Coach honored after sudden death

IREDELL COUNTY, NC (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — The South Iredell High School campus has been forever changed by the sudden death of beloved volunteer baseball coach Chris Davis, who died Tuesday of a medical emergency while tending the baseball field.

The coach, who has been with the team for the past four years, has had health issues but has never let it get in the way of the sport he loves and the players he mentors every day.

“I’ve never met a man like him,” South Iredell head baseball coach Jeff Peck explained.

Peck said he owes his career to Davis. The two grew up together and played baseball throughout their careers at Statesville High School.

The coach described him as his “favourite player” of those days. However, Davis suffered from a series of health problems that put a long hiatus on his career.

At the time, Peck was also going through his own dilemmas with being expelled from college.

He arranged a high school reunion to reconnect him and Coach Davis, where the man encouraged him to return to school and become a baseball coach.

“He told me he was going to get his body back in shape and come train with me,” Peck said.

They both did. They coached baseball together at Statesville High School before moving to South Iredell High School near Troutman four years ago.

Peck said, “This would be our 13th year together in the same dugout. It was extremely difficult with this extra burden. I just lost my best friend. . . Coach Davis had that ability to get the best out of you.”

Players like Vikings senior catcher Michael Eichhorn stick with the message their coach instilled in them at every practice; show up and give it your all.

“He was on fire,” Eichhorn said. “He brought energy when we didn’t have it. He came to practice every day with a smile on his face, even when he didn’t feel like it.”

Coach Davis had weekly checkups on his players to make sure their grades were steady, their minds were sharp, and they were developing their abilities as players on the field.

Above all, however, Davis is remembered for his faith in God. Michael explained: “You never know what you’ve got until it’s gone.

“Every day I try to be the person he was, the father, the student he was,” Davis added. “It doesn’t get any better.”

The man’s funeral is scheduled for 2 p.m. Sunday at Beulah Baptist Church in Statesville.

The family requests that donations be made to the South Iredell baseball program in lieu of flowers.

The players say they will wear their baseball jerseys in his honor. School leaders also began looking for ways to honor his memory.