Jay Lasley has been called up to the majors.
North Oconee’s baseball coach resigned this week to take an international player development position in the Dominican Republic with the Miami Marlins organization.
Lasley will coach his final North Oconee game on Friday, the last game of the regular season. He will begin in the Dominican Republic in two weeks.
“To have a chance to work in professional baseball,” Lasley said, “the little kid inside of me is excited.”
He will assist in running the Marlins baseball academy, a 35-acre facility, according to MLB.com, with fields, strength and conditioning buildings and pretty much anything needed to develop players into future major league stars.
Major League Baseball teams are allowed to sign foreign players at 16-years old, which fits into the age of players Lasley has coached in his 21-year career at Camden County and North Oconee. He will lead two coaching staffs, he says, along with 75 players from 16 to 19 years old that he will develop with the expectation of having them promoted to rookie ball in the United States.
A speech he gave at a Georgia Dugout Club in December on philosophies of baseball made an impression, Lasley said, and the Marlins had interest in him soon after.
“They were looking to go outside the box for a hire,” said Lasley, who is 431-168 in his high school coaching career. “So rather than hiring a traditional professional or a pro guy or a guy with professional experience … they basically reached out to a lot of people and my name came up because of the success we had (at North Oconee).”
Lasley, 48, was hesitant to say he seeks advancement in Miami’s organization, but he is excited to see what the opportunity could bring.
“My goal is to try to turn your academy into one of the best academy’s in the Dominican,” Lasley said he told the organization when interviewed. “We’ll see where that leads, and if it leads to something else, then great. If I do my job and get to come home and be a dad again, that will…
