A high school baseball coach who was mysteriously asked to resign last week will return Tuesday to a community full of support and questions.
Rancho Bernardo High School baseball coach Sam Blalock was notified Wednesday that he would not be brought back for RB High School’s 2012 baseball season, the school said.
Students and baseball players spent the weekend gathering support for their long-time winning baseball coach, Sam Blalock.
They created an online petition and a Facebook group supporting their coach. RBHS student and baseball player Matt Jervis started the group on Facebook, which has now gained 200 supporters. The online petition included a letter to PUSD Superintendent John Collins, which Jervis said he and his teammates will deliver after school.
“He is a fatherly figure to many that we as players look up to highly,” the petition’s text read. “The reason of his layoff is yet to be discovered, but we know for a fact it was not financially driven and he was definitely not involved in any criminal actions.”
Blalock taught and coached in Poway Unified School District for 40 years. He helped lead the baseball team to several CIF championships and was generally well-loved. In 2007, he retired from teaching but remained the coach of the RB baseball team.
While Rancho Bernardo High School officials did not say why Blalock had been asked not to return, Blalock told the North County Times that Principal Paul Robinson fired him.
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“I was called into Robinson's office and was asked to resign," Blalock told the North County Times. "If I didn't resign, I was told he'd have to fire me. I didn't resign.”
Four days after the alleged confrontation, PUSD issued a statement that Robinson “notified … Blalock that he would not be brought back as coach for the 2012 season.”
"The timing of this was not the best,” the principal said in a statement sent Saturday night.
In the statement, Superintendent Collins said he is still gathering information Robinson's notice to Blalock. He said that he won’t be able to address the issue until Blalock returns from out of town on Tuesday.
A spokesperson with PUSD said she could not comment further on the situation until later this week, after meeting with Blalock.
“I look forward to an open dialog, to better understand exactly what transpired on Wednesday, to look at potential options, and to reach a satisfactory resolution,” Collins said in the statement.
He asked for patience and said that soon the district will address any “inaccurate information circulating” around the community.
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