COACH MARCHANT: STRIKING OUT ADVERSITY 

Coach Bill Marchant is well known for his competitive spirit, a trait that helped him overcome adversity later in life and led him to be a coaching legend for the Delta State baseball program.

"We were always competitive. We did all kinds of competitive things at the end [of practice] and if you lost, you had to put the gear up, so some of those guys got tired of losing, so I said, 'Well, don't lose.' Just like you don't want to lose when we play, you don't want to lose when you compete doing anything," Marchant said. "That's one thing that always pushed me. Everybody always told me I was too small; I wasn't big enough to do what I needed to do, and I was just bullheaded enough that I was going to try to do it."
           
That determination is what pulled Marchant through one of the toughest moments of his life, a car accident that left him paralyzed from the waist down. Although his physical situation had changed, he continued to coach baseball with the same competitive spirit unique to his character, exemplifying that people can overcome the obstacles in their path and do anything they set their mind to. Marchant continued to coach baseball for three more seasons after his accident, and then he retired from coaching. Marchant then focused only on teaching, helping students learn to overcome obstacles they may face and be the best they can be.
           
"I don't think I'm any different in the classroom than I was on the field," Marchant said. "I have expectations for them just like I do my players, and the ones that can take coaching in the classroom do well."
           
Marchant grew up in California, where he stayed until he was 16 years old. He moved to Mississippi when he was in the eleventh grade.

"My dad worked for Chevron, so he was transferred to the refinery in Pascagoula, and I finished high school in Mississippi," he said.

"I started playing baseball I guess when I was old enough to throw and hit," Marchant said. "I played Little League baseball and pony league baseball and Babe Ruth baseball in California. I played high school baseball and summer baseball in Mississippi, and then I came to Delta State to play."
           
He chose to play college ball at Delta State because of former Red Sox pitcher and legendary coach Dave "Boo" Ferriss. "I had some small offers at different schools, but I decided to come here because Coach Ferriss was a good role model and a good pitching coach." 
           
"We didn't have scholarships back then," Marchant said, reflecting back on his playing days as former Statesman. "Some of the guys were getting some aid through the school, but most of us were just walk-ons. We just liked to play, and we had a good ball club the years that I played. We went to the regional tournament three years in a row."

Marchant played at Delta State from 1965-1969, and one of the highlights of his playing career was being able to pitch in the first Division II College World Series in 1968 in Springfield, Missouri.

But his legendary coaching career began in 1970, when he was the assistant coach at Meridian High School in Mississippi. The next year, he became the head coach.

"I was lucky enough to have the players to win the state championship for the first two years I coached," he said.

Learning to get the most out of a player is one of the most challenging aspects of coaching. In high school, coaches don't have the luxury to recruit players, so sometimes coaches move players around to find the position that best suits them.

Marchant once moved a player down in the batting order so the player wouldn't see as many change-ups and curveballs. The player was a good fastball hitter and would be able to see more fastballs lower in the batting order, but when his father found out, the father of the boy threatened to beat up Marchant in a parking lot one day.  

"Well, a lot of coaches would have told that parent, 'Well you just take your kid and go home.' I wasn't going to hold that against the kid because his daddy got mad," Marchant said.

"It's hard to be objective about your own kid, and I always made it a priority that I wasn't going to tell somebody how to coach my child," Marchant added.
           
In 1972, he was named Mississippi High School Coach of the Year. Besides coaching at Meridian High School, he also coached at Texarkana and Lufkin, Texas, and at Hinds Community College in Mississippi before coming to Delta State University. 
           
Marchant applied for the coaching job at Delta State because he always wanted it, and he became the head coach of the historic Statesmen baseball program in 1989, after Ferriss stepped down.
           
"Well, first of all people used to ask me what it was like to go in the footsteps of Coach Ferriss, and all I used to say was, 'Well, I don't wear a size 15 shoe,'" Marchant said. "I don't think there will ever be another Coach Ferriss."
           
As a coach, Marchant would teach his players discipline, patience, character, to try to be the best that they can be, not try to be someone else, and to be humble.
           
"We probably had a few more rules than some of the other folks did," Marchant said. "We made them get hair cuts. We made them be clean shaven. We want them to have a good reputation and represent the school and the baseball program in a good way."

"The second year that I was here, I had four graduate assistants that played for me at four different schools," Marchant said. "Every time they'd say how bad I was, then the other one would tell him how bad I was where he played."

Marchant had high expectations for his players, and his emphasis on discipline helped his players learn to be accountable and responsible.

"Coach always said with Delta State baseball on your chest people will know you and watch you," Rick Collier, head baseball coach at Itawamba Community College, said. Collier played as an outfielder, first baseman and DH for Marchant during his time at Delta State.
           
Marchant coached his players hard, but he also emphasized high expectations in the classroom and the importance of an education. He said they had study hall for younger players and transfer students, but if a player didn't make their grades, he wouldn't let them play.
           
Jake Yarborough, head baseball coach at Grenada High School, played third base for Marchant from 1993-1994. He recalled Marchant's tough philosophy on academics while he was player saying they had to run four miles if they skipped class, but he also credits Marchant's efforts for the reason he and his teammates were able to get a degree.

Although he was tough, Marchant never stopped caring for his players.

"Our first meeting back to school in the fall of 1990, he [Marchant] was laying the law down, and the end of the meeting someone raised their hand and asked him if we win the Gulf South Conference tournament could we shave his head," Collier said. "He kind of smiled and said, 'Yes.' I knew we were going to be pretty good. As the season rolled along, the wins started stacking up. We knew that we had a chance to win it. Sure as the season ended we were the 1991 GSC champs. He came over to the dorm the night after, and we all got to use the clippers and shaved his head bald. He stood up to his end of the deal."

During Marchant's time as a coach, he would not only coach his players to be better athletes, but better people.

Yarborough said Marchant was a quality man and had a lot of character, that he was a tough coach, but he knew how to build his players up when they were down.

"I owe a lot to Coach Merchant," Collier added. "A lot of things would not have happened in my life if it were not for him."

However, on Easter night of 1993, Marchant faced the ultimate test of adversity. "My wife and I were going to her uncle's hunting camp inside the Mississippi river levee," Marchant said. "We're on a gravel road. I was in a jeep, a jacked up jeep, going around an S-curve, and the back end caught up with the front. We started out across a cotton field that was freshly plowed and the tires caught.

"The jeep flipped several times. I was thrown from the vehicle. My wife was not because she had on her seatbelt. I did not, and I don't know how I broke my back, but I broke my back."

The accident left Marchant paralyzed from his sternum down. Marchant was hospitalized for about 10 days and spent three months in rehab, but he continued to stay motivated during his recovery. "Dr. Wyatt told me I still had a job," he laughed as he reflected back on the incident.

"I didn't look at it as me being a coach in a wheelchair," Marchant said. "I just looked at it as me being a baseball coach and happened to be in a wheelchair."

After his accident, Marchant continued to coach out of a golf cart, and although his situation had changed, he stayed true to his competitive nature and refused to give up his dream of coach and educating young players.

Former right-handed pitcher for the Statesmen, Greg Goff, is currently the head baseball coach at Louisiana Tech. Goff played for Marchant from 1992-1993 and recalled how Marchant never lost his competitive spirit.

"He has had a lasting impression on my life," Goff said. "I saw what he had to do on a daily basis just to coach. He wouldn't let anything keep him from what he loved to do, and I have so much respect for him for that.

"I always think about my time with Coach and seeing him accomplish the things he did was just amazing. He is one of the main reasons I'm coaching, and I'm forever grateful for him giving me an opportunity to play and work under him."

The determination Marchant displayed and the motivation to keep doing what he loved was also one of the greatest lessons Yarborough learned from him. "Just seeing how to handle adversity … to get back up and keep going," he said.

"We were at William Carey his first year in a wheelchair, and he got upset with an umpire and told me to get him on the field to talk with the umpire," Goff recalled. Before long the umpire threw him out of the game, and I was wheeling him out to the parking lot. It was great to see him continue that spirit as he coached."

During the next three years following his accident, Marchant overcame all odds and led the Statesmen to some of their most successful seasons during his time as head coach.

In 1994, the Statesmen finished first in the Gulf South Conference Championship, won the regional championship, and finished third place at the NCAA DII College World Series. It was the first time the Statesmen had made a World Series appearance in many years.

His 1996 team had the winningest season in school history going 53-8. They finished the season as GSC champions and finished fourth in the DII College World Series.

After the 1996 season, Marchant announced his retirement from coaching, and his assistant coach, Mike Kinnison, took over as head coach in 1997. During his time as head coach, Marchant's record was 283-127-1, and his teams posted an 82 percent graduation rate. In 1998, Marchant was inducted into the Delta State Athletics Hall of Fame.

Marchant retired in part because of his wife, who had to take off from work to travel with him during away games.

"It was getting too hard on her," he said. "When I told her I was going to retire, it kind of shocked her." But Marchant said there was also the possibility Kinnison was going to leave to work for his father-in-law, and Marchant was also going to lose four graduate assistants.

"That meant I was going to have four brand new graduate assistants and may not even have an assistant coach because the girls' softball team didn't have an assistant coach." Marchant said. "And I didn't want the program to go down because of that, so that all came into it, too. If Coach Kinnison could stay, I wanted him to stay."

"I look back on it and certainly realize that it was a special time in my life, and I'm thankful for it," Kinnison said, as he reflected back on his time as an assistant coach. "We have a great friendship now, and there is a strong bond that developed during that time that we worked through that situation together. I would say that he is a great example for all of us to see of how we make adjustments in our life to continue to handle the adverse situations and be a positive influence on others by seeing how we handle those circumstances."
 

After he retired from coaching, Marchant dedicated the rest of his career at Delta State to coaching life lessons in the classroom. While he has taught classes such as methods of coaching baseball, methods of coaching football, and philosophy and psychology of coaching, he tries to teach his students that people can do whatever they set their mind to and not to let little things get them down.

"I've had people in my classroom come ask me about personal problems," Marchant said. "I tell them that my door is always open. I've had several people come in here and ask me about occupational choices, about their girlfriend, about their boyfriend, problems that they've had on campus.

"I've had people come in here to talk to me to tell me things they wouldn't even tell their own parents, and I think that's a real reward for being honest with the kids. If you're honest with them, they're going to be honest with you, too. There is a trust factor there they just know."

Although Marchant has achieved many milestones throughout his career, his most proudest accomplishment was when he and his wife were named the Delta State College of Education's 2012 Outstanding Alumni. His wife, the late Cheryl Thomas Marchant, was a public school teacher for 34 years, and a scholarship was set up in the Marchants' name to honor Cheryl's memory and the couple's service to Delta State. The Bill and Cheryl Thomas Marchant Scholarship, is awarded annually to a physical education major and an elementary education/early childhood major at Delta State.

Marchant has been working at Delta State for 27 years, but will retire from teaching in May.
           
"Being here was a dream come true for me, and the coaching part was something that I always wanted to do, and I enjoyed every minute of it," Marchant said.