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The funny story of that picture of me and UVA baseball coach Brian O’Connor

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brian o'connor“If you want,” UVA baseball coach Brian O’Connor said to my wife and me, standing outside the outfield fence at Davenport Field, “you can go on the field and take your photos there.”

Only at the moment, I didn’t know it was Brian O’Connor. I’d heard a truck driving up the access road behind where I was standing on a hill in front of the Davenport Field sign behind the center field wall.

I assumed it was a maintenance worker driving up to tell me that police had been summoned, or worse, you know, the actual police.

Then I realized that it was Coach O’Connor.

“Coach …” I said, my head racing, wanting to thank him, and also relieved that I wasn’t about to be arrested.

“Just let me back my truck up, and I’ll meet you on the field.”

When we met him in the outfield moments later, he reached out his right hand and introduced himself.

“Hi, I’m Brian.”

I’m Chris, I said back, grabbing his hand.

“You actually found a hat?” he said, noticing the national championship hat that I’d just bought, third time being a charm, after striking out at the UVA Bookstore and the team store at JPJ, finally scoring at Mincer’s in Stonefield.

It was upon leaving there that I’d hatched the harebrained scheme to drive over to Davenport to snap a photo of me in my new national champs hat in front of the Davenport Field sign with the new hat for the purpose of updating my Facebook cover.

Rather stupidly, I insisted to my wife, Crystal, that we trek around the track and try to get as close as possible.

Reaching the field, we discovered that, naturally, everything was locked up, but then upon closer inspection, I saw an open door in the gate nearest the field.

I really wanted that photo, so in we went.

Then we heard the truck, it was Coach O’Connor, and then we’re on the field chatting with Coach O’Connor.

I asked him if it had sunk in yet, that his team had just accomplished what it had. He said it really hadn’t yet, and told us about how he was supposed to be back hard at work today, with a recruiting camp that had been scheduled to start this morning, but for the rain.

Think about that for a second. Not even 72 hours ago, O’Connor was busy trying to win a national championship, and he was scheduled to be back in Charlottesville on the weekend, win or lose, getting ready for next season, and beyond.

Crystal mentioned that we work with the Waynesboro Generals team in the Valley League, and that our game tonight had already been postponed, prompting O’Connor to ask about Kevin Doherty, who had pitched for us last year in Waynesboro.

“How do you want to do this?” he said as we made our way into position. “In front of the stands, or in front of the scoreboard?”

He then insisted that we do both just in case.

After snapping the photos, we walked back toward his truck. He’d asked about the hat, and said he’d gone to the team store at JPJ, too, on his search, and struck out, and we told him about Mincer’s, and how they’d still had several in stock when we’d left.

Note to self: Coach O’Connor needs a hat? He’s the reason they even had to print up the hats.

Come on, whoever needs to do something about this. Get Coach O’Connor a hat.

As we parted, I thanked him, “as a UVA alum,” I phrased it, for what his team had done, and told him about how I’d had two roommates who played baseball at UVA when I was a student on Grounds in the early 1990s, and there were 50 people at games, and seeing where the program is now is just amazing in that context.

“Well, now we’re going to get back to work and see if we can do it again,” he said.

This hat may never again leave my head.

– Column by Chris Graham

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