Steve Ward, 54, is the new coach for the 2012 Baseball Season at DVC.

Although Ward is the new coach, his face is not a new one on our campus.

Ward has been a part of the Athletic department at DVC since 1986, when he was hired to be the baseball coach.

Since ’86, Ward has held many positions within athletics including Athletics Director, head baseball coach and Hall of Fame Chair and Director.

“Steve Ward bleeds green, he is very dedicated to DVC athletics and the campus as a whole,” said Christine Worsley, DVC’s current Athletic Director.

This time around will be different than Ward’s first coaching position.

“I already coached for 30 years, I had my career. The best thing I can do is let my assistant coaches do more of the everyday functions with the team,” said Ward.

“Steve is a great mentor. He will be great mentoring the assistant coaches,” said Worsley. “More than just teaching the ins and outs of the game, but [additionally] giving the assistant coaches more insight on campus life and academics.”

There are still nine players on the field at a time, and the sport is still baseball but it is different now than it was a decade or two ago.

“The game is still the same, but we play less now,” said Ward.

“We used to have multiple baseball theory classes and technical strategy classes. Now we have one. We used to have a full schedule of winter ball games, now we can only have 10.”

The assistant coaches are still on the team from last year which Ward likes, but he did go out and find a special person from the school’s past to help out this year.

“I hired one new guy, Eric Snider, who is the winningest pitcher in DVC history and the very first DVC Hall of Fame inductee,” said Steve Ward.

“I played together and against Ward, and we started our coaching careers at the same time,” said Snider. “He is a very high energy guy who is driven, and goal oriented.”

Ward has a lot of work ahead of him, especially if he hopes to match last season’s success and rise above their remarkable 27-9 record.