with his wife, falling into the rhythm of waves crashing into the beach.

“There’s too much out there. It’s not like I have these five things I have to see before I can’t see anymore,” he says. He’s quiet, composed as he contemplates what the future will hold. “I’ve never seen a shooting star, I’ve never been able to see much out at night with friends. But once you’ve had something, and then it’s lost… like being able to see the ocean. The mountains. My wife. It’s just going to be a whole different world for me.”