Chip Haleβs first at-bat as an Arizona Wildcat can be described in six words:
First pitch. First swing. Home run.
The freshman third baseman from the greater San Francisco area smoked a line drive down the right field line at Sancet Field, clearing the fence. The ball rolled onto Sixth Street.
The next dayβs Star, Jan. 31, 1983, published a photograph of Hale being congratulated as he reached home plate.
A few days later, Kindall elevated Hale to No. 2 in the batting order, a spot he occupied for the next four seasons, playing in more games and getting more at-bats than anyone in school history.
Today, Hale is a rookie again. Sort of. Although he is 56 β although he played in 333 major-league games and has been coaching since USA Baseball hired him to be part of its organization 21 years ago β Chip Hale is finally the head baseball coach of his alma mater.
You wonder what took so long. Could you possibly find a better fit?
Two months after he left Arizona in the summer of 1987, Hale pocketed a modest $5,000 signing bonus from the Minnesota Twins, and quickly won the batting championship for the Class A Midwest Leagueβs Kenosha Twins. At seasonβs end, he had a heart-to-heart talk with manager Don Leppert, a baseball whisperer for more than 30 years who didnβt gush about Haleβs .345 batting average but instead told him βyou should get into coaching, thatβs your future.β
Itβs virtually the same thing Haleβs Triple-A manager Phil Roof of the Portland Beavers told him a decade later: βYou should retire now and get into managing.β
And so, five years later, he did. After Hale sent his rΓ©sumΓ© to the minor-league directors of all 30 big league teams in 2000, the Diamondbacks hired Hale to manage the Rookie League Missoula Osprey. Over the next two decades, he managed or coached for the Diamondbacks, Nationals, Aβs and Tigers. Although he twice flirted with college jobs β not at his alma mater, though β Hale pursued the UAβs opening the same way he pursued an Arizona scholarship 38 years ago.
This is a job that seems to have been made for Walter βChipβ Hale, son of a school district administrator from Contra Costa County in California.
Those who say he might struggle figuring out the recruiting system of college baseball have probably been misled about the dynamics of recruiting. Who could teach a young ballplayer more than Chip Hale about the road to the major leagues?
βChip is the most inquisitive and organized person β man or woman β Iβve ever been around,β says former UA head coach Jerry Stitt, who was the Wildcatsβ hitting coach during Haleβs Wildcat career. βHe absorbs everything.β
An honor student at Arizona, winner of the schoolβs Tom Hansen Pac-10 medal as the UAβs top male student-athlete of 1986-87, Hale declined a congressional appointment to the Naval Academy to pursue baseball at what was then one of the NCAAβs five or 10 leading baseball schools.
Itβs not that way now, but if anyone can get Arizona back to that level, Hale is that man.
βChip was voted co-captain in both his junior and senior years; Iβm not sure Arizona ever had a two-year captain before,β says his UA teammate Steve Strong, starting catcher on Arizonaβs 1986 national championship team. βChip is a cerebral guy, he has understood the pieces, the players and the dynamics from the get-go. He was always the first guy on the field and the last to leave.
βHeβs got a huge network of contacts in baseball. The recruiting part of this wonβt stop him for a second.β
It was a shock to the UAβs deeply-rooted baseball family that any coach would use Arizona as a steppingstone, as Jay Johnson did by leaving to coach at LSU 10 days ago.
βChipβs not coming here to go to LSU five years from now,β says 1960s All-American shortstop Eddie Leon, the UAβs first-ever first-round draft pick. βHeβs the long-term answer to keep Arizona baseball rolling. This is a destination job.β β
Haleβs timing at Arizona has always been impeccable.
When he chose to play for the Wildcats in the spring of 1983, eschewing offers from USC, the Naval Academy and a football scholarship from NAIA powerhouse Linfield University of Oregon, Hale appeared to be stuck in line behind returning third base standout Jack Howell.
But Howell, who went on to play 10 seasons for the Angels, Astros and Padres, performed so well in the 1983 Alaskan Summer League that he signed a pro contract two weeks before Hale arrived in Tucson as a virtually unknown freshman.
Haleβs American Legion coach in California, Don Miller, tipped off UA pitching coach Jim Wing about Haleβs ability.
βHe wasnβt the biggest name we recruited,β Stitt remembers, βbut with Chip it went beyond the typical five tools used to measure a baseball player. Chip was a little above average in all of the five-tool categories, but he had a sixth tool and a seventh tool and an eighth tool β his intangibles are off the charts. He has always been able to lead, lead, lead. Heβs the same as a coach as he was a player.β
ASU and Oregon State, two of the Pac-12s leading baseball franchises, recently established a template of staying in the family, hiring former All-Americans as head coaches, men who had not coached a day of college baseball.
Hale, who wears a World Series championship ring from 2019 when he was Washingtonβs bench coach, is more widely known than OSUβs Mitch Canham and ASUβs Willie Bloomquist. Getting a foot into a recruitβs front door should not be an issue.
βIβve spoken at a lot of clinics, small and large, in-state and on a national scale,β says Stitt. βThe coaches and players always bring up Terry Francona and Chip Hale. They always ask whoβs the best I ever coached. I tell them itβs Terry. And they always ask whoβs the player that made himself better, got 100% of his ability. I tell them itβs Chip.
βI laugh at those who say he wonβt be able to recruit. Once Chip gets in the living room with the parents and the kids, itβll be a sealed deal. Heβs definitely got the pedigree. Heβs Mr. Wildcat.β