Wake coach Tom Walter was – emphasis, was – the top target for the UVA Baseball job

As of Monday night, as Wake Forest was playing Tennessee for a berth in the Super Regionals, Tom Walter, the Wake coach, was the top candidate for the UVA Baseball job.

I’ve been piecing this together the past couple of days, in the aftermath of the fallout from the ugly incident that seems to have taken Walter out of the running – the homophobic slur from Walter that was picked up on a crowd mic on the ESPN broadcast of the Wake-Tennessee game, and has since gone viral.

Baseball America writer Jacob Rudner, who had originally listed Walter among the top candidates for the UVA job, back on Monday, reported on Thursday that “sources close to Virginia’s search indicated to Baseball America that (Walter) was an unlikely candidate for the position.”

From what I’ve come to learn since Rudner weighed in with that bit of news, I’m of the opinion that Walter was, before the slur, not only a candidate, but the top target, and I’ve also learned from a source that Walter is very much interested in the job, after interviewing and being a finalist for the Texas A&M job last summer.

Walter, 927-711 in 29 seasons as a D1 head coach, and 495-383 at Wake, which hired him in 2009, has led the Demon Deacons program to seven NCAA Tournament appearances since 2016, with one trip to the College World Series, in 2023.

Not bad for a guy working with a fraction of the annual budgets in the $5 million to $6 million annual range that UVA Athletics had given Brian O’Connor to work with in recent years.

I was able to get a Walter confidant on the phone yesterday as I was tracking this item down, and the friend of the embattled Wake coach, who has since, obviously, in the interest of keeping his job, issued a lengthy, plaintive public apology, told me that Walter is “embarrassed” with himself over the slur, and also insisted that the remark, to the friend, doesn’t reflect who Walter is as a person.

“Tom might be the most liberal and progressive-minded person that I know. That remark was so out of character for him,” the friend, who also works in baseball, said.

I was directed by the Walter friend to look up Walter’s record of community involvement in the Winston-Salem area, and having done so, he seems to check the boxes.

Per his bio on the Wake Forest Athletics website, his program has raised more than $100,000 for causes like the V Foundation, the ALS Association, Brenner Children’s Hospital and Parenting PATH, a Winston-Salem-area organization that supports parents, strengthens families and creates more stable communities.

Two other nice items on his bio is the one of Walter donating a kidney to outfielder Kevin Jordan days before the 2011 season opener, and then, in 2020, at the height of the protest movement that arose following the police murder of George Floyd, Walter and Jordan launching Get In the Game, an organization aiming to educate and empower young people to take action.

This Get in the Game project is focused on reaching out to middle- and high-school students with a program that fosters conversations on race and social justice in the classroom and on the field.

The goodwill built up with his community work with these efforts is why Wake didn’t cut ties with Walter, according to his coaching confidant.

I can see why Carla Williams wouldn’t want to have to answer questions about hiring a guy who just made national headlines for a homophobic slur, even if it does seem out of character for the guy.

It’s probably clear that she’s moved on, because Walter is free to talk with his season being over, and you know Williams wants to get a new coach in place as soon as possible, to get the heat off her seat after losing Brian O’Connor to MSU.

I wonder, though, if it’s a coincidence that I was able to get a Walter friend on the phone to tell me how “liberal” and “progressive” Walter is, given that I’m the one sportswriter in the UVA Athletics media traveling circus who wears the labels liberal and progressive as badges of honor.

Do I feel like something is maybe being orchestrated here? Yes, I do.

Do I mind being one of the instruments being played? No, I don’t.

I kinda want to see what happens here with this.

Probably nothing, but anyway.