Former baseball coach, athletic director and alumnus of the St. Thomas University Sports Administration program Paul Mainieri was honored at the dedication of a new baseball field and scoreboard at St. Thomas University. The new field, home of the St. Thomas University Bobcats baseball team, is now named Paul Demie Mainieri Field at Frank R. Esposito Stadium.
Paul Mainieri was inducted into the St. Thomas University Sports Hall of Fame in November 2009, and his jersey No. 1 was retired by the University in February 2012. Now the baseball field will bestow his name, along with his father's, with the dedication of Paul Demie Mainieri Field at Frank R. Esposito Stadium.
Paul Mainieri, currently the Head Baseball Coach at LSU, asked to include his middle name “Demie” in the naming of the field because it is the same name as his father's first name. Both Mainieris have deep roots with St. Thomas, and recently became the first father-son duo to be elected to the American Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
Paul Mainieri is an alumnus (M.S. Sports Administration, 1982), former Head Baseball Coach, and former Director of Athletics at St. Thomas. He won the NCAA College World Series with LSU in 2009 and was recently named a 2014 inductee for the ABCA Hall of Fame.
Dr. Demie Mainieri, who was an adjunct professor in the early years of the prestigious St. Thomas University Sports Administration program, won 1,012 games as Head Baseball Coach at Miami-Dade Community College North. He was elected to the ABCA Hall of Fame in 1988. In 1990, Dr. Mainieri became the first junior college coach in history to win 1,000 games. He finished with 1,012 wins in a career that spanned from 1961 to 1990. While at Miami-Dade College, Dr. Mainieri coached 35 players who went on to play in the major leagues including Hall of Famer Steve Carlton, Bucky Dent, and Mike Piazza.
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