‘Baler sports that are on the climb? Secrets to coaching hires?
Prune Bowl or CCS championship? We don’t know how he does it, but
he runs one of the CCS’s top athletic departments, serves as
defensive coordinator for the football team … and has a
10-month-old daughter to boot! He is Tod Thatcher, the man at the
helm of all things ‘Baler sports. In the latest installment of a
regular series, sports editor Scott Campbell sits down with another
impact player in South Valley athletics.
Free Lance: Tod, I’m really glad we have a few minutes to talk ‘Balers sports here. Another season is just getting underway. It’s a pretty exciting time to be a part of the ‘Baler community.
Tod Thatcher: Oh yeah. We look forward to the beginning of a new school year and getting off to a great start in our athletics as well. They kind of go hand in hand. The tone of the school year is set by getting off to a fast start in athletics.
FL: Going into your third year as AD, what do you hope you can do differently? What are your expectations for this year?
TT: I would like to shore up a couple of our programs. I know right now water polo’s a hot topic. I’d like to find an on-campus girls’ water polo coach. And I’d like to be able to shore up the track program because I know we’ve been having some people who’ve been wanting to help and I’d like to make sure we have enough coaches to coach every aspect of our track program.
FL: Your program was one of only four public school programs in the Central Coast Section to win both a boys’ and a girls’ section title last year. What does that say about ‘Baler athletics?
TT: It says from top to bottom, we offer a great program. Not just the coaches and athletes, but the community and the school as a whole. ‘Baler athletics involves everybody in this town. We’ve reached the pinnacle in two sports and we’re working toward that in all our sports.
FL: My number was wrong there. I meant to say three. There were actually only four public schools that won multiple CCS titles, but only three that won …
TT: Boys’ and girls’? That’s pretty impressive. We were right there with volleyball and we had a pretty good run in baseball. We’re right there in a lot of sports. I consider us up there with the best of the best across the section.
FL: If you were CCS commissioner for a day, what would be on your to-do list?
TT: That depends if you’re talking about in general or sport by sport. In general … shoot, that’s a good question. I’ll take football. I’d fix the playoff system. I’d go back to a four-round system, not a three, win two and you’re in finals, be a champion. You know, win four, be a champion – 16-team brackets. I’d really look at the playoff picture sport by sport and take the subjectivity out of it. That would probably be my No. 1 concern. I think a lot of sports are just by vote – who should be in and who shouldn’t. Like for example, water polo is a perfectly subjective bracketing system. Basketball, you can get in with a .500 record. I think that’s flawed. I think I would spend time to come up with a system that’s more objective for getting the playoffs set up.
FL: You starred in football (and) played on a standout baseball at Oak Grove High, played football at San Jose City College and at Humboldt State. What do you take from playing career? What do you bring to athletes here at the high school?
TT: I think it’s kind of two-fold. For me, athletics is about the relationships you develop through participation in athletics. I’ve still got friends from every one of those stops that are lifelong friends. As a coach, coming from those programs, being the type of player that had to work extremely hard to be successful, I think we instill that in players. We don’t let them take things for granted. I think that’s part of my background. Nothing was easy for me. You’ve got to work for what you get.
FL: You and Chris Cameron have been coaching together since the fall of 1989 on the frosh/soph squad at Oak Grove. Now we’re in 2006. You guys have combined to win two CCS titles here, been to the title game six of the last seven years. Oak Grove, Andrew Hill High, Hollister High. Talk about the relationship between you and Chris.
TT: I’ve got the utmost respect for Chris most importantly as a friend and as a person. As a coach, there is not a coach out there, I don’t care where it is, that gets more out of kids than Chris. So, I’ve been able to kind of ride that as a defensive coach and as a position coach. He provides me the ultimate stock to work with – a kid that he’s gotten everything out of physically. He hands ’em to me to teach ’em how to play football. I get kids who are in great shape, kids that are mentally tough, kids that are physically strong in the weight room. And now I get to take that kid and make him into a football player. Chris has the ability to get out of every kid, everything he has. I don’t care if it’s a kid that’s very gifted or a kid that’s never stepped on the field, Chris finds a way to get everything out of that kid. And that’s his magic as coach.
FL: Pretty potent combination, duo over the years – the two of you. How special has it been to be working with Chris since the two of you came here in 1994?
TT: It’s been great. It’s almost, a lot of things … we’ve been together so long, a lot of things are pretty automatic at this point. We kind of feed off of one another. It’s like coaching with one of your family members – we’ve been that close over the years. It’s been fun. And it hasn’t just been Chris and I. It’s been Rick (Dukes) for 13 years, Shawn Tennenbaum for a number of years. We have a tight-knit staff. All our families get together and it’s just more than coaching. It’s about relationships, and that carries over to our team.
FL: You’ve been defensive coordinator since you arrived here. You worked in the special ed department for a number of years. Now, you are also athletic director. How do you combine being defensive coordinator and being athletic director? How do they fit together? How do you mix and match to make the puzzle fit?
TT: It’s just about being organized. Being a coach at any level, or being a defensive coordinator or working in special ed, it all comes back to your organization – being able to juggle the 15 things that are going on at once, wearing three hats at once. It’s all about being organized and making it work, day in and day out. I just comes back to being a super-organized person and I consider myself a super-organized person.
FL: Talk about being in the Hollister community. This is a sports-mad town. You’re at the helm of the ‘Baler athletic department. How do you orchestrate the doings?
TT: I think it comes back to our staff. We have an excellent staff and people are running their programs the way I would run it, from A-Z. You know, they put a good product on the field and it makes my job real easy. So it comes back to how good of a staff it is. Staff has problems, I generally get a lot of phone calls. Staff’s squared away, things are good and we’re winning games, the community’s happy.
FL: Let’s talk about these coaches and your staff. What do you look for when you hire a coach to be running one of these programs.
TT: Ideally, I want an on-campus teacher. I want somebody who can teach. And if they’re on campus, that way they can keep tabs on their athletes. They full control of their athletes, from behavior issues to academics to athletics. On campus is key. Obviously, I want somebody who is competent in their sport – somebody who has playing experience or coaching experience at high levels. When you combine the two, you’re going to be all right.
FL: Football, volleyball, softball, baseball. A number of programs right up at or very near the top of the section. Wrestling, over the years. Where is soccer on the landscape?
TT: Soccer is … we’re building. I’ve got two coaches that are passionate about their programs. And I know we had a very young girls’ team last year that struggled through league, but they’re loaded with some young, talented girls. We had a boys’ program, on the flip side, that … there’s talent on this campus. We’re just trying to get those kids to realize that playing for the high school is a good thing. And get them out of the club leagues and the adult leagues to bring their talents to our team. We’re trying to win that battle and get all those kids on campus that are excellent soccer players to join our program.
FL: Once you step off campus, you have a 10-month old, Ava. You have a lovely wife that you met on campus here. Is there room for sports in your personal life? Or do you leave sports at work?
TT: I leave work at work. Outside of work, I enjoy sports as well. I’ll be glad my daughter is growing up around athletics and sports. I think there’s nothing but mostly positives about all the coaches’ kids that have grown up here, run around the field and come to all the games. I see those kids develop into great kids and I think sports plays a big role in that. So I’m looking forward to having my daughter growing up around sports. Does it impact our family life? Sure. A lot of the things we do revolve around fitting it into the schedule or bringing my wife to a game or now my daughter to a game. So yeah, it filters into my personal life, but not the work aspect of it. I leave work at work.
FL: When the television turns to a sports station at the Thatcher residence, what are you watching?
TT: Right now, it’s NFL Channel. Watching inside training camps and some of the preseason games. And once we hit the end of August, it’s all about college football at the Thatcher household. No NFL. We don’t watch too much NFL. But we do enjoy college football. And I’m speaking on behalf of me and not my wife. (Laughs)
FL: How rewarding was it to get this most recent football section title at the expense of, or by defeating a former mentor, Ed Buller, at Oak Grove. You’d lost to him the year before, you guys had lost in the playoffs a few years ago. Did you and Chris finally get the monkey off your back?
TT: I think walking over there to shake Coach’s hand was a great thing, being the champion. I really enjoyed it. Yeah, I think it was good for our program to knock off a school like Oak Grove. Finally, being up there with … you’re talking about public high schools and championships, Oak Grove and Los Gatos teams, those are the best of the best. And now, us knocking them off, it was great for program. And it was personally gratifying to beat that program and to beat Coach Buller.
FL: Why high school athletics? Why not collegiate athletics? Why not something else involving sports? What is it about prep sports?
TT: I think it’s just the excitement of high school athletics. It’s still competing for your school, competing for your town, competing for your teammates. … You don’t find that in JC football. You don’t find that in Division I football. It’s about ‘me’ at the next level. It’s still about the team and about the school at high school. To me, Friday night, you come out here to a game and you can feel it. It’s Hollister vs. Salinas. It’s Hollister vs. Gilroy. And it’s about ‘us’ vs. ‘them.’ And it’s pretty neat to be a part of that every weekend.
FL: What do you want your lasting imprint on this athletic program to be?
TT: I think … I thought about that because I knew we were going to sit down and talk. I don’t necessarily want to change it. I just want to keep it at this level. I want to bring in the best coaches we can and offer the best programs to our athletes. There’s a couple of sports I want to see continue to improve. We mentioned soccer. I’d love to see our basketball teams get back up there to compete for league championships every year. But you know, I’m confident that’s going to happen because of the people that are running those programs. I don’t want people to say, ‘This is Coach Thatcher’s athletic department.’ I’m not that kind of person. I want them to think this is Hollister Athletics and what a quality program, what a class program they have there. And that’s, to me, more important than what I did as an AD.
FL: What’s been the most memorable moment as a football coach.
TT: One of the highlights for me, personally, as a football coach was beating Los Gatos a couple of years ago in the playoffs. First time we got to play ’em. Great program. Storied program. And taking it to those guys that day was pretty memorable. That was a good day. … All right, Palma, too. Beating those five of out 10 times is pretty good. I don’t think there’s any other club out there that can say that, beating them 50 percent of the time.
FL: Prune Bowl trophy. CCS championship trophy. Are they weighted equally in your mind?
TT: Right now, I think the old-timers in the community … if we never won another championship trophy, but we kept that Prune Bowl trophy, everything would be OK. But I think, going to that CCS championship game and winning it is pretty special. I think we want to win them both every year. There’s no doubt about it. We’ll make sure to keep the Prune Bowl trophy around here as long as we can.
