Firmin’s scouting report on me: ‘Son, you can run, but you can’t hit’

Coach Simms was closing out his octogenarian years. His once sturdy frame as a former athlete was being supported by a walker and the arm of his son, Jerry. Yet, he still exuded the mental vitality of a man on a mission. That mission was teaching young men that, through their belief in God, they would become good men if not great athletes.
    

A devout Catholic, Simms taught the playground athletes under his care that, above all, God came first; the team second. Over a 40-year span, that mantra led his New Orleans-based teams at Bunny Friend and other playgrounds to five Babe Ruth League World Championships. But he wasn’t only a baseball coach. He coached 10 of his Biddy Basketball teams to national titles and a World Biddy Championship in 1968.
    

Coach Simms died on May 9 at age 91. He leaves behind the undying gratitude of thousands of men and women whose lives he touched, mostly through his teachings.
    

While he treated every youngster under his care as he would have his own, Coach Simms tutored and played a large role in the development of such greats as former major leaguers Rusty Staub and Will Clark and pro basketball stars D.J. Augustin and Kerry Kittles, all of whom are Catholic League alumni.
    

Beginning as a 17-year-old volunteer coach following his high school days at Holy Cross, young Firmin found a home at the city’s playgrounds. And through the success of his teams at the national level, the name NORD became synonymous with the title “champion.”
    

I knew his name early in my life. I heard it often at my neighborhood playground, Stallings.
    

A fledgling sports wannabe as an early teen, I used to stand across the street from my house and pitch a tennis ball at my front porch. I chalked off a rectangular strike zone and called my own balls and strikes. When the ball came off the jagged bricks awkwardly, I pretended it was hit and chased the ball down after fielding it in my Sears glove.
    

My first (and only) baseball bat was a “Duke Snider” autographed Louisville Slugger. I used it to hit rocks in the driveway. My goal was to see how often I could hit the rock that I tossed up over the roof of a house to the rear of the yard. Mostly, I hit the house (but never a window). 
    

A neighborhood friend told me he was going to a mass Babe Ruth baseball tryout. I decided to tag along. A seven-cent bus ride took us to Perry Roehm Park where I was confronted by waves of other kids my age anxious to show their skills to none other than Firmin Simms.
    

After signing some sort of document, I was sent with a group of 20-30 boys to the outfield to shag fly balls. From there, our group took turns fielding ground balls on the left side of the infield and throwing them to a first baseman.
    

It was then on to the plate, where we were timed in a 90-foot sprint from home to first base. Then we took turns at bat. Then came a snack break, at which time the great Firmin Simms and three other coaches evaluated the prospects. 
    

I was one of the last to hear his name called. I knew I was lost in this shuffle of more experienced boys.  “Son, you can’t hit and you can’t field,” Coach Simms told me. “But you were one of the fastest running from home to first base. You ought to try out for track.”
    

That was my last conversation with Firmin Simms for many years. Sure, my ego was bruised. All those rocks and nicks in my Duke Snider had gone for naught.
    

I attended the city’s only junior high school that didn’t field a football team – McDonogh 28. But I did make my high school’s football team as a sophomore. I was also a starter on the junior varsity basketball team and ran sprints and a leg on the relay team. All that was left to do was to conquer the sport of baseball.
    

Our football coach, Joe Salsiccia, wasn’t happy about that. He thought football players should be practicing track in the spring. 
    

Then, one day he showed up at a practice baseball game we played against Ben Franklin on one of the generic fields in City Park. Franklin was a relatively new school, many of whose graduates would become among the pillars of local industry. I drew a base on balls then struck out twice against a pitcher who threw the ball in slow motion.
    

Coach “Sal” intercepted me as I walked back to the bench. “See you at track practice tomorrow,” he said through his cigar smoke, then got back in his car and left the park.
    

I was there. My aspiring baseball career was over. Firmin Simms was right all the time. He’s been inducted in enough halls of fame to know the difference between an athlete and one who loves sports enough to write about athletes.
    

The best way I could pay tribute to him and his career was to have a plaque mounted on one of the walls of legends at Ye Olde College Inn, home of the New Orleans Prep Hall of Fame, where he has a place of honor.
    

Ron Brocato can be reached at rbrocato@clarionherald.org.