We lost a great one recently. Unless you live in Central Florida, you might not know his name, but I assure you, the world is a little less wonderful without him in it.
David Lee was his name, but most people called him Coach. He passed away recently from his heart giving out on him. Coach was 55 years old.
Truth is, it is sort of understandable that his heart would wear out way too soon. David Lee was all heart. He cared about things and people passionately and his mere presence was felt by all who had the good fortune to be around him.
I grew up with David. His Dad, John Lee, owned the Gulf gas station just down from our high school. Mr. Lee was one of the great childhood influences in my life. A town Father who looked out for all the kids who came to get gas at his station. Mr. Lee was a role model for all of us, even if we did not know it at the time.
I don’t really remember when I met David. It seems he has been a part of my life for about as long as I can remember. We shared a mutual passion, playing baseball.
Like me, David loved the game and he was a great student of the game. We used to have these wonderful conversations about the old-time players and how they would stack up against the players of our youth (the 70s & early 80s).
I was a pitcher and David was my catcher. As a high school quarterback and a high school pitcher, I had a strong right arm and could throw a pretty mean fastball. The curveball, however, was my undoing. I could never throw a curveball that would hit the right time zone, much less a strike zone, but David never gave up on me or the curveball.
We would stay after practice, after everyone was finished running the lines, or laps depending on the field of practice and David would push me to work on the curveball. Finally, after several seasons of work, during my senior year, I threw a couple for strikes in practice and he convinced me to throw one in a game. Even in high school, David was a Coach to his teammates.
We had two outs in the first inning and an 0-2 count on the third batter. David drops down two fingers calling for the curveball on my next pitch. I did everything we practiced, went into my windup and hit the back wall behind him at Pat Thomas Field, about 30 feet behind Homeplate. (I am laughing even now as I write this)
David calmly runs out to the mound and says, “That was entertaining.” We both smiled and he ran back behind the plate. We got the batter out on the next pitch and as we ran off the field to the dugout, legendary baseball Coach Buddy Lowe looks at us and said, “Don’t EVER do that again or you will be running til you graduate.”
It is one of my favorite memories of high school baseball.
David and I had lost touch over the years as people often do. I moved to Maine and pursued my dreams. He stayed in Central Florida and pursued his. We re-connected a few years back on Facebook.
As we re-connected, I found out that he had truly lived the dream he had talked about almost 40 years ago. David wanted to make his life being involved and coaching baseball and he did just that.
David was not just a baseball Coach; however, he was a life Coach for his players. He taught them as much about being a man, being a leader as he did about the finer points of the game of baseball. Aside from his Dad, he had a good mentor in that approach in our former high school coach. Coach Buddy Lowe saw his position to be as much about molding young boys into men, as he did teach them the game of baseball.
As I begin to reconnect with old friends in Florida and made some new ones through Facebook, I would hear stories about how David Lee had impacted their child’s life. He was always there with an encouraging word for all he encountered and not just during baseball season.
Our mutual friend and high school classmate Cathy Roesel Brown teaches at Apopka High School where David once coached. She told me recently that he was a beloved figure among his players and the faculty. She said the players said he demanded a lot from them, but they were better ballplayers and better students because of it.
The evidence, not that any was needed, of the tremendous impact of David Lee’s life was demonstrated while he was in Shand’s Hospital in Gainesville Florida. Many of his players and their families, past and present, gathered on the baseball field to pray together for his well-being. The outpouring of love for David and his family, while he was sick and in the aftermath of his passing has been overwhelming to see.
One of the stories that made the rounds while he was in Shand’s Hospital was that after seeing him, his doctor looked him up on social media. The next day, when he returned to visit David in his room, he called him King David because of all the love, prayers and thoughts being lifted in David’s support. The doctor realized he was with a true celebrity, the kind that makes a real difference in the lives of others.
I very much feel his loss. I miss him. We had not seen each other in years but kept up on Facebook. I followed his baseball season each year, reveling in his victories. Each game took me back to a time when it was he and I on the playing field, still trying to throw a curveball that would hit his catcher’s mitt.
David called my talk show several years ago. He ran into my Mom and Dad at the grocery store and they gave him the number. Being his usual prankster self, he did not initially identify himself, but rather gave clues to his identity from our childhood. As the clues became more personal, I began to get nervous (hey, you never know what someone will say). Finally, he said, “I caught your no-hitter in Tennessee,” and I knew it was David. Truth is, I still don’t really remember throwing a no-hitter in Tennessee, but David did and that was all that mattered.
Coach Lee’s State Champs
I know how devastating David’s loss has been to all that loved him and had the privilege to be coached by him. David Lee was truly a giant among men.
When I learned of his death, for some reason the closing words of the movie, “Brian’s Song” kept echoing through my head. Brian Piccolo played for the Chicago Bears. He became sick and passed away at the age of 26. The movie is about his life.
In the closing scene, the actor playing George Halas, the Coach of the Chicago Bears, has a brief monologue. Halas said of Piccolo, he left a loving family and countless friends who miss him and think of him often. “When they think of him, its not how he died that they remember. It’s how he lived… How he did live.”
When I think of David, as so many who loved him do, I will not think about how he died. I will think about how he lived… How he did live.
P.S. To my old friend, who I know is in Heaven, talking baseball with God. Please get God to finally tell me the answer to our debate from 1980. How did Reggie Jackson not win the MVP that year?
** The photos used in this story were posted on Facebook in tribute to David Lee
Ray Richardson is the host of the Ray Richardson Show on WLOB Radio. He has authored three books, written a newspaper column for over a decade and is a contributor to Richardson Magazine. Ray lives with his wife of almost 34 years Dee Dee in Westbrook Maine. They have four children (8 when you count the spouses), one granddaughter and a little dawg who thinks he is human.
