Major League Reptiles

I thought I'd take a minute to introduce myself to the BP.net community. I've been posting here for a little while now, but I never formally introduced myself. My name is Brant Rustich from San Diego, CA. If you can't tell from the username, I play professional baseball for the New York Mets. I was drafted in '07 as a pitcher from UCLA. Baseball has given me the opportunity to begin to expand my collection of ball python morphs to begin a business that should be up and running this winter. I've began collecting since '07 but it really wasn't until this year I've decided to convert a hobby into an actual business. I've owned and raised reptiles my whole life and this is something I'm very excited about. I look forward to meeting new people in this industry, and learning along the way. While it's difficult to run a business with my occupation, I do have a wonderful fiancee to help me get the wheels rolling, and some great advisors. I've debated whether or not to disclose my personal occupation with this business, but I do know it is a part of me and personal reputation is vital in this industry. My reputation is something I'm very proud of and wish to establish within this community. I know Chad Brown has done a great job playing professional football and starting his own business himself, so I look to him as a sort of model for myself. If you have any questions or simply just want to chat about reptiles, feel free to write me a PM or email. Looking forward to hearing from you.

Wishing you much success in baseball and your business.

Same here good luck with both.

Welcome aboard! :handshake

I think it's awesome to see professional athletes and other celebrities showing a serious public interest in herps. There's not nearly enough of you guys, so if you know any others, encourage them to get the word out about their passions! :D

Good luck on both fronts Brant! I love supporting local breeders and look forward to doing business with you someday. :gj:

Welcome to the herp world.

I too was in baseball, made it down to lake land with the Tigers for spring training but shoulder gave out 3 weeks in and never recovered. Ended up finishing up college as a closer.

Keep that arm healthy and RUN, RUN, RUN

Welcome to Bp.net... It is great that you have a great love for reptiles and want to further your knowledge by becoming a larger part of the reptile community. There are many great people that you will meet in your dealing with bp's. I really wish you the best in your new venture with bp's.

Morgan

Pleasure to meet you! It's nice to see someone "in the spotlight" so to speak who loves reptiles. Good luck in both aspects of your life :)

welcome, hope you have enjoyed being a member here for the last few months and plan to stick around. good luck with the business and your career, hope to watch you play one day. although im a Boston fan, i only hate the yankees, and my brother-in-law love the Mets. you cant say that your collection has expanded without posting pics. PICS!! :rage:

You gonna make it to the show this year? The mets need all the help they can get.

Hello. Glad to see you could make it. We've been expecting you for some time now.

Jim Smith

Welcome to the family and just because I live in Mass I was born in NYC. Let's go Met's

Holy cow! It's so awesome to have a professional athlete in BPs! You could really help the non herp people to accept the hobby! :gj: I think I just became a mets fan :D

Welcome to the site, it's a great site with lots of people that are always willing to help!

Thanks for the welcome everyone. I will try and post frequently and include some pictures of some recently acquired animals when they begin to arrive. Most of which are being held for me until my season ends however, but I'll definitely be around. I've listened to a few reptile radio broadcasts recently, definitely a sweet deal. Looking forward to hearing more.

I sometimes wish more athletes were interested in ball python morphs or reptiles in general, but that doesn't seem to be the case. I have yet to really come across another player at this level who was interested, but that's alright. A lot of what people perceive with reptiles is a huge misconception, and hopefully that will change as this industry grows.

Growing up I was always a good athlete and played multiple sports, but I did spend a lot of my childhood field herping with my Dad or simply on my own catching anything I could find. I was definitely that kid in elementary school who's parents had to paid the library for the expensive reptile books that I'd check out and never return. Anyways, once I hit about middle school I sold most of my snake collection (about 10 snakes) that I acquired because club baseball and stuff simply got too busy to keep. Plus, I was at that age where I thought girls were more important anyway. Long story short in 2007 some wild fires hit San Diego pretty hard, and it came right up to the back of my Fiance's house. Shortly there after, surveying the damage I rescued some burnt rosy boas. It was right then where it sorta clicked for me again that housing and caring for snakes were AWESOME again... and I missed it. After nursing them up, I knew I had to acquire a python so I purchased my first NERD Lemon Pastel in '07. Well when I went to buy the snake, the local breeder brings out a piebald, and a slew of other morphs... Of course, my jaw dropped and was like what the heck?? Then he goes into the whole bit about ball python morphs. I then go out and purchased the morph book and couldn't believe what the heck I was seeing with these ball pythons. It sure changed a lot from good ole normal I had when I was a kid. That's when I figured I'd acquire a few more morphs that year and try my luck making my own combos.

Well a couple years and a few clutches later, I've definitely expanded to the point where I decided to make the transition from a hobby into a business this year. Now I didn't just attend UCLA because I could throw a fastball, I did take some stuff away from school. I've been reading these forums for a few years now, and you can see everybody's passion/obsession with these morphs, me included. This industry isn't going anywhere fellas. At least not until I'm an old old man. People are always going to want what they don't have. I do believe the economy frightened some people, and definitely hurt others who invested at a bad time. I for one bought a male fire for 2k in 08... that sucked, but I didn't even utilize my investment appropriately at the time anyway. If I had some quality females I would have made my return and then some; even at the peek of economic depression. If you took a business or economics class, you'd know that investing when the market is at it's lowest is a good idea if you have the funds available. So that's what I'm deciding to do, and I'll staple it to my forehead. "To produce animals people don't have, and higher quality ones they do have." I think if I can somehow manage that, how can I not be successful?

Hopefully, I stay healthy and some big league success will allow me to share my feelings on reptiles to a lot larger community. That would be the ultimate goal. :yes: I'll be around to check in on all the craziness you guys do. Keep pluggin away and best of luck to everyone this year. All I ask for is good health!

Take it easy,
Brant

Awesome! Great story and I can't wait to see what you do! :gj:

It's neat the people who are into reptiles. I mean it doesn't surprise me that someone like Kerry King from the band Slayer is as huge in carpet pythons as he is, but we don't see professional baseball players very often!

Keep up that fastball, I don't pay much attention to the NL these days but I've read that you're able to really burn it across the plate :D

It's great to see you here, Brant. I hope you get what you want out of both aspects of your life.

Good luck with the Herps....GO STROS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You know on the topic of professional athletes in the herpetoculture hobby:

I just remembered that Chad Brown (owner of Pro Exotics) was a football player (I think linebacker) in the NFL for 15 years or so. Just another interesting tidbit.

I think it's pretty cool to know that this hobby transcends most stereotypes of "that weird lonely guy with lots of tattoos and piercings who also has a bunch of creepy snakes".

:welcome: Best of luck with the business.

Have you started a web site yet?

Welcome, and awesome that you would join this community. I played baseball through high school, but just got physically dominated as I was smaller and couldn't keep up. I have some buddies who play still and have one more year in college.