With the hiring of David Banes as its baseball coach last Thursday,
Buchholz has completely moved on from the 24-year Bob Smith era.

That same day (prior to Banes’ hiring becoming public knowledge) three parents called The Sun to lend their support to Smith and talk about a few issues that upset them regarding his firing on Aug. 24. Two of the three said that while they wanted Smith brought back, they were happy to see Banes hired if Smith wasn’t going to return. The third said he didn’t know Banes so he couldn’t offer an opinion.

The gist of the conversations regarded a two-and-a-half hour meeting BHS principal Vincent Perez held with baseball parents eight days earlier. It was a meeting in which answers were expected, but some parents said none were given.

Perez was in a bad spot here, as he and Smith are longtime friends and each of the parents who called said they were of the belief Perez didn’t make the final decision (Perez has twice declined comment ” the day of the firing and the day of the meeting ” aside from a short press release). What they wanted to know was who did make the final decision and why.

“If he did something illegal, if he touched a kid improperly, if he was profane or abusive, people deserve to be told,” said former BHS player and coach Wickie Ariet, who was not present at the meeting. “If he did any of those things or something worse or similar, I’ll be the first to go up to him and tell him what he did was wrong. But as far as I know, he didn’t, and he didn’t even get a suspension first. After 20-plus years, if he did something wrong, shouldn’t that have been the first punishment?”

The parents said they were of the belief a story in The Sun on Aug. 22 in which Smith criticized new Florida coach Kevin O’Sullivan was the final straw, but only a small part of what built the haystack.

That, they say, came from a division of parents.

There was one camp that has wanted Smith out for months and another that wanted the coach to be allowed to finish what he said would be his final year.

E-mails I received (and there were hundreds) were split right about 50-50 on Smith, something Smith himself kind of predicted when he told me, “Half this town hates me, half loves me.”

One parent in Smith’s camp said Smith was sat down last spring and was told he needed to work on his communication skills. All three parents who called agreed he did that over the summer, going as far as to put his cell number on the Buchholz Web site and encourage calls at any time.

In the end that wasn’t enough.

For now, the David Banes Era has begun at Buchholz. Let’s hope two groups of angry parents can do what they previously couldn’t.

Unite behind their coach.

Banes and the Bobcat players deserve that.