Nolan Ryan

Nolan Ryan's eldest son, Reid Ryan, also became a pro baseball pitcher. He played in the minor leagues for three seasons before hanging up his gloves and becoming a television broadcaster for the Texas Rangers. He missed being more actively involved in the game, though, so he brokered a business deal to purchase a minor league team in Mississippi, convincing his father to join him in the venture. Nolan and Reid brought the team to Texas in 1997, changing its name to the Round Rock Express.

Reid Ryan was born in 1976 in Southern California, where he father was pitching for the California Angels. The Ryans moved back to his parents' native Texas by the time Reid was in high school, and Reid attended his parents' high school, Alvin High. There he played on the same school team on which his father got his start, as well as on the school basketball team. After graduating from high school, he went to the University of Texas on a baseball scholarship, pitching on the school team for one year.

After his freshman year at the University of Texas, Reid transferred to Texas Christian University, where by his senior year, he was the number one starter for the school baseball team, helping the team get to the NCAA regional games for the first time in several years. Coming out of school, Reid went pro, playing for the Hudson-Valley Renegades, a member of the New York-Penn League based New York State's Hudson River Valley.

After three years in the minor leagues, Reid decided to call it quits, acknowledging that he probably lacked the power to do well in the major leagues. "I could always throw strikes," he later told the Houston Chronicle's Alan Truex. "I just couldn't throw a Nolan Ryan fastball." And, "I'd have to be in the minors eight to 10 years before I'd get a cup of coffee in the big leagues."