'I couldn't say no': Longtime coach Bill Miller is back with Denmark baseball in quest for state four-peat
Bill Miller wasn’t planning to step down as the Denmark baseball coach after leading the Vikings to a third straight WIAA Division 2 state championship last season.
He has spent half his life coaching at Denmark. He piled up more than 500 wins in more than 30 seasons, numbers that made his eventual induction into the Wisconsin Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame not a matter of if, but when.
There was so much history for Miller and his players to chase this season, despite being improbable.
Denmark joined Nekoosa (1980-82) and Sun Prairie (2012-14) as the only teams to win three straight state championships since the tournament started in 1948 after a thrilling 3-2 win in 11 innings over St. Thomas More last June at Fox Cities Stadium.
But six months later, a short time before Christmas, Miller called it a career instead of going for the four-peat.
He wasn’t tired of coaching kids. He still loved games. He still got a kick of out writing down practice plans.
It was all the little things adding up that finally did it. He no longer works at the school, so he couldn’t walk in and get keys to the practice facility because keys aren’t allowed to be handed out. Not even for the man who put the baseball program on the map, not to mention a stint as the athletic director and his teaching duties.
The baseball field also wasn’t up to championship standards, in rough enough shape that the team entered the week hoping to finally play a home game for the first time this season.
He simply got tired of it the past few years since retiring as a teacher.
“It’s disappointing for the players that their coaches can’t get into the practice facilities and have a field to play on,” Miller said. “That’s what’s disappointing is the kids are getting the raw deal.”
Miller sticks around for Denmark baseball
Miller loves baseball too much to walk into early retirement. Considering he's one of 13 high school baseball coaches in state history to win 500 games, he wasn’t going to be out of work long.
He talked to a few people about other opportunities in the game, at least up until the day good friend and longtime Denmark pitching coach Luke Kraschnewski was hired as his replacement and made co-head coach with Chris DeLarwelle.
One of Kraschnewski’s calls afterward was to Miller.
He wanted to make sure Miller was going to help and still be part of the team.
He was going to help, right? Right?
“I couldn’t say no to him,” Miller said, laughing.
Their roles are reversed now, but it’s difficult to tell anything is different.
Miller still is at practices and games. He still is on the field when the team is batting, right there in the third base coaching box. He’s still the one who emails results after every contest.
Kraschnewski and Miller have been a dynamic duo for so long they’ve pretty much been co-head coaches all this time anyway.
He also knows DeLarwelle well, a former University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh star who spent three years in the minors with the Minnesota Twins and is a hitting guru.
Miller can’t exactly miss coaching since he’s still doing it at the same place he’s enjoyed his success.
But perhaps now he can appreciate all the things he accomplished and take time to reflect on it in a way that’s more difficult when still responsible for leading an entire group more focused on the present than the past.
If a coach got to write a script for how their career would end, Miller couldn’t have come up with anything better.
“Well, I would say it was a great way to go out,” Miller said. “I really had no intentions of getting out, even after last year. Things all came together the last few years. A great group of guys. They played ball the way it is supposed to be played. We were fortunate, quite a few times we were down multiple runs and had to come back in the playoffs. Things fell into place.”
Miller also got to coach both his sons, Brennen and Lucas, during those championship years.
The last three seasons aren’t the only ones he takes with him. He appreciated the teams that came so close to winning a state title but finished painfully short, or even those teams that never came close.
“It really has gone by quick,” Miller said. “It’s hard to believe it’s 31 years. They are all enjoyable, from the first year to the last year. Winning these last (titles) here with my sons playing in all three of those, it’s special to look back and look back at what they have accomplished.
“But, you know, I go back 20, 30 years, and those were just as enjoyable. Just coming to practice every day, working with the guys.”
Miller never had an exit plan. He didn’t know how many seasons he was planning to coach, only that he was ready for this one.
It means he might still add to his win total someday as the coach for another team in some other community.
“I don’t look at that,” Miller said. “It doesn’t necessarily have to be a head coaching job. An assistant somewhere else.”
Denmark goes for four-peat
Whether it had been Kraschnewski, DeLarwelle or Miller calling the shots this year, attempting to become the first school in state history to win four straight state titles is going to be a chore.
Denmark lost most of its starters from last year’s team to graduation and is without another after junior outfielder Eli Kapinos underwent season-ending shoulder surgery for an injury sustained during the football season.
During a doubleheader Saturday, there were five sophomores on the field.
The Vikings do have a top pitcher in senior right-hander Jaycob Dittmer, who was one of the heroes against St. Thomas More when he inherited a bases-loaded jam and struck out No. 3 hitter Brady Johnson in the bottom of the ninth of a tie game before Denmark won a state title a few innings later.
“We have our work cut out,” Miller said. “A lot of guys with little experience playing this year. We are making some mistakes that we haven’t experienced in a while.”
This article originally appeared on Green Bay Press-Gazette: Longtime coach Bill Miller has new role with Denmark baseball
