Baseball Alumnus Rob Rinehart is Committed to His Community
Rob Rinehart is all about giving back to sport. The former South Carolina baseball player (1984-1985) put up great numbers for the garnet and black in his day, but he’s better known for giving his time as a high school and youth coach for the last three decades in his hometown of York, Pennsylvania, where he will be inducted into the York Sports Hall of Fame on September 1.
“It’s really humbling, and I was a little bit shocked when I got the call,” said Rinehart, whose fulltime job is in the oil commodities business. “This is a combination thing for what I’ve done as a high school and college player as well as volunteer coaching. I’ve coached everything from junior high basketball, a varsity basketball assistant, and junior high all the way up through varsity football. I’ve done a little bit of everything. I’ve been around sports all of my life and have a passion for coaching and being around young people. A lot of it was volunteer coaching.
“It all started out by doing half-an-hour hitting lessons with kids at a batting cage. I was giving lessons to eight-, nine-, and ten-year old kids. Eventually it led to coaching other things and about thirty years of doing it.”
Rinehart played two seasons with the Gamecocks after transferring from Baltimore Community College and set several single season records at the time while making a big impact on a rising South Carolina program.
“I played my freshman year up here in Pennsylvania, and the weather was just awful,” Rinehart said. “I can remember standing in the outfield, and it was snowing in the spring. I remember thinking, baseball would be so much more fun if it were warm!
“A friend of our family knew somebody down there and made a phone call to Coach June Raines’ office, and as luck would have it, they were looking for an outfielder. I came down for a visit, and the rest is history. I was originally going to go to Francis Marion (in Florence, S.C.).”
“My best memories were of the fans.”
Luckily for South Carolina, he came to Columbia. The leftfielder hit .318 with 33 RBI in 1984 and helped Coach June Raine’s squad post a 41-18 record while advancing to the NCAA Regional in Starkville, Mississippi, where he hit a big three-run home run in the eighth inning to help South Carolina rally for a win against North Carolina. As a senior in 1985, he batted .390 with a then school-record 21 doubles, and 14 home runs, including three in one game against Clemson, and 60 RBI as the Gamecocks reached the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska. He earned All-Metro Conference honors and was a second team Academic All-American. His .357 career average still ranks in the top 10 at South Carolina.
“My best memories were of the fans,” Rinehart said. “The facilities blew me away. When you’re used to playing up north, and then you come down here and play on the old Sarge Frye Field, that was something! The fans and the enthusiasm were great as well.
“That 1984 regional was something. Mississippi State had Will Clark and Rafael Palmeiro. I didn’t hit but one or two home runs all year that year, but in that regional game against North Carolina, they brought a reliever in, and he hung a curve ball, and I hammered it. Mississippi State is known for its fans out there in left field – the left field lounge. I got to know those folks really well! We had good friendly banter. They gave me a ‘Left Field Lounge’ shirt at the end of the week. That was pretty cool.
“Then the next year we had NCAA Regionals at home, so to play in front of our fans was really something. When you get to Omaha, that’s the goal of every college baseball player. That was a great experience.”
After graduating with a degree in business administration, Rinehart was signed as a free agent by the New York Mets and enjoyed a brief minor league career, playing for the single-A Columbia Mets, just a few blocks from the South Carolina campus.
“My minor league career was lackluster, at best,” Rinehart laughed. “Bottom line is I didn’t hit. I struggled with Major League caliber curveballs. I never got it going, but I had two years there and never had any regrets.”
Rinehart hasn’t been back to campus in nearly twenty years, but he hopes he can come back to catch a game at Founders Park in the near future. For now, he’s thrilled to be honored in his hometown hall of fame where he is the lone inductee this year.
Rinehart and his wife, Lynn (pictured below), have two grown sons, Jordan and Josh.
