:The Virginian-Pilot;

:Jun 15, 2006;

:Sports;

:39

Diamond is hallowed ground for new coach

BY JAMI FRANKENBERRY THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT

CHESAPEAKE — The talks, those are what Bill Partain misses most.

    The baseball talks, the ones he and his son Brad shared during long drives to youth baseball tournaments all over the country.

    Before Brad’s death in a boating accident eight years ago, they secured a bond between father and son.

    “Baseball was our tranquility and our common thread,” Bill said this week. “It was one of those things we always talked about.”

    The elder Partain still feels Brad’s presence when he steps on a baseball field and scratches “28” — his son’s number — and a halo on the infield dirt. Next season, Partain will do so for the first time as a high school head coach. He recently was hired at Deep Creek after serving as a Hornets assistant since shortly after Brad died.

    “Walking on the baseball field’s my sanctuary,” Partain said. “It’s like I talk to him when I’m out there. All the pressure goes away and I’m comfortable there.”

    Partain, 47, replaces Scott Hughes. who resigned after 11 seasons, saying he wants to watch his son David play at Kempsville.

    “They’re in good hands,” Hughes, 44, said of Partain taking over.

    Partain was Brad’s youth baseball coach, and after his son’s death he stayed involved in the sport, especially at Deep Creek. He poured hours of his time into caring for the field.

    “He has a lot of passion,” Hornets senior Justin Hess said. “I know as soon as Brad left he took a lot of his time and put it into the program.”

    Brad Partain, an honor roll student and a three-sport athlete at Deep Creek who excelled in baseball, was killed while knee-boarding behind a personal watercraft during the summer of 1998 on the Deep Creek Canal.

    The accident devastated the community and spurred Bill Partain to get more involved in coaching.

    “I never realized how many people we affect as coaches until after that accident,” he said.

    The elder Partain joined Deep Creek’s baseball staff the following season and in the years since quit his job in law enforcement to pursue a second career in teaching. He’s a special education teacher at Deep Creek and is working on a master’s degree at Old Dominion University.

    Partain inherits a Deep Creek team that finished 11-9 overall and 7-9 in Southeastern District play this past season.

    Coaching his son’s former high school team will keep Partain close to his son.

    Still, nothing will replace those precious times the two spent talking baseball.

    “The hardest thing,” Partain said, “is for me to drive by myself to a baseball game.”

GENEVIEVE ROSS/THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT Coach Partain, still feels the presence of his late son Brad when he steps on a baseball field.