Jul. 31—GRAND FORKS — The Grand Forks baseball community suffered an unexpected loss Friday morning.
Longtime Grand Forks Royals head coach Nick Chine died of a heart attack at age 57.
A moment of silence was held for Chine before Friday’s North Dakota Class AA Legion tournament game between Fargo Post 2 and Fargo Post 400 at Jack Williams Stadium in Fargo, N.D.
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Chine was in the Royals’ dugout during Thursday’s tournament game.
“First and foremost, he cared and loved his family deeply,” Royals assistant coach Mark Varriano said. “That was the most important thing to him by far. As far as the baseball program and teaching the game, he could do that just as well as anyone else could.
“He did a lot of things behind the scenes that no one knew about. He never sought attention for the things he did. He cared, and he cared really deeply about the kids, the players he had past and present. He did a lot of really good things for Grand Forks baseball.”
Chine was an assistant coach with the Royals for 18 years before he was named head coach in 2012.
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Former Royals head coach Brent Polum and Chine grew close while coaching the American Legion program. After Polum stepped down, Gabe Dahl was elevated to head coach for six seasons while Chine remained an assistant.
“(Chine) stabilized (the program),” Polum said. “When we first got here, I wouldn’t say it was the top of the American Legion list, as far as known for baseball. We started to turn the corner, and then when I backed away, he kept it steady and kept it going. … He cared about it. He’d cook burgers out there. He would work the concession stand. His family would take money. He gave a lot of his life and dedication to the program, and I would say took it to new heights.”
Chine, a teacher at Red River, was also an assistant for the Roughriders baseball team. Varriano, the Riders’ head coach, taught alongside Chine for more than 20 years. Like Polum, he formed a bond with Chine while coaching.
Chine grew up in a military family before he settled in Grand Forks. Varriano and Polum both described a man whose somewhat stony exterior veiled a loyal, caring individual.
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“He comes from a military family, so he has kind of a stonewall thing up front,” Polum said. “But as soon as you got to know him, he was a teddy bear. He’d do anything for anybody. Just a great human being. Loved his family. We grew up as men together, or as he would always say, we cut our teeth together. Coming in right out of college and then growing up as human beings, into families. … I lost a brother today. I loved the man.”
Varriano said: “It does take a while to break down that rough exterior. But once you got inside and got to know him, he was as soft as they come. It just took a little bit to get there and to get to know that part of him. But once again, he would take the shirt off his back anytime, any day, it didn’t matter. If you need something done, he found a way to get it done.”
Chine’s impact reached generations of players. When news of his death spread Friday, Varriano and Polum were flooded with texts and messages from former players.
“He had a way of speaking,” Varriano said. “He had a way of being able to communicate first, through the game, and then all of the side talks all the time. He had a chance to do that in class, too, because he had a lot of players in class. You get to know kids a different way, because you have a different relationship when you coach and teach them at the same time. It’s the side conversations where you really build relationships. If you can know someone personally, and if the kids know that you have their back and their best interest in mind, most of them will run through a brick wall for you.”
