Gallaudet Embraces Deaf Baseball Coach

Ex-major leaguer Curtis Pride sets example at school for the deaf

By Marie Morris, Newser Staff

Posted Apr 27, 2010 2:54 PM CDT

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Gallaudet Embraces Deaf Baseball Coach — Curtis Pride, then with the Atlanta Braves, looks on during a spring training game against the Boston Red Sox in Orlando, Fla., March 4, 1998. Pride is now the baseball coach at Gallaudet University. (Getty Images)

A recently retired former major leaguer sets out to turn around a college baseball program—a familiar story, but not when you're talking about the only deaf player of the modern era and the country's foremost college for the deaf. "I want these kids to play like real players," Curtis Pride, who wraps up his second season at Gallaudet today, tells USA Today. "We have a lot of work to do—but will get better."

Pride, 41, played 11 seasons in the majors for six teams; his journeyman's resume includes a modest .250 batting average. But to the Division III Bisons, who recently snapped a 150-game league losing streak, he might as well be Babe Ruth. "We can do something special here," says Pride. Says a 30-year-old pitcher who returned to school because of the coach: "It's amazing to be playing for the guy I loved watching as a kid. He's inspirational."
(More Curtis Pride stories.)

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