The Caledonia High School baseball team will take the field with a new head coach in the upcoming 2022 season as Brad Hamilton takes the helm.
Hamilton, a 1997 graduate of Amory High School, played baseball at Meridian Community College before pursuing a career in coaching. The 2022 campaign will be his 15th season coaching. Prior to getting the head job at Caledonia, he was the head softball coach at Amory, moved on to Itawamba Agricultural High School, then served three years as Starkville High’s pitching coach. For the past three years he has been an assistant head coach for the Cavaliers.
“The first thing is familiarity,” Hamilton said of his relationship with the returning players. “They know me already, they’re used to me, and they know what they’re going to get.”
Hamilton is taking over for Travis Garner, who coached the Cavs for the last three years and led them to the playoffs in 2021. The two coached together at Starkville before they both left to coach at Caledonia in May 2018.
“I’ve been with (Garner) for six years, and I appreciate everything he did for me,” said Hamilton. “I’m excited about the process of getting to take over and build the program in my eyes.”
Hamilton is not only excited about his returning talent but truly confident in them. He’s especially excited about Caledonia’s pitching staff, which dominated Yazoo City in the first round of this year’s MHSAA Class 4A playoffs.
“We are returning three really good arms on the mound, but we’re bringing back a lot of pitching, period,” Hamilton said. “A lot of them are unproven, but they’re going to get a lot of work in this summer and we’re going to see what they can do.”
Hamilton already has a leg up over most first-year coaches because he’s already well acquainted with the returning players. He also already has his vision for his players in his first season at Caledonia for both on and off the diamond.
“The big vision is to remain as competitive as possible while growing in our accountability and growing more as a person than a ballplayer,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton said being a head coach is something that he has always wanted to do and it was one of his main goals when he first got into coaching softball at Amory. He feels like he’ll be able to use his influence in a positive way more than when he was an assistant.
“I want to be able to help mold them in a positive manner and really run things the right way,” Hamilton said.
One of the things that Hamilton is looking forward to in his new position is looking for an assistant coach to take his old role. Hamilton said he has to find someone he trusts to coach the pitching staff, but he’s excited to hand the job over to give a new coach a chance to learn and grow in the new role.
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