"Did you hear the one about ... Cooke's retirement?"

While describing his recent retirement from Davidson's athletic department, Dick Cooke reflects for a moment and pivots to a story.

That's only natural for a man who has spun as many anecdotes as four-seamers throughout a baseball life. And more often than not, Cooke can locate his fastball.

It was April, 1982, and after playing three years in the Boston Red Sox system, Cooke had just been released during spring training. He was gathering his belongings in the locker room and coming to grips with what felt like an abrupt end to his playing career when one of the organization's coaches walked by.

"What are you going to do now, Cooke?" he asked brashly. "Who the heck knows, right?" Cooke older shot

In the rawness of that moment, which also included a more colorful word than "heck," Cooke did not know, but he had an idea. He soon embarked on a coaching career that spanned more than three decades and 600 wins, two Olympics appearances with Team USA, the survival of and comeback from a near-fatal automobile accident and a storybook run to Omaha's doorstep.

After 35 years of service at Davidson, including 28 as the head baseball coach and seven in athletics administration, Cooke retired on June 30. The college will recognize him with multiple events Oct. 24-25, the same weekend baseball alumni will gather to play a game at Wilson Field. (To register, click here).

Cooke says he's been "appropriately busy" the last few months, adjusting to life without work.

"It's been sort of what I expected," he says. "I'm not a good 'sit around' guy. I've been able to do the types of things I want to do, and a lot of it's been baseball related."

Cooke has continued offering lessons to young players in the community and serving as a color analyst on Charlotte Knights TV broadcasts. He's been fielding and making calls in his extensive network of "baseball people" and catching up with former Davidson players and/or assistant coaches such as Brett Boretti '94, Chris Pollard '96 and Rick Bender '93. He and his wife, Susan, have traveled some. He's tweaked his short game out at the Covington Golf Course, right next to the Coach Dick Cooke Clubhouse.

And stories? He's told a few.

"THAT REMINDS OF THE TIME ... "
A life in baseball lends itself to telling tales, as the game itself is filled with natural pauses, the flare for the dramatic and the ever-present feeling of seeing something new in an old game. And yes, sometimes the game just doesn't move very quickly.

There's time to fill between pitches, at-bats, innings and about everything else, so surface-level sly comments and deeper, on-going, revisited conversations just happen. Cooke long ago leaned into that part of the gig.

Like a pitcher trying to match a pitch to a moment, Cooke looks for just the right time to interject a tale. His stories range from giving up a grand slam during a Little League game in Wall Township, N.J. — as a member of the King's Market team, it was a crushing blow to lose to Highway 35 Lanes — to traveling the world with Team USA and Hall of Fame manager Tommy LaSorda and everything in between. Many, naturally, are rooted in Davidson, where the Cookes raised three daughters, Alison, Lindsay and Erin.

Cooke once introduced a young Alison to Hall of Famer Cal Ripken, Jr., and was excited to do so, as any father would be. When Alison was surprisingly unimpressed, the way only a daughter can be, Cooke had a story to add to the stack and reach for later.
Dick Cooke USA baseball BP

"It's a little bit of an art form," he says. "There's not a story I tell that I haven't told a thousand times. Our girls roll their eyes. 'Okay, he's telling the instructional league story again,' or whatever."

Many of his go-to tales are self-deprecating.

There's the one about Cooke trying to get ejected from a game, handing off his clipboard to an assistant and saying, "I won't be back," … only to have to sheepishly walk back to the dugout and reclaim his clipboard after the umpires refused to run him. The veteran umpires, who knew him well, were more concerned about him — "Dick, are you okay?" — than offended by his arguing or bleep-worthy language.

During the 2017 NCAA postseason run, Cooke chatted with outfielder Justin Lebek regarding the peculiar ground rules for Texas A&M's right field, only to be reminded that Lebek was actually playing left field. Lebek respectfully listened to all of the information that wouldn't help him in the other corner.

Cooke's Team USA involvement led to countless first-hand accounts with LaSorda, the fiery and foul-mouthed former L.A. Dodgers manager, who Cooke once nervously watched address one of his Davidson teams, and other baseball greats such as Frank Robinson and Ernie Banks. He coached on a team featuring modern stars Justin Verlander and Dustin Pedroia, and he's got some Ted Williams stories, too, thanks to sharing spring training with a hitting instructor widely known as the game's greatest hitter.

Some of those stories will certainly emerge on Friday, Oct. 24, when the weekend's events commence with an informal "Dick Cooke Story Time" at nearby Brickhouse Tavern (8 p.m.). Cooke will spin some of his typical yarns, while friends, former players and alumni will bring some stories as well.

"They've certainly got remembrances of antics or things I did or said, and I remember stuff about them," he says. "I've had a few stories pop up about mound visits I made. But I also remember pretty accurately how a player wound up here. Don't tell me you were being recruited by LSU and Auburn and Alabama because I remember how you got here."

COOKE'S DAVIDSON STORY
Cooke was hired at Davidson in 1990, shortly after coaching a game against the Wildcats.

He began his coaching career as an assistant at Richmond, his alma mater, where he worked for five seasons. He then helped revive the program at Belmont Abbey, where he spent a full year organizing and building a team and one season coaching games. The last game of the 1990 reboot campaign featured Belmont Abbey visiting Davidson (an 11-4 Wildcats' win). Davidson beats #2 North Carolina 2-1 to advance to the Super-Regional in the 2017 NCAA Baseball Championship at Boshamer Stadium on Sunday, June 04, 2017 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Davidson beats #2 North Carolina 2-1 to advance to the Super-Regional in the 2017 NCAA Baseball Championship at Boshamer Stadium on Sunday, June 04, 2017 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

With then-Davidson coach Jim Stoeckel resigning, a coaching search was underway, and Davidson athletics director Terry Holland soon had Cooke on the phone. It was an easy sell. The Cookes were already familiar with the town and college and had even briefly discussed moving to Davidson while he was at Belmont Abbey and Susan worked in Charlotte.

Cooke coached the next 28 seasons at Davidson, and his final Wildcat teams were among his best. The 2017 Wildcats rallied from the brink of elimination in Atlantic 10 play to win the A-10 championship and extend their season with a Hollywood-style run. Led by gutsy, wild-bearded pitcher Durin O'Linger '17, they rolled into the program's first NCAA Tournament, where they twice knocked off No. 2 North Carolina and won the Chapel Hill Regional. Then they pushed Texas A&M in two tight Super Regional games, ultimately just missing a berth in the College World Series.

In 2018, the Wildcats won a then-school record 32 regular-season games, and Cooke finished his career with 601 career wins, including 590 at Davidson.

Then came a transition into athletics administration, where Cooke served as an associate athletics director with multiple duties, including scheduling and oversight for sports such as baseball, swimming and diving and volleyball. It was a new role and vantage point for a man who spent many of his afternoons and evenings in dusty dugouts.

"Hopefully I brought a coaching perspective to the administrative side," he says.

Nearing his 69th birthday, Cooke admits that being comfortable in his own skin at Davidson allowed retirement age to sneak up on him, but now he's once again fielding the "what's next?" question. Thankfully, to this point, no one has inquired with the coldness of an early-80s release day.

For now, he plans to just do what he's been doing — spending time with family, traveling, sprinkling in some baseball instruction and commentary and working on his golf game.

As for his collection of stories?

"I'm adding to it, I think," he says.
Davidson participates in practice day prior to the 2017 NCAA Baseball Championships at Boshamer Stadium on Thursday, June 01, 2017 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Davidson participates in practice day prior to the 2017 NCAA Baseball Championships at Boshamer Stadium on Thursday, June 01, 2017 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

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