The Comeback Coach

In 2000, after a long bureaucratic struggle straight out of Kafka, Jesse Braverman was removed as coach of the varsity baseball team of Bethlehem Central High School of Bethlehem, New York, nearly destroying him. But the baseball gods were not done with the beloved diamond strategist. Hired by La Salle Institute of Troy, Braverman took its baseball team, the Cadets, to new heights, including an unprecedented twenty-seven-game winning streak. Written with distinguished journalist and his long-time friend Gordon F. Sander, Comeback Coach tells the story of Braverman's remarkable, dual career as multi-sport athletic coach and special education teacher. Packed with human interest, Coach follows Jesse's forty-year journey from the sandlot baseball fields of his youth, learning about life and baseball at the knee of his mentor, Joe Austin-with whom he would be elected to the New York State Baseball Hall of Fame in 2015-to his initial successes with his numerous Bethlehem teams; to his heartbreaking firing and inspiring "redemption" with the Cadets.