CLOSING THE DEAL

Holder preferred driving from Stillwater to Garden City for his visits with O’Brate, not for the less-than-scenic 5-and-a-half-hour drive itself, but for what it represented.

“It makes a statement how important the relationship is,” Holder said, “to invest a full day for someone. It also shows you’re a good steward of money. It costs a lot more to rent a plane and fly to Garden City than to drive.”

One particular day, however — Dec. 22, 2016 — demanded something different. Christmas was closing in, and a departure for the Alamo Bowl was fast approaching. Time was an issue, and Holder was ready to truly gauge any intent O’Brate might have for impacting Cowboy Baseball.

So that day, Holder jetted into Garden City Regional Airport. Upon arrival, he found a surprise. O’Brate had arranged for a swap of Holder’s rental car, replacing a Ford Taurus with a Jeep Wrangler Sahara — bright orange

A sign? Perhaps. Because O’Brate would soon deliver an even bigger surprise.

Once behind the wheel in Garden City, Holder drove to an O’Brate hotel property in Garden City, where a lunch meeting with his executive team was taking place. When the meeting broke up, O’Brate said he’d catch a ride back to the office in the Jeep.

Holder had rehearsed for this moment in his mind many times over many months — “probably in my sleep” — and he braced for just the right opportunity to deliver the question on whether he could count on a gamechanging donation for OSU baseball, when O’Brate beat him to it.

“We’re just driving along the road,” Holder said. “All of a sudden, out of the blue, he looked at me and said, ‘I’m going to make a big gift for you.’”

Then it got better. Holder had previously asked for $20 million, but O’Brate announced he was in for $30 million. Later, when construction costs escalated, he kicked in $5 million more.

“After all that fretting and planning for what I was going to say,” Holder said, “I didn’t even have to ask him.”