Ron Fraser

Ronald George Fraser (June 25, 1933 – January 20, 2013) was the college baseball coach at the University of Miami from 1963 to 1992.

Nicknamed the "Wizard of College Baseball," he was one of the most successful coaches in NCAA baseball history and was also responsible for bringing college baseball to a new level of public awareness.

The Miami Hurricanes baseball team went from being on the brink of being "contracted" to being the toast of college baseball under Fraser's tenure.

Born and raised in Nutley, New Jersey, Fraser was a three-sport letterman at Nutley High School where he graduated in 1953.

He then attended Murray State College in Murray, Kentucky from 1953 to 1954.

Later, he played baseball for Florida State University from 1954 to 1956 as a relief pitcher.

At Florida State, he joined Theta Chi.

He served in the United States Army for two years from 1957 to 1958.

He was stationed in Germany and the Netherlands.

He became manager of the Germany national baseball team after the 1958 European championship, and he managed the Netherlands until 1963.

He graduated in 1960.

In 1963, Fraser took a head coaching job with the University of Miami, a school which did not offer its baseball players a scholarship.

In the mid-1970s when Hurricane football was on the verge of being eliminated, Fraser's resurrection of Miami baseball was a useful model.

The University knew that with the right football coach in place, Miami could do the same thing in football that it did in baseball.

Without that model, Miami might have just dropped football unceremoniously.

Fraser was also instrumental in lobbying ESPN to broadcast college baseball games, something which is now part of their rotation of spring sports.

Fraser also helped get the momentum going to reinstate Miami's dormant basketball program which has seen sporadic success.

Ron Fraser's special gift for promotion has served as a model for many college Olympic sports programs around the country which have traditionally had difficulty attracting spectators.

Even though the school did not begin to offer scholarships until 1973, Fraser built a program.

Some of the people Fraser brought to visit the school to bring publicity to the program were Major League Baseball Hall of Famers Ted Williams and Stan Musial, as well as announcer Joe Garagiola.

Also in 1973, Mark Light Stadium was built in large part to efforts by Fraser to build a privately funded stadium.

In 1974, Miami was runner-up to the University of Southern California, a perennial college baseball powerhouse.

The 1980s were a time of great change in Miami athletics.

While the success of Miami football seemed to eclipse much of the success of the baseball program, Miami won its first two college world series in 1982 and 1985.

While opponents' fans often criticized Hurricane football fans for not selling out the Orange Bowl.

Mark Light Stadium was almost always a full house for Hurricane baseball games and Fraser's Hurricanes drew 1.27 million fans in the '80s, the best in college baseball.

The Miami Hurricanes football team won championships in 1983, 1987 and 1989.

In 1992, Fraser retired as coach of Miami baseball, and for a short time was head of the U.S. Amateur National Baseball Team.

The building that houses the baseball offices is named after him, the Ron Fraser Building.

The 1992 Summer Olympics marked the first time that baseball was an official medal sport.

Fraser coached the United States national baseball team, which per Olympic rules at the time was restricted to amateur players only.

Fraser's 20-player squad of college baseball players included future major leaguers such as Jason Giambi, Nomar Garciaparra, and Jason Varitek.

The team had a 5–2 record in pool play, then fell to Cuba in the semifinals, followed by a loss to Japan in the bronze-medal match.

Fraser's impact on college baseball, University of Miami athletics, and college athletics, in general, are hard to overestimate.

Fraser died on January 20, 2013, at his home in Weston, Florida of complications from Alzheimer's disease.

The previous year, Miami started a record streak of consecutive postseason appearances in college baseball, a record which as of the 2016 season is still being added to.