Former College baseball coach Augie Garrido, holds the record as the winningest coach in NCAA college baseball, died March 15 in Newport Beach, California at the age of 79 as a result of complications from a stroke.
Garrido retired from coaching in 2016 after coaching for 48 years with a record of 1,975 wins, 951 losses, and nine ties. Garrido has also led his teams to five NCAA College World Series championships. A two time Coach of the Year winner, Garrido was presented with the Tony Gwynn Lifetime Achievement Award by Baseball America.
Speaking on Garrido’s death, Florida State University Seminoles head coach Mike Martin said, “college baseball and the world lost one of the finest men in our coaching profession. Augie dedicated his life to making young men better people. He will be deeply missed by myself and many others.” Martin, who began coaching at his alma mater in 1980, is just eleven victories away from tying Garrido’s record of 1,975 victories.
Before becoming a head coach, Garrido played college baseball at Fresno State where he became one of only eleven people to be a part of the College World Series in Omaha both as a player and as a head coach. He played minor league baseball as an infielder in the Cleveland Indians organization for six years where he rose as far as AAA.
Garrido began his coaching career in 1969 at San Francisco State. He then coached at Cal Poly and Cal State Fullerton where he made his first trip to Omaha in 1975 and won his first championship in 1979. He also coached at Illinois and a second stint at Cal State Fullerton before taking over the coaching duties in Texas with the Longhorns in Austin where he finished his coaching career. After retiring from coaching, Garrido became a special assistant to the Athletic Director at the University of Texas.
Garrido’s accomplishments include the first coach to win a national championship with two different teams, setting the record for most Division I wins, and the most overall wins. Three of Garrido’s players won the Golden Spikes Award – the highest honour in college baseball – Tim Wallach, Phil Nevin, and Mark Kotsay. He is also a member of the College Baseball Hall of Fame.
He was born August Edmun Garrido Jr on February 6, 1939 in Vallejo, California – outside San Francisco. He was introduced to baseball very early, his father played fast pitch baseball.
While Augie Garrido is best known for his baseball, he also played basketball.
Award winning actor Kevin Costner has appeared in numerous movies, but three of his biggest movies are baseball films – “Bull Durham”, “Field of Dreams”, and “For Love of the Game”. Costner admits that he used Garrido as inspiration for his characters in “Bull Durham” and “Field of Dreams” and in “For Love of the Game” Costner case Garrido as the manager for the New York Yankees.
Garrido is survived by his third wife Jeannie and daughter Lisa.
feature photo credit: By Johntex – Own work, CC BY 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1663812