DMACC Mourns Loss of Former Baseball Coach

via.www.dmaccbears.com

• Smith won 876 games and took DMACC to its first JUCO World Series
• Smith was inducted into the National Junior College Baseball Hall of Fame and the Iowa High School Baseball Coaches Hall of Fame
• Smith was a teacher, coach, psychiatrist, parent and mentor to his players 

The DMACC community is mourning the loss of veteran baseball coach John Smith who passed away April 23 from Acute Myeloid Leukemia. Smith joined DMACC in 1967 and taught accounting and business in addition to coaching baseball until his retirement in 2007. He then worked as an adjunct instructor until 2017. 

"John Smith had a tremendous impact on everyone that he came into contact with on the DMACC Boone Campus and in the community of Boone, Iowa," said DMACC Athletics Director B.J. McGinn. "Not only was he a hall of fame Baseball Coach, but he was a leader, mentor, and a really good friend to many people. John will be greatly missed by all of his players, students, colleagues, and community members that he worked with throughout his career and many years after retirement."

Smith became DMACC's head baseball coach in 1974, the program's sixth year of existence. He continued coaching until 2007, compiling 876 wins.

Smith built the Bears into one of the most respected community college programs throughout the Midwest and DMACC was competitive for regional and conference championships every year he was at the helm. In 1982 he achieved one of his primary goals in leading DMACC to its first-ever appearance in the Junior College World Series in Grand Junction, Colo. He earned coach of the year honors three times.

Smith, who was known as Smitty to all of his players, was a coach to more than 600 baseball players, 85 percent of whom went on to get their degrees from four-year colleges or universities after graduating from DMACC. Seventeen of his players became Certified Public Accountants and many went on to become coaches.

Seventy-eight of his players were drafted by Major League baseball teams and three players, Corey Koskie, George Wiliams and Paul Wilmet, reached the Major Leagues. Koskie had the most success of the three, playing for the Minnesota Twins from 1998 to 2004 and then spending time with the Toronto Blue Jays and Milwaukee Brewers before retiring in March of 2009.

While Smith's accomplishments as a baseball coach stand out, it was the care he had for his players that really stood out to many of them. He had a notebook full of phone numbers of many of his former players and made it a point to call most of them at least twice a year.

"He was a teacher, a coach, a psychiatrist, a parent, a mentor," said Kelly Heller of Bismarck, N.D., who played for Smith in 1988-89 and 1989-90. "He was all of those things and continued to be all of those things even while he was coaching and after he retired from coaching. He continued to be that larger than life figure in our lives."

Smith's importance to Heller meant so much that when Keller heard that Smith's health was failing, he decided to drive to Boone to see his long-time mentor. He had planned to leave on April 22, drive most of the way that day, spend the night somewhere along the route and then continue his journey on April 23. While traveling between Sioux Falls, S.D., and Sioux City, Iowa, Heller said he talked with Smith's wife, Connie, who told him that the Hospice nurses had told her that the outlook for Smith wasn't good. Following that conversation, he decided to continue on to Boone. 

"I drove the rest of the way, slept in my pickup in Smitty's driveway and when the sun came up Connie came out and we went inside and spent time with Smitty," Heller said. "I was actually sitting with him, Connie and (Smith's son) J.P. when he passed away."

Heller, who will be making a return trip to Boone this weekend for visitation and the funeral service, graduated from DMACC in 1990. He said Smith has been a mentor and a friend ever since. 

"It's hard to explain what Smitty meant to hundreds of us," Heller said, adding that his father passed away in 1994 and that Smith had become like a second dad to him. "He put DMACC baseball on the map. The reality of it is Smitty was a teacher and baseball was a tool to teach young men about life. I'm sure he wanted us to win baseball games and he wanted us to go as far as we could in baseball, but more importantly he wanted us to be good citizens, good husbands, good fathers, good stewards of our community. That's what made him most proud. Any important decision I ever made, I always talked to Smitty first. He had the ability, if you needed tough love, you got tough love and if you needed somebody to build you up, he would build you up." 

Brad Durby came to DMACC from Nevada, a community some 30 miles east of Boone., and played for Smith in 1978-79 and 1979-80. And when Durby came, he admitted he needed a haircut. Smith, who detested long hair, gave him one.

"Coach had me in his office one day and after our talk he invited me to his house that night for a spaghetti dinner," said Dubry, Vice principal of Recruitment and Retention at Fletcher Academy in Fletcher, N.C. "It made such a difference to me because he could be a pretty gruff guy as a coach but when I saw how he treated his boys and his wife, I was completely amazed at what a different man he was in that environment. After we finished eating, he invited me out to the garage where he had a chair and a sheet ready. The next thing I knew, I had his haircut and I never wore my hair any other way than a buzz cut the entire time I played for him. I grew to love that man and appreciate everything he did for me." 

Stories like those from Heller and Durby will number in the hundreds this weekend when many of his former players journey to Boone for the funeral service and visitation.

The funeral service will be held at 1 p.m. May 3 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Boone with the committal service to follow at Linwood Park Cemetery in Boone. A reception will be held at 2:30 p.m. at the Courter Center at DMACC-Boone Campus in Boone. 

Visitation with the family present to greet friends from 5 to 7 p.m. May 2 at Schroeder-Stark-Welin Funeral Home in Boone. 

In addition to his wife, Connie, and son, J.P., Smith is survived by another son, Scot, seven grandchildren, two great grandchildren, a bother, Merlin, and many nieces, nephews and sisters-in-law.