The coach said he was "forced to resign" after his second season at the helm.
By SCOTT PURKS
Published May 13, 2003
TAMPA - Saying he was "forced to resign," Robinson baseball coach Greg Suazo did just that Monday afternoon.
"It hurts. After all I put into the program, it hurts," said Suazo, who just completed his second year with the Knights, going 17-9 and 12-14.
"When you put thousands and thousands of hours into something and you're told we don't want you anymore, well, you can imagine what that feels like," he said.
Suazo, 32, did get a lot done. Such as helping reconstruct a portable classroom scheduled for demolition into a clubhouse with a toilet and hand-made lockers, pouring a 15-foot by 60-foot cement slab in the batting cage, raising money to erect a green netting and yellow pad on the outfield fence that flew the county's school flags, resodding and fertilizing the field, and securing many business sponsors.
Suazo said he kicked off 12 players this year for disciplinary reasons (he got down to 11 by season's end) and had been involved in several protests for various incidents the past two seasons.
He said the problem was the way he did things rubbed Robinson's administration the wrong way.
"I didn't always go through the channels the school wanted," Suazo said. "If something needed fixing, then I just went out and got it done.
"If you depended on the system to get things done, it would never happen."
Robinson principal Kevin McCarthy couldn't be reached for comment.
Before Suazo took over, Robinson won three regular-season games in 2001, less than 20 the previous five seasons combined, including a schedule without a victory.
