Dave Barrett lets the numbers rattle around his noggin, the one covered by an Oceanside High baseball cap for nearly five decades.
Barrett is hanging up that cap after directing Pirates baseball since 1978, although it’s just the tip of his impressive accomplishments.
When Oceanside dominated football, spitting out two state titles and 13 CIF San Diego championships, Barrett was barking out assignments as its defensive coordinator for 16 of the 28 years he was an assistant coach.
He’s also too modest to cite his baseball teams’ successes. They won seven league titles and were a CIF San Diego Section finalist three times. Barrett pushed enough right buttons to be ranked fourth on the county’s all-time win list at 656.
No, we didn’t forget his 14 years as Oceanside’s athletic director, a job with countless demands and much fewer backslaps.
Instead, Barrett reflects on kicking back in lurching vehicles with no seat belts and zero bad vibes. Where the destination was always the same, that special place where sports brings people together for all the right reasons.
“I like to think of all the rides in all those yellow school buses with all the different teams over all the years,” Barrett said. “There must have been thousands of those, and that’s what I’ll miss the most.”
Barrett, 72, is tapping out, and there’s no tip-toeing around his hemming and hawing. For the guy in jersey No. 14, who spent his life making a zillion in-game decisions, this one was a mind-bender.
“It’s bittersweet,” Barrett said. “Coaching is an all-in business, and you have to be into 100%. My mind tells me I can still go out there and do it like it was 25 years ago.”
But a keen coach, which Barrett is, knows there’s always a counterpoint to contemplate.
“My body and other circumstances tell me otherwise,” he said.
Barrett speaks from his soul, one that he doesn’t mind sharing in showing its vulnerability and a willingness to help others. He’s a man of strong faith, dabbles as a preacher, and he can pluck a guitar.
A chorus that he never tires of humming is of gratitude.
Barrett, who played baseball and football at Oceanside and MiraCosta College, had an impact on numerous students and players.
They’re the ones stopping him on the street, ducking in his office, or giving him the baseball whistle to get his attention at games.
Barrett was the same coach in 2024 as he was in 1978, one who put wind under his players’ wings, even those for whom EGR was more prevalent than RBI or ERA.
EGR?
“Extra grace required,” Barrett said, with a chuckle. “The amazing thing is that some of the guys with EGR are the ones that come back and are the most appreciative.
“Now they’re husbands and raising families and they tell me they’re the man they are because of me. I am so humbled and honored to have a part in that. But God gave me a good assignment.”
Maybe it was divine intervention when Barrett started coaching the grandsons of his former players. That’s a long arch of baseball, and now Barrett dives headfirst into what’s next.
But not before serving as a springboard of wisdom for so many, including those in Barrett’s English classes.
“He was more than a coach; he was a father figure to all of us,” said Jose Hernandez, 39, a catcher on two of Barrett’s CIF finalist teams. “It was how he interacted with everyone and made them feel wanted. He knew how to get the best out of each athlete and student.
Barrett will help the baseball program, and then there are those citrus trees at his Oceanside home he’s neglected. Instead of tending to them, he’s been revealing his green thumb at Oceanside’s baseball field.
There’s a to-do list on the horizon, and Barrett is waving that home, too. But first, he thanks the wide spectrum of players who once called him “Coach.”
“It’s pretty emotional that so many people have reached out to me,” Barrett said. “Those are forever relationships.”
Contact Jay Paris at [email protected] and follow him @jparis_sports
