Much like his favorite baseball player of all time, Cal Ripken Jr., who earned the nickname “the Iron Man” while playing an MLB-record 2,632 games, Glen Carter has shown up day after day over the past 21 years for the Central High School baseball program.
Carter has cherished his time well spent at Gene Lively Stadium, where his sons Ripken, 11, and Wrigley, 4, have enjoyed being welcomed by their father’s players as one of their own at one of the most well-kept fields in the Chattanooga area.
The memories made with the Purple Pounders will last a lifetime for Carter, who decided after his team’s season ended earlier this month to step down as the school’s baseball coach in order to be able to coach his sons in that sport during the spring.
While he compiled 14 winning seasons and nearly 400 victories leading Central on the diamond, he said being there for his players was the greatest reward.
“Just knowing I had a small impact on the young men’s lives here on the baseball field lets me be at peace with this decision,” said Carter, who spent his first seven seasons as a baseball coach at North Jackson in Stevenson, Alabama. “Obviously I had an impact on some of their baseball careers and development, but there were plenty of years that I kept a kid who needed baseball more than baseball needed them.