One of a series of a season long spotlight on former Rockies players during the team’s 25th anniversary season.
Nearly two full years following his retirement from Major League Baseball, Clint Barmes is still hanging around the diamond.
But now, the former Rockies infielder who also played for the Astros, Pirates and Padres is making his impact felt from the dugout. Barmes is a volunteer coach for Berthoud High School, the head coach of his 10-year-old son’s baseball team and an assistant coach on his 7-year-old daughter’s softball team. While the Mead resident has been coaching his kids for several years now, the Berthoud gig is new this spring and provides the 39-year-old with the chance to help the Spartans make their first postseason appearance in nearly two decades.
“I took that first year after retirement to just be with the family, relax a little bit and step away from everything,” Barmes said. “But this year I felt like I was ready to get more involved in the game again. To get to work with some older boys and break the game down a little bit more has been a lot of fun for me.”
Barmes said he still hears from locals reminiscing about his days at Coors Field, especially his signature moment with the club as a rookie, a walk-off homer off the Padres’ Trevor Hoffman in the 2005 opener.
“At this early point in the season, I usually have opening day fresh in my mind, and I’ll always hear somebody bring that up around this time,” Barmes said.
