Class began every summer afternoon on the ballfield at Bethlehem Central Middle School. The crunch of gravel underneath Jesse Braverman’s beat-up Ford Escort could be heard as he promptly rolled in at noon. He’d step out of the car with as many as 50 to 70 neighborhood kids already waiting for him. Instead of a syllabus, Braverman would pull out bags of helmets, bats and baseballs. It was the School of Baseball and class was now in session. In time, kids would simply call it “Jesse Ball.”
Adam Hornick was a school kid living in Clarksville, several miles away outside the center of town, “but I was there pretty regularly,” he said. “Jess was very dedicated to the sport, but even more so to the community. He was there literally every day in the summer. … It really helped in the development of the kids, because it wasn’t about playing in a league structure, it was more about having fun.”
Kids ranging from Little League age to approaching college would attend. Two captains would be picked out of the lot, each choosing players for his or her team. Each side had to accommodate the number of players. A batter’s line-up looked more like a classroom attendance sheet, and the ballfield could have three shortstops, and five times as many outfielders on defense.
“I have kidded with my wife, Debbie, that my love of baseball began in the womb,” said Braverman. Braverman, a special education teacher by profession, started teaching at the middle school in 1974, and immediately inquired about opportunities to coach baseball. “[The athletic director] said there were none available but he would keep me in mind,” he said.
Braverman learned to play ball in the sandlots of Queens. But, when the Baseball Gods bestowed the gifts of athleticism to the few, they blessed him with the body of an educator. He developed into a left-handed pitcher like Sandy Koufax, only several inches shorter. When he played his first organized baseball game at 11, he went up against kids five years his senior. His only goal was to make sure his advisories didn’t mistake him for a batboy.
“As much as I am indebted to Jesse Braverman for giving me a shot when no other coach would, I am more grateful for the copious amounts of time and energy he donated, often without any compensation, to shaping so many young men’s lives positively,” said Delmar native Seth Friedman.
“I finally got my shot in baseball with the freshman team in 1985,” said Braverman. “That is when I really started … going to the field each day at noon and organizing pick-up games for the local kids.”
“Jesse Ball” was emulated from Braverman’s days growing up in Queens. About thirty years before he made the habit of driving his Escort to the local baseball field, Braverman was one of many kids waiting anxiously for Joe Austin to arrive.
Outside the baseball diamond, Austin was a regular Joe who worked the nightshift at a local brewery. During the day, however, you’d find him surrounded by 50 to 70 neighborhood kids on the baseball field, hitting fungos and pitching against both sides in two, sometimes, three games. Jerseys, hats, equipment – all purchased and provided to the kids. Didn’t matter where the kid was from, religion or ethnicity, each kid got a shot to play.
“[Braverman] was such a great mentor to young ballplayers,” said Glenmont native Matt Bechard. “He didn’t care who your parents were, where you played before or what your skill level was. All he asked was that you loved the game and played as hard as you could. That always brought the best out in his players. I use a lot of what Jesse brought as a coach to the kids I coach, regardless of the sport.”
Braverman started coaching organized baseball in 1985, with Bethlehem Central’s freshmen level team. For more than 25 years, Braverman was an asset to Bethlehem’s sports community, walking the sidelines as a high school coach in soccer, basketball, softball and baseball. In addition to scholastic sports, he started the town’s Mickey Mantle baseball team in 1987, to which he coached for nearly 20 years. It served as a needed outlet for local 15- and 16-year-old kids looking to continue playing baseball beyond the Babe Ruth levels where children could only play up to age 15.
In 18 years of competition, the Mickey Mantle team he founded would accumulate six league championships, one state championship, one regional championship and a berth in the Mickey Mantle World Series.
In 1994, Braverman was tapped to coach the Adirondack team in the now-defunct Olympic-style New York state competition. In his tenure, he helped the team earn six bronze, three silver, and three consecutive gold medals.
When Ken Hodge stepped down as Bethlehem Central’s head coach in 1995, Braverman was named his replacement. Four seasons later, the school won a sectional title. But, the summer team would ultimately serve as a lynchpin in a decision that would cause him to leave Bethlehem Central.
“No career, and no life, is without challenges, and in 2000 I faced a big one, perhaps my darkest time,” stated Braverman in his memoirs. “In a bizarre bureaucratic struggle involving my Mickey Mantle summer team, I lost my school team at Bethlehem.” Through the urging of a friend, Braverman wrote a memoir. Every day, he woke up at 5 a.m. to write down his thoughts for an hour. He did so each day, and after four months he had written 360 pages. In a private meeting with then-Bethlehem Central Superintendent Leslie Loomis, Braverman said he could have remained as the head coach of the varsity baseball team, if he quit his post on the summer team. “I called in a sick day after they fired me from coaching,” said Braverman. “It was the first sick day in my 19 years.”
Adam Hornick and his older brother Daniel loved baseball. The two were born to debate against each other – Adam a devoted Mets fan, while the other was a die-hard Yankees fan. Daniel didn’t make Braverman’s freshmen team when he was old enough to tryout. But, he stayed, traveling with the team to keep score.
In 2003, Daniel Hornick and his father were working at La Salle Institute in Troy, as the private school was looking for a new head coach for their baseball team. Braverman’s name came up. “Naturally,” the Hornicks vouched for him, said Adam. Braverman sat before a panel of staffers at La Salle, interviewing him for the job. “It’s a Catholic military school,” said Braverman, as he recalled the day. “I’m a Jewish kid from Queens. How did I get here?” Someone on the other side of the table asked him what happened at Bethlehem Central. For a reason still unbeknownst to the old coach, he retains something ex-presidential candidate George McGovern said when he lost to Richard Nixon in 1972 – “I’d rather lose the right way then to win the wrong way,” he said.
He got the job.
Braverman recently stepped down as head coach of La Salle’s baseball team. He is now the assistant varsity coach, no longer left with the weighty obligation of filling out the starting line-up. Prior to his self-demotion, he built the private school into a baseball powerhouse in the Big 10 – leading the school to two Class AA sectional championships.
Since starting his baseball coaching career thirty years ago, Braverman helped many of his teams achieve high accolades. In doing so, he helped develop the careers of kids who went on to play professionally, like Matt Quatraro, Cameron Smith, Dan Conway, Matt Eldeldt, Avi Rasowsky, Will Remillard, JP Sportman and David Roseboom.
“The man who taught me said it best a long time ago,” said Braverman. “Joe Austin was once asked if he produced any major leaguers. He replied, ‘I’ve produced a lot of cops and firefighters and businessmen. They’re all major leaguers in my book.’”
That list also includes Seth Friedman, educator and author; Matt Bechard, journalist; and Adam Hornick, police commander.
“I hate to say it with my job, but we need more people like Jesse to keep kids clean,” said Adam Hornick. “It’s programs like Jesse as an individual we don’t see of enough. … With the kind of time and dedication he put in I’m not sure we will again. It’s a different world today.“
Braverman and Austin will be inducted into the New York State Baseball Hall of Fame in November. The induction ceremony is scheduled for Nov. 1 in Troy. To purchase tickets contact the hall of fame at 518-877-5170.