COLLINSVILLE — Michael Hill graduated from West Lauderdale in 1981 and played four years under head baseball coach Jerry Boatner. 

Like many fathers, Hill passed along his love of the game to his two sons, Grant and Daniel Hill. As they were growing up, it became clear Hill’s sons would stick with the sport at least through high school. By that point, Michael Hill said there was no question what the plan was for his sons’ prep careers.

“As we got older, my kids wanted to play baseball and were serious about it, and I didn’t want anyone but Boatner to coach them, because he was the best,” Michael Hill said.

It’s a somewhat common theme for Collinsville boys who play baseball. Boatner, who began coaching at West Lauderdale in 1974 and will retire after this season, said there have been countless examples of former players whose children have also played ball for him. It’s something Boatner said he finds flattering, and he said there are some advantages to coaching the children of former players.

“I just feel blessed, blessed that I’ve been around that long,” Boatner said. “If I coached your daddy, I can relate to you better and see things you do that are similar to how your parents did. It’s just a good feeling. I love coaching my ex-players’ kids, because they know what to expect from me.”

Michael Hill said he made those expectations clear to his two sons, and they both took it to heart.

“They loved him,” Michael Hill said. “They learned everything the right way.”

Daniel Hill, Michael Hill’s younger son who graduated from West Lauderdale in 2014, said he fell in love with the idea of playing for West Lauderdale when he would go watch the 2007 state championship team play at home. That’s when he knew he wanted to be a Knight.

“I kind of looked up to the baseball players, so I always wanted to play,” Daniel Hill said. “When you get to high school and play for Coach Boatner, you know the little kids are looking up to you.”

NO POLITICS

Despite being a legacy player, Daniel Hill said nothing was handed to him when he joined the team in high school — and he had no problem with that.

“I didn’t really want to use my dad as a reason to get on the field,” Daniel Hill explained. “(Boatner) is a very special person. Even if you didn’t have the energy to go out to practice, he always brought that energy. If you went out there, you had to play hard to get on the field for him.”

Said Michael Hill, “That’s what I wanted. I didn’t want my kids to have any free rides. I wanted them to earn it, and if they weren’t good enough to play, I didn’t want them to be on the field.”

While he’s humbled to have so many former players who wanted their children to play for him, Boatner said he always made it clear that being the son of a former player would earn you a roster spot, but it would never earn you playing time.

“We don’t believe in politics,” Boatner said. “I’ve always pressed to the good Lord to never let me play politics. If I’ve coached you and you tell me your son wants to play ball (for me), I take that as a compliment, because you’re saying you had a good experience and you want your son to have that same experience. That will get him on the team for a couple of years to give him time to develop, but if he’s not good enough to play, he won’t ever play first-team or get on the field.”

That was the same experience for Cole Hurst, whose father, Jody Hurst, not only played for Boatner but currently works for Boatner as an assistant. Cole Hurst graduated from West Lauderdale in 2017 and had one of the best individual seasons in school history after hitting more than .500 last season. Still, Cole Hurst said he never felt like Boatner showed him favoritism just because his father is Jody Hurst.

“I think he’s always operated that way,” Cole Hurst said. “You have to work for your playing time. You had to go out there and practice every day and prove you were worthy. If you didn’t work hard, there was going to be someone behind you that would work harder than you.” 

NO EXCEPTIONS

In fact, Boatner is so adamant about that policy that he had a heart-to-heart conversation about it with David Clark, who played for Boatner in the 1980s. Clark described himself as a troubled youth during his high school years and views Boatner as a second father of sorts because of how much Boatner looked after him and helped mold him as a person. 

“In trouble,” Clark said as to where he would be right now if it weren’t for Boatner. Because of that, Clark, who lives in Brandon, said he “spent 30 years trying to figure out how to get back” to Collinsville in hopes his two sons, Kellum and KK, could play for Boatner just like he did.

It almost happened several years ago, when Clark met with Boatner to discuss the possibility of his children transferring to West Lauderdale. Boatner, however, explained that would be asking Clark’s family to make a lot of sacrifices when he couldn’t even guarantee playing time for his sons. Ultimately, when Clark realized he couldn’t move back to Collinsville, he said he did the next-best thing by sending his sons to Jackson Academy, which is coached by former West Lauderdale standout Jay Powell. Although his children won’t get to play for Boatner, Clark still credits his former coach with their development.

“I tell Coach Boatner this all the time, if it wasn’t for me falling in love with the game, my kids wouldn’t have done as well in baseball as they have,” Clark said.

Even though he has that policy, Boatner estimates most of his former players’ children did end up earning playing time.

“Part of it is they have some pretty good skills to begin with, good genes, because their daddy was a pretty good ball player,” Boatner said. “Usually if you were a pretty good ball player from here, you like baseball a lot, so you’re going to spend time with your kids trying to develop them to be a part of the program.”

NOT JUST SONS

Danny Mosley graduated from West Lauderdale in 1981 and was a member of Boatner’s first state championship team at the school in 1978. He has a son, Brock Mosley, who played for Boatner when he was in high school. He also has a daughter, Brittany Pearson, who played for Boatner as a slow-pitch softball player back when Boatner also coached that sport at West Lauderdale.

Whether it was his son or his daughter, Danny Mosley said he was glad his children got to experience the same thing he did as a ball player.

“Coach was always really strict, high energy and disciplined,” Danny Mosley said. “We didn’t have near the talent back in those days that we have now. We didn’t hit that well, we didn’t pitch that well, but we just didn’t beat ourselves.”

Pearson, a 2002 West Lauderdale graduate, said she learned the same work ethic her father learned in baseball. Back in those days, she said you could practice twice a day, which Boatner made sure they did.

“More than anything was the work ethic; that’s what I learned the most from him,” Pearson said.

While she was playing softball for Boatner, Danny Mosley was the announcer over the PA system at the baseball games. It was a family affair, Pearson said, and it’s something she will always treasure.

“It’s pretty special, just being able to say you played ball for him,” Pearson said. “We won three state championships when I played, so he knows what he’s doing for sure. As a female playing for him, he wasn’t any easier on the girls, because he expected just as much. It was that tough love — he didn’t change his coaching abilities and strategies toward coaching.”

OUTSIDE OF BASEBALL

Neil McKeithen played for West Lauderdale from 1978 to 1981 and stayed in touch with Boatner due to a bond outside of baseball: both are members of Collinsville First Baptist Church. It offers McKeithen a unique perspective on his former coach that some might not see if they only observe him coaching.

“I go to church with him, so I get to see him as a Christian man praying and taking up the offering,” McKeithen said.

Both McKeithen and his son, Colton McKeithen, were the leading hitters on their teams during their respective senior years. The elder McKeithen said he’s grateful to share such a unique bond — both he and his son won state championships while at West Lauderdale as well — but the most important thing to him was having his son play for Boatner, the person.

“Colton also grew up in church with him and got to see the things he does in church,” McKeithen explained. “Little things like tucking your shirt in and not wearing your hat backwards, that sticks with you. Today, if I was walking around with my shirt untucked, I wouldn’t want him to see me.”

Colton McKeithen said it was interesting attending the same church as Boatner and getting to know him long before he stepped foot in West Lauderdale High School.

“He’s a well-respected Christian coach,” Colton McKeithen said. “I saw Coach every Sunday, and he always called me ‘Little Boog.’ My dad was ‘Booger Bear’ when he played, because one time he stole second and third and it looked like a booger bear was chasing him.”

Because he knows him from church, Colton McKeithen said he got to see some of Boatner’s humorous side at an early age.

“Off the field, he knows how to crack a joke,” Colton McKeithen said. “At church, he’s that same fun-loving, good-spirited guy who will crack a joke. He’s always funny and uplifting, and he always has a smile on his face. He always sits on the fourth row, and it’s been that way all my life.”

Boatner also isn’t too proud to get emotional, which is why Neil McKeithen said he allowed himself to get emotional when he watched his son win a state championship at West Lauderdale in 2014.

“Coach Boatner will tell you it’s OK for a man to cry,” Neil McKeithen explained. 

LONGEVITY

Boatner being around long enough to coach fathers and children ultimately comes down to him being the coach at West Lauderdale for more than four decades. When Dane Ethridge played for Boatner in the early 1980s, he said the thought never crossed his mind that Boatner would one day coach his children, Smokey and Colby, but he’s happy it worked out that way.

“I consider it good, because he’s second to none as far as someone teaching you the game,” Ethridge said.

While he didn’t imagine it as a player, Ethridge said he isn’t surprised Boatner has coached as long as he has.

“He’s a goal-setter,” Ethridge explained. “Once he has a goal… I don’t know what they may have been, but he just didn’t want to hang it up.”

It also has to do with the Collinsville community and the Lauderdale County school system, which embraced Boatner and allowed him to run the program his way.

“First of all, it’s a really good community, and he really got a lot of support from the community for his baseball program,” Ethridge said. “I think the community support plays into it a lot.”

Boatner agrees, saying West Lauderdale ultimately allowed him to be himself and run the program his way. When he retires, Boatner plans to move to Atlanta and do some volunteer coaching in the area, but he has reservations about it.

“I’m afraid if I go somewhere else they won’t let me run the program. I can’t be me,” Boatner said. “I’ve always been afraid of change, so that’s what I’m dreading in Atlanta. If I’m going to try to coach, I’m not going to be able to be me for a while, because they don’t know me. It’s different everywhere else, and I love this community and this school.”

Like Ethridge, Jody Hurst said he never thought about his children playing for Boatner while he was a player at West Lauderdale.

“Then I came back here in 1995 (to work at the school), and I knew my kids would play for Coach Boatner, because he wasn’t going anywhere,” Jody Hurst said.

One thing Jody Hurst liked about having Boatner coach Cole Hurst was the familiarity of Boatner’s expectations.

“Playing for him, you know what you’re going to get,” Jody Hurst said. “He has energy, and he expects you to work hard. You want a coach who’s demanding and who’s pushing you to the best of your ability. There’s no one else I’d rather have coach Cole and teach him the game.”

With the longevity comes the stories fathers pass down to their children about Boatner, and Smokey Ethridge, a 2011 West Lauderdale graduate, admitted the stories built Boatner into an almost larger-than-life figure.

“Before I started (playing for him), it was a little intimidating, a little scary, because he’s probably the best coach in the state,” Smokey Ethridge recalled about the idea of playing for Boatner. “Once you got to play for him and really got to know him, it was fun. It was tough, because he expected so much out of you, but it was good to know he actually cared and expected you to do well.”

Not all of the stories make Boatner into an intimidating figure. Cole Hurst recalled hearing about how Boatner would joke with waiters at restaurants when one of his assistant coaches would ask for sweet tea, saying they’d better not bring the sweet tea or the coach would wet the bed. Boatner was also known to ask for no cheese on his hamburgers because cheese would make him ugly. It’s a lighter side to Boatner that Cole Hurst came to appreciate.

“It’s different, because he’s intense and brings that energy,” Cole Hurst said. “He has the most energy of anyone I know at that age. That lighter side, he’s super-funny. You have to get used to it. He uses the same clichés that get old but are funny.”

Smokey Ethridge said he’s glad he played for Boatner not just because of the actual experience, but also because it gives him a common bond with his father.

“It’s a really special thing, looking back on it,” Smokey Ethridge said. “The world has changed so much between when he grew up and when I grew up. Knowing we have that one thing in common, it’s special to know we share that experience.”

This is the second in a series of stories that will run during the 2018 baseball season commemorating Jerry Boatner and his 50-year career of coaching baseball as Boatner prepares to retire after the season.