Longtime East Granby Baseball Coach Steps Down

EAST GRANBY, CT — On a spring day in 2005, recently-retired Enfield High School baseball coach Bob Bromage was summoned into the office of East Granby athletic director Bob Paskiewicz and offered the same job with the Crusaders, if he would commit to giving the program three years.

Three years stretched into 15, bringing newfound respect toward the former laughingstock of the North Central Connecticut Conference. Prior to the coaching change, East Granby had won exactly one game in the previous two seasons combined.

Under the guidance of Bromage, who had coached at Enfield for 39 years, East Granby turned into a team to be reckoned with. The Crusaders qualified for the Class S state tournament 10 times in an 11-year span, with a peak season of 14-6 in 2008. That year, East Granby was seeded fourth in the class, and made it to the quarterfinal round.

That era came to an end Thursday, as Bromage, 75, stepped down from the helm.

In his letter to Athletic Director Joel Ziff, Bromage said, "I was brought here 15 years ago to turn around a failing baseball program. I feel I have done that and more in my tenure here. I have found the players to be exceptional kids."

Paskiewicz, who played for Bromage with the Berlin American Legion team in 1965, said, "He did turn our program around. He is a Connecticut baseball legend."

East Granby won playoff games eight times during Bromage's tenure. Overall, the Crusaders compiled more than 145 victories under his guidance.

Former All-State player Ryan Gothers said, "He was a tough, yet fair coach on and off the field. What he taught us on the field was useful off the field, in life. He's an old school coach; he doesn't baby you. because you are not going to be babied in life."

Bromage, a Berlin High School and Springfield College graduate, leaves East Granby on a high note, as catcher Christian Fagnant was selected last week in the Major League Baseball draft by the Baltimore Orioles. His only previous draftee in more than a half-century was pitcher Brad Tweedlie, taken by the Cincinnati Reds out of Enfield High School and Western Carolina University in the third round in 1993.

"It is an absolute privilege and an honor to be part of Coach Bromage's final team and final graduating class," Fagnant said. "He is a rarity these days, a coach with old school values and a knowledge of the game one can only gain from decades of experience. While it could be frustrating at times because he was tough on us, I know it is because he expected a lot out of us, and wanted to turn us into the best baseball players and men we could possibly be. Coach taught us not only the game, but also the life skills of discipline and hard work we will take with us when our years on the field come to an end. I would not trade my four years with him for anything, and I speak for decades of players when I say that Bob Bromage is the kind of person everyone should get to know in their life. I would not be the ballplayer or person I am today without him."

At Enfield, Bromage led the Raiders to the Class L championship game in 2001; that team will be inducted in September into the Enfield Athletic Hall of Fame. Bromage was elected to the Hall of Fame as an individual in 2001, joining his wife, Cookie, who was a charter member in 1996.

The Bromages were honored at the prestigious Gold Key Dinner in 2015 with the Bo Kolinsky Special Recognition Award by the Connecticut Sports Writers' Alliance. The award, named after the late Bo Kolinsky of the Hartford Courant, was presented in recognition of the couple's combined 100 years of high school coaching, a feat never before accomplished by a husband-wife duo in the state.

Cookie Bromage also retired this week after 52 years of coaching field hockey at Enfield High School.