Butch Thompson is working his magic so far this season. (Auburn photo)

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Thompson Living Personal Dreamland

For 23 years, he waited.

As an assistant at seven different schools, three within the Southeastern Conference, Butch Thompson had learned to be patient. It fit his personality. Humble, genuine, almost apologetic when receiving praise, Thompson was by all accounts the stereotypical nice guy. And we all have heard where those guys finish.

So, when Thompson was contacted regarding the vacant Auburn head coaching position, then did a phone interview that didn’t go so terribly, then met in Auburn, Ala., with Tigers’ athletics director Jay Jacobs and left feeling that the interview went pretty well, he still wasn’t sure all this was really happening.

After all, Thompson had interviewed with Jacobs the last time the Tigers had a vacancy two and half years ago and was bypassed for Sunny Golloway. So despite all of the signs, Thompson just was not confident that he would finally get the chance to sit at the big desk and run a program.

“I thought the interview went well,” Thompson explained. “At the same time, I guess I protected my heart.

“Don’t put the cart before the horse. We have been through this before.”

Before any offer arrived, Thompson had plenty to figure out. After all, he and his wife Robin and three daughters had been in Starkville, Miss., for six years. Even if Auburn chose Thompson, how would the family react to a move out of state?

“They were kind of torn,” Thompson explained. “You can understand, I have a 17, a 15, and a 10 year old and they are all girls. The two oldest are a junior and sophomore in high school. They have that friend group that is pretty strong. And they can really see that finish line of graduation. So we had some challenges.

“We had a bunch of stuff to work through. Whenever we would get to a certain level, I would say, ‘hey guys, they interviewed a lot of good men for this. We may never get a call back. We just have to have a conversation’.”

After Thompson had the interview, he crawled in a hole and talked to no one. He felt that was his best tactic with the outside world. He retreated to a fifty-acre farm outside of Starkville where the cell phone service is spotty. It was a place to think, to introspect, and plan for whatever path awaited.

“I would just go to practice, take care of our players, and then head to the farm,” he explained.

Thompson was faced with the balancing act that many coaches face when they are in the job market. They have a job to do and must continue to do it well while waiting to see if that next step up the ladder is coming.

“I just tried to think of everybody I am accountable to,” he explained. “I think about my head coach (John Cohen) and that university. I think about Scott Stricklin, our athletic director. A huge portion of time comes with the relationships with those players. Those players invest. Not all, but some come to that school because of the opportunity to be with you. You are trying to teach them right from wrong every day and then you are put in the spotlight. I weighed through every one of those and I communicated with everyone who was in my world.

“You know what I found out? I learned, I found out, and I sensed that everybody at Mississippi State seeing me as an assistant for 23 years is that, ‘we want Butch to get this’. Believe it or not, that was the sense I got from our players at Mississippi State. And that was kind of overwhelming to me.”

Apparently, all of the respect Thompson had shown in his Starkville tenure was being repaid, and at a difficult, and at times awkward, few weeks for their associate head coach.

“First of all, Butch is an unbelievable human being,” Mississippi State head coach John Cohen stated. “He might be the most grounded person I have ever been around professionally. He knows who he is. You have heard the expression where certain people act one way around one group of people and then they act another way around another group of people. Butch is the same human being, it doesn’t matter if he is meeting President Obama or one of his left-hand pitchers, he is the same guy. I think that really makes him special.”

So, here was the self-described simple guy from Amory, Miss., and he was a phone call away from matching programs week-in-week-out with Tim Corbin, Paul Mainieri, and yes, Mississippi State’s Cohen.

But would that call come? And if it didn’t come now, when would it?

“I had kind of resigned to the feeling that, ‘man, I will either get my opportunity to be a head coach in the Southeastern Conference or I’m either going to be the best assistant I can be in this league for as long as people will have me around’,” said Thompson. “That is really how I have been rolling for the better part of a decade.”

He got the call on October 22.

“It took me about three seconds to accept,” he said with a laugh. And with that call, the 23-year assistant was an assistant no more. His dream was realized. He was a head coach.

And all of the “what if’s” switched to “now what’s”? The family knew the drill. They were Auburn bound. But what about those folks at MSU who Thompson had built strong relationships with? They weren’t going with him.

That elusive offer arrived via phone call after practice and Cohen asked Thompson to speak with the Mississippi State players the next morning at 7 a.m. Thompson went into the meeting dreading how hard it would be to say goodbye. Now he is thankful it occurred.

“It allowed all of us to have a good cry,” he explained. “With some of those boys I have been through three plus years, two plus years, one plus years, and the new guys I was excited about coaching. It just ran the gamut. We had just been through a lot. We got to hug the guys and hug the staff. Now I am so thankful that John wanted it, and allowed it, and I am glad we did it.”

And with those hugs, those tears, the maroon chapter turned orange and blue.

Thompson arrived in Auburn just after lunch that day. He was met at the door by a large group that included football coach Gus Malzahn and basketball coach Bruce Pearl. Then came a press conference, a reception, and a basketball event.

“Everything was a blur,” said Thompson. “It will be a day I will never forget.”

As the night’s events ended, the Thompsons, five-strong, headed to the hotel to relax a bit. They were now in Auburn but were about to get some help looking the part of locals. Awaiting on the bed for all five of them were suitcases packed with Auburn clothes.

“The girls were so excited,” he said. “That helped me, you know, after dragging them over here. So many things were uncertain. We were able to have some smiles and some time as a family, and that was pretty neat.”

Isn’t it something how the little things can mean the most? It was like Christmas. We had that moment late that first night where we had some family time and some smiles. That was a neat gesture.”

He was on a plane at 5:30 a.m., the next morning to get on the recruiting circuit. There were only 13 days until the early signing period.

“It was like you were blasted out of a cannon and I feel like we have been going at a good rate ever since then,” Thompson admitted.

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Understanding Auburn

Sunny Golloway had been hired in 2013 to replace John Pawlowski. With a College World Series pedigree from Oklahoma, Golloway had the resume to bring a winning program to The Plains. After a foundational year in 2014, Golloway led the Tigers back to the NCAA Tournament last spring, their first since 2010.

But things were not as rosy off the field. Golloway, confident and at times headstrong, clashed with some in and around the athletic department. There were multiple incidents where Golloway was not considered to be representing Auburn in a preferred way, according to sources familiar with the situation. On September 27, he was dismissed with cause. Golloway has since sued Auburn to collect his salary. The suit is pending.

By anyone’s standards, this is not the way a new coach wants to enter a program.

Obviously, when the last guy’s tenure didn’t end with a dog pile in Omaha, there are challenges to avoid those mistakes and blaze a new path. For Thompson, he might be as different personality-wise from Golloway as any candidate they could have hired.

He also understands Auburn after serving as the Tigers’ pitching coach under Tom Slater from 2006-2008. Some have surmised Golloway’s time was shortened because he didn’t understand or acknowledge ‘the Auburn way’. In Thompson, Jacobs found one of the most qualified candidates who can find his way from Wire Road to Donahue Drive.

“That is how I tried to sell my interview,” Thompson explained. “One of my statements is, ‘I know Auburn. I think I have a feel of the identity’. I want to be welcoming to every alumni person, every player, every fan who has ever been here. Instead of building a fence, we are trying to be as welcoming and open. This is their program, this is not my program.

“To be honest, they may have been doing the same thing with the last staff. I don’t know. But I know how I want to run it and I know how based on when I was here before how Auburn people want it run.”

Thompson has reached out to Auburn baseball royalty to aid his transition. Former coach Hal Baird is throwing out the first pitch of his tenure opening day. Auburn and MLB great Tim Hudson just retired, lives in Auburn, and Thompson wants to tap into his knowledge as much as he can.

Even though the remainder of the past staff, led by former hitting coach Greg Norton, took Auburn’s team through fall practice, Thompson will not get much transition from his predecessors. He brought in a new staff, though, does have a couple of personnel that were with the previous staff.

Randall Dickey, who was on the former basketball staff of Tony Barbee, is the administrative assistant (often called the director of baseball operations). Hunter Vick, in his third season at Auburn, is moving from the volunteer position to video coordinator.

Ever prepared, Thompson knew who he wanted to hire if he ever received the call to be a head coach. So when the moment came, he executed the plan.

“I knew, if they called me back and offer me this job, I need to know what I want to do and I did,” he explained. “As soon as I got the opportunity, I went after it.”

Within a couple of days he had hired Doug Sisson and Brad Bohannon as his two full-time assistants.

“Doug Sisson, he coached me in college. I don’t see him as an assistant coach. I see him as my field coordinator. I see him as my brother. He is not a ‘yes man’.

“What I mean by that is that he will come in and say, ‘we need to do this’.

‘Have you thought about this?’

‘Why did you do that?’

“So I am so thankful to have him here.”

In 2011 and 2012, Sisson was the first base coach for the Kansas City Royals. Recently, he was a roving instructor for the Chicago White Sox. When the two would talk, and they have been connected for 25 years, Sisson would say, ‘if you ever get to be a head coach in the SEC, I would want to coach with you’. Thompson wanted the same. So that one was easy. “I had that in my hip pocket for a while,” Thompson explained.

Bohannon started the day after Thompson’s opening press conference.

“I called (Kentucky head coach) Gary Henderson who is a great friend. I told him, ‘Man, I want Brad. I want to talk to him’.

He said, ‘I am going to try to keep him’.”

In the end, the Georgia native Bohannon came to Auburn.

Thompson wanted to make sure everyone on his staff had SEC experience. As a result, Thompson, Sisson, Bohannon, and volunteer assistant Greg Drye have a combined 39 years in the SEC.

“I have known Brad and respected him and he had been in the league,” Thompson said. “That was my prerequisite. Doug had been at Georgia and Brad at Kentucky for a long time. Greg has been at Mississippi State. I have been in the league. Our trainer (Sean Stryker) has been the league. Every hire that we had the opportunity to make, that was a prerequisite. I am comfortable in saying that we went 2-for-2. It wasn’t like we were interviewing a lot of people about our assistant jobs.”

But why was SEC experience so vital to the search? After all, they do play baseball in other conferences. Thompson used his own resume to explain why he felt it was so important.

“It is simple,” he explained. “When I was at Birmingham Southern, we won the National Championship in 2001. The head coach was (now UAB coach) Brian Shoop, one of the best men in baseball. I had the opportunity to go to Georgia. It was my second formal offer to go to the SEC as a pitching coach. The first time I didn’t because I loved Coach Shoop so much, so I came back. Then I had the opportunity to go to Georgia and I went. Our third year we went to Omaha in 2004. But those first two years in the SEC, I thought recruiting was a struggle. The speed of the game, the level of athlete. The fanfare, everything was such an adjustment. I think it took a couple of seasons to get my feet steadied on the ground.

“I thought with Auburn hiring me and bringing me back, I thought a part of that was because I had been there before and I might have a feel for Auburn. I might have a feel for the Southeastern Conference. And I didn’t want to bring in a coach that felt the way I did when I first went to Georgia. And to keep everything in line, I really made that a prerequisite for putting a staff together. I didn’t want to have to come in and coach a coach along with coaching players. That was the deciding the factor based on my own experience.”

For another perspective, Cohen expressed his feelings on the adjustment to the SEC.

“When I went to Missouri out of the Big Eight a long time ago to become a head coach at Northwestern State it was not a huge adjustment for me at the time,” said the Mississippi State coach. “When I went from Northwestern (State) to become an assistant at Florida, it was a huge adjustment. In the SEC, everything is just moving faster. I am not even talking about on the baseball field, although I feel it is true there too. But the speed in which recruiting, the speed of which things need to be purchased and paid for, the speed in which paperwork has to get done, that compliance is working. Everything is working a lot faster in this league and you have to be able to keep up. That’s why I feel understanding the league is important.”

Cohen added this analogy to further his point.

“I love going to New York City with my family. The first couple of times I was really intimidated. Just walking down the street it is like an SEC football game on the sidewalks. But after you go to New York for sixth, or seventh time, you kind of relax and you know what to expect. It is more enjoyable. Until you experience it, it is just different.”

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It’s going to be OK

Whatever the cause that led to the Golloway’s dismissal, the collateral damage landed on a dugout full of players. Thompson was sensitive to what that group had been through. He also knew the first impression would matter. He not only had to start developing relationships with the team but also figure out how to evaluate and assemble a club that would soon face cut-throat opposition.

What do you tell the players?

“I was trying to look for a template,” Thompson explained. “I talked to Jim Wells. I talked to Hal Baird. I talked to Ron Polk. You can imagine all of the people you can talk to. Everyone who won a zillion games, I wanted to have a conversation. ‘Lead me’.”

He received a lot of good advice ranging from just be yourself, to how to address the team early on, to how to handle the short amount of practice time before games begin.

“We are forced to be simple this year,” Thompson explained. “I think we are going to back off and not do 36 different bunt defenses. Sometimes when you are simple it turns out to be better. We do two or three and do them really good. Teach what you know. Get good at simplicity. And care more than any other team about your players, and your fans. I think some of the advice is trying to align with who people think I am. They don’t want me to be someone else now that I am the head coach. I need to hear that from people who I believe in and look up to.”

So, when Thompson finally reached the moment when he was addressing his team as their head coach, there were so many things he could have said. But he settled on one premise, something he felt they needed to hear more than anything.

“With the players, I told them, ‘I’m not coming in with some Knute Rockne speech’. I just told them, ‘It is going to be OK’. Trust takes time to build. From a chemistry standpoint, you may be the strongest team in the SEC because you may have been through more than any other thing this year.”

As the calendar flips toward the season — up until January 29 the current staff had not practiced with the entire team — there was an escalated timetable to get ready for the opener against Sacramento State. So what is the greatest challenge in using those three weeks?

“I think the evaluation process is really difficult,” said Cohen. “That would be the biggest obstacle for me personally. He is watching a lot of film but if you didn’t see the prospect play in high school and you didn’t see him perform in the fall, in some ways you have to rely on other people’s opinions and you are guessing a little bit. When it is your own club, and you have been able to evaluate them from start to finish. It is easier to make those tough decisions like who is going to pitch, who is going to pinch-hit, and who will have every role on your club. And trust is a huge issue for any club, any organization. You have to be able to trust all the people around you and in the beginning, trust has to be earned. When you are going through that transition, that is a difficult thing too.”

Thompson has three weeks and he can treat them however he wants.

“I think we are going the first two weeks and go seven intra-squads and we are going to develop players. We are going to invest in every player like there is no tomorrow. At the end of those seven squad games, our coaching staff is going to sit down for the first time and start thinking about how do we want to plug guys in?

“I would not be truthful if I said I didn’t have an opinion about some of these guys because I have seen them play. Several of these guys I recruited and they told me ‘no’. We actually joke and kid about that a little bit. I have some predetermined thoughts. Coach Sisson does not. Coach Bohannon may have a few. We will have those seven squad games and then about ten days out from the season, let’s sit down and see where we are. We just want to be patient with that.”

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Aim High

Before Golloway’s departure, Auburn was getting some notice as a potential top 25 type of club. Its improvement from 2014 to 2015 earned some credibility and the Tigers had many key components back.

Then the autumn unpleasantness happened and those lofty expectations vanished quicker than souvenirs on the last days of the War Eagle Supper Club.

Thompson saw how the perception of the team’s futures had plummeted (D1Baseball predicted them 7th in the SEC West) and he did what he could to address them head on.

“I apologized to the team because the reason we are picked there may be because of me,” said the new coach. “But I told them to aim as high as they possibly could because they have experience. And they think they have a good club. As Les Brown said, ‘People don’t fail because they aim high and miss. It is because they aim low and hit.’

“I think we should aim as high as possible,” he continued. “Our catcher has experience. We have our middle infield back. Anfernee Grier is a good center fielder. Defensively, you feel like you have experience and are strong up the middle. We are seven deep in the lineup who have over 200 SEC at bats. That is usually a good thing. We are picked seventh in the West. I think that is easier to justify. Anywhere else, 1-6 is harder to justify. You just don’t know what to expect. Hey, I don’t know what to expect either.”

For Auburn to exceed the prognostications, it needs to find some depth on the mound. Cole Lipscomb and Dalton Rentz are back to lead the rotation. But they are missing a huge cog.

“Keegan Thompson, who is arguably one of the top five guys in the league, he is unavailable for us this year,” the coach explained. “That is a huge challenge for us to overcome because I feel like when he walks out there and he is right, he can stay for a couple of hours and give you a chance to win. That hurts to lose that for one of those three games on the weekend. Keegan is going to miss the whole year. We petitioned the NCAA for another spot on the roster and it was granted. It is the best thing for Keegan. Somebody might give him a $ million this year. He has the track record.

“We are not deep on the mound. They were not deep last year. (Former pitching coach) Tom Holiday did a phenomenal job with this pitching staff last year. I think we will be in that same mode where we have to do a really good job with our pitching staff. It is all going to shake out based on our rotation and can we be competitive in the last three innings of a ball game to finish them.”

Thompson has lived a dream the past few months and the pace is only quickening as opening day approaches. A job that seemed a distant fantasy a few months ago is his reality. And he is honored and humbled to be on this path.

“We had a banquet the other night,” Thompson recalled. “It was just slammed. This is the first time this has happened to me. I came expecting to eat and, ‘man, I love to eat’. But I decided not to eat and just sit there and watch. I thought, ‘there are a lot of people here who care about this’. They just came out in droves. We were overflowing. I was just thankful. I was in awe and I kind of pinched myself and thought, ‘man I am the head coach at Auburn’. I feel that sense of awe, but then five seconds later it is replaced with, ‘I’ve got to make these people happy’.

“I yearn to coach. When I have trouble going to sleep at night, I just picture Plainsman Park and it is full of people seeing us play. I can’t really see which player it is, I can just see diving and then somebody splitting a gap. That chills you. That gives you energy. That is the most exciting thing to me. I am ready to see it be reality. All this stuff is visualized in my head and I am ready to see it in person.”

Sometimes, even for nice guys, dreams do come true.