Windsor High School’s baseball field will forever be known as Barry Chasen Ballpark.
With many of his former players in attendance, the town dedicated the field to Chasen on Saturday. When asked what the honor means to him, Chasen said “everything.”
“It’s a fulfillment of a career that I had for 39 years, 34 at the high school level and five summers,” Chasen said. “It’s a show of appreciation for what I tried to do here and what we accomplished here.”
Chasen led the varsity baseball team to state titles in 1979 and 1991 and he also coached football and girl's basketball during his tenure at Windsor.
He is humbled by the outpouring of support from his former players.
“It shows that these kids respect what I did when they were here and I certainly respect them,” said Chasen. “I treated these kids like they were my own kids. Yeah, I got on them and so on but my whole goal was to get the best out of them because I wanted them to be the best they could be at whatever they did.”
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“He was responsible for making boys and girls into young men and young women and that couldn’t be more true of any human being I know,” said Cliff Stalph, who played for Chasen in 1980 and 1981.
“I think his legacy is going to go on for eons after our time has passed,” said former player Jim Burton, who credits Chasen with helping him play collegiately at Marietta College.
Chasen’s impact extended beyond his own players. He helped start the RBI program in Hartford, which aims to revive baseball in inner cities.
