Baseball will always be at the forefront of Paul Martinez’s mind–right behind his family.
The athletic director is stepping down from his position next year so he can spend more time with his family, he said Friday. He said he’ll finish out this year and plan for the fall, and will return to coach baseball next season.
“I’ve put a lot of time in at this school and it’s somebody else’s turn to do it,” Martinez said in a phone interview. “It’s prohibiting me from doing some of the family things I need to do.”
He has three daughters, and plans to watch his oldest play soccer at American River College next year. He also coaches his middle daughter’s softball team during the summer.
“I’m hoping this’ll give me the freedom to come and go to see my own kids play sports,” he said.
Martinez, who has been the Wolverines’ athletic director for five years, said the past two years have been tough–especially with and unexpected late spring rains.
“Probably about toward the end of basketball season I was just running on fumes,” he said.
But he has had a successful career at Rosemont, winning more than a dozen Metro League titles and rallying the other coaches to agree to work for free . But most of all, he’s proud the Wolverines had no rules violations with the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Section, which oversees high school sports in northern California.
Rosemont High School Principal Leise Martinez said the school hasn’t begun searching for a new athletic director. She praised Paul Martinez’s dedication to sports, saying she knew he would make it through the year no matter what happened with the district’s budget.
“Paul is one of the most straightforward and accurate [athletic directors] in the district,” she said.
