Matt Acker, a former coach of the Kitsap Bluejackets baseball team, said  Oct. 1 that he has signed a buyers’ agreement with the Kitsap-based ownership group to purchase the team.

The West Coast League team owners must approve the agreement. They are scheduled to meet Oct. 16.

Acker, 39, was the Bluejackets’ first coach when the team began play in 2004 and coached the team for seven years.

Details of the purchased were not released.

Acker purchased the team from the group that consisted of Rick Smith, general manager, Chuck Huddleston and Charlie Littwin.

In April, Acker came back to the Bluejackets’ organization under a contingency contract to help run the franchise. The Bluejackets are a member of the West Coast League and will enter their 11th season next summer.

Acker said he talked to Smith, the team’s general manager, in May and knew he was interested in selling the team. So, he purchased a small percentage of the team.

“I wanted to be part of it to see what they were doing and to see if it was viable,” Acker said. “I wanted to help because they are good people. Getting a small percentage would allow me the insight to what they were doing, not step on any toes and lend a hand. I wanted to help increase attendance and to be another person there.”

Acker said he was able to help the franchise lower their cost on equipment and during the season help bring some players to the team.

“You may have an idea how things are working, but you don’t until you get inside the business,” he said.

Acker said he studied for several months to see if it was viable to purchase the team.

“As a business, can you make money, can you do something positive and stay within the values of what you are about,” he said. “I answered ‘yes’ to all of those questions — with a lot of work.”

He will focus on making the team profitable and see the possibility for growth.

“I am buying the team and I will have 100-percent control of the team,” Acker said. “I put down a tremendous down payment, but the rest of buying the team is from the owners rather taking out a bank loan. That show that they trust me. I respect the heck out of them.”

The Bluejackets will continue to play in the West Coast League.

Forming a feeder league

While coaching the Bluejackets, Acker created a feeder-team called the Tacoma Cardinals, and later the Olympia Athletics.

“While I was coaching there, it made sense to me to make a league,” Acker said.

He formed the Puget Sound Collegiate Baseball League (PSCBL).

“I focused the league on development rather than just feeding the Bluejackets. I wanted it to have purpose and its own thing,” Acker said.

Acker said he saw the need for a developmental league rather than a result-based league, like the West Coast League.

“There is development within it, but it is result-based,” he said. “It’s about fans and guys competing for every inning.”

During his last season with the Bluejackets and Green River, Acker said he decided to focus his attention on the Puget Sound Collegiate Baseball League in 2011.

“I created it, so I needed to make sure it was running correctly,” he said. “It’s hard to have other people do your vision.”

He later started the Thurston County Senators, which plays against PSCBL, West Coast League and Pacific International League teams.

There is more than 1,200 players competing during the fall baseball season, tournaments and camps in the Lacy area, according to Acker.

Acker is a graduate of North Thurston High School and later played football and baseball at Central Washington University in Ellensburg. He suffered a career-ending injury in football while at CWU and focused on baseball.

“After I got injured in college, my baseball career steadily declined,” Acker laughed. “The injury was actually one of the best things that happened. It gave me a perspective on my future that a lot of people my age didn’t have. I focused on school and decided what I wanted to be.”

He served as a graduate assistant coach at CWU, then helped coached at St. Martin’s. Acker was a college head coach at age 25 at Green River, where he coached for nine years.

For the past two seasons, Acker also served as head coach at Timberline High School where he posted a 40-8 record. He was 23-3 last season.

He resides in Lacey and is married with two children.