Ever since Ravaughn Morgan was a small boy, he remembers knowing his parents were in the stands for his sporting events.

The Morgan family — dad Reggie, mom Rachelle and Ravaughn, from the Austin Texas area — are a sort of three musketeers. When Ravaughn Morgan, an only son, signed with the Joplin Outlaws, there was little question that mom and dad would be there for him.

Their sacrifices have not gone unnoticed by Ravaughn Morgan.

“It makes me feel great, because I know that the people that care about me and raised me have come to watch me since I was little,” Ravaughn Morgan said. “It makes me enjoy the game even more and makes me appreciate the fact that every moment I play this game is special.”

“I could probably count on one hand how many games they have missed since I was 8 years old,” he added. “I love them, every day, all the time.”

Reggie Morgan, a retired educator and coach, and Rachelle Morgan, a retired and then unretired educator, have made the 16-hour round trip from Pflugerville, a suburb of Austin, to Joplin for each of the Outlaws home series this year.

“He’s my son,” Rachelle Morgan said. “It’s about support — through good and bad, I’ve always stressed to him that we would support him regardless. His dream is to be in the MLB and he said, ‘Mom, I’m going to do that until you tell me ‘Stop.’”

That’s when she solidified her support for her son.

“I told him, ‘Why would I ever tell you to stop? I’ve never told you to stop before. If that’s your dream, go make your dream come true.’ Don’t tell him he can’t do something because he will prove you wrong,” Rachelle Morgan said. “He’s always been a competitor, he’s always been determined and he’s very coachable.”

Reggie Morgan, a coach of 35 years, knows a lot about what young athletes need.

“I think every kid needs some kind of support,” he said. “Where I come from, you get some parents that are hardly ever there. They are working two jobs sometimes and can’t show up to support their kids. I think that hurts them.”

That’s why even after some of his former players graduated, he would call them in college to see how they were doing.

“It’s important to them, but it’s important to me, too, to see how they are doing,” Reggie Morgan said.

Reggie and Rachelle Morgan, who have been married for 34 years, don’t make their trips alone. They also bring along their son’s two Shih Tzus, Angel and Blaze, that he has had since he was a boy.

“Sometimes after the games, I just need to see my two dogs,” Ravaughn Morgan said. “It just reminds me that life is good.”

Rachelle Morgan said she and her husband plan their trips depending on where the Outlaws are playing and coordinate their routes to catch Outlaws games in Arkansas and Texas as well.

Ravaughn Morgan’s senior year at Oklahoma Wesleyan ran deep into the postseason this year, and he joined the Outlaws in mid-June. Since then Reggie and Rachelle Morgan have been a fixture at Joe Becker Stadium.

Rachelle Morgan can be found on the third base sideline for Outlaws games, keeping a scorebook of every game. She said she started keeping book in 1989 when her husband was a high school baseball coach in Texas.

“Every game I have been at I have kept a book of Ravaughn,” she said. “From summer ball in middle school to high school and his college career, I have kept books.”

Ravaughn Morgan is a multisport athlete who also has participated in football, soccer, swimming, basketball, and track and field.

“He was a late bloomer in baseball, I think because we made him play everything so he could find what he wanted to do, not what we wanted him to do,” his mother said.

An All-District selection in high school for both football and baseball, Ravaughn Morgan was offered a football scholarship at the University of Tulsa, but he opted to play baseball at McClennan Community College in Texas.

Ravaughn Morgan helped that McClennan team to two straight appearances in the JUCO World Series. He missed most of his freshman season with a fractured femur in 2021, when the Highlanders won the Division I championship.

After McClennan, Ravaughn Morgan transferred to Oklahoma Wesleyan, where he was named the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference Player of the Year this past season. His senior campaign at Wesleyan saw him hit .416 with 14 homers, 71 RBIs and 76 runs.

Reggie Morgan said hitting and speed are the two biggest strengths in his son’s game.

This season, Ravaughn Morgan leads the Mid-America League in hitting with a .400 average and is fifth in stolen bases with 15.