If you know anything about SIU baseball, there’s a good chance that you know the name Itchy Jones. 

Itchy presided over the program for 21 seasons as head coach, but he was much more to the program than just a coach. He was an advocate. A teacher. A donor. 

Advertisement

Richard C. “Itchy” Jones died on Monday, Feb. 17 at age 87 according to a Saluki Athletics press release. 

To retired Saluki Hall of Fame broadcaster Mike Reis, who broadcasted SIU baseball games for 12 seasons while Itchy was at the helm, he was a friend. 

“He was my closest professional friend, and I would say that he would be tied for first among my best personal friends,” Reis said. 

Advertisement*

Itchy also had a profound impact on the life of Bill Lyons, a former player under Itchy who was at SIU from 1977 to 1980 and eventually played in the MLB for the St. Louis Cardinals.

“I think our relationship developed even more as I got older, and it means the world to me. I mean you look at it this way; if I didn’t know Itch, I wouldn’t have the family I have,” Lyons said. “I met my wife… when I was playing in a collegiate league after my freshman year, and she just happened to be going as an incoming freshman to Carbondale. We met up down here, and the rest is history.”

Putting it plainly and with a chuckle, Lyons said, “Itch is either responsible, or the cause of my family, I don’t know which.”

Itchy, who has membership in nine halls of fame, including the Saluki Hall of Fame, was known to his players as a great storyteller and somebody who could “command a room like no other,” though not as a yeller or screamer.

“He motivated you, he made you want to be around him because you could learn so much,” Lyons said. “He was one of those people you just knew you had to listen to because you were going to learn stuff all the time.”

As the coach of a powerhouse program, “like a Southern California, like an Arizona,” that garnered national attention, Itchy’s talent as a speaker was on full display in the media too, even when he had to, as Reis put it, “suffer fools,” or inexperienced reporters.

“He had a patience and a confidence, not only in coaching but in the media as well,” Reis said. “It requires a special person for that to work.”

According to Les Winkeler, a longtime sports editor and writer at The Southern Illinoisan, it wasn’t always Itchy dealing with the media though.

“After every road game, Itchy would call The Southern to talk to our reporter to get a story for the next day,” Winkeler said. “Gene Green (an assistant coach) apparently, on the bus rides before Itchy would get on the bus, would do a great imitation of Itchy. So Itchy goes, ‘Green! I hear you do an imitation of me.’ Gene’s like ‘yeah, uh.’ (Itchy) goes, ‘Go to the phone and call Greg Severin, give him some quotes.’”

“Greg Severin was the sports writer at the time. He played baseball for Itchy, so he knew Itchy very well. And Green’s impersonation of Itchy was so spot-on that Severin didn’t know it. So for three years, all of the road comments from SIU baseball were Gene Green speaking as Itchy Jones,” Winkeler said.

Itchy, though he “was awful with names,” according to Reis, was always invested in those that he knew, or maybe recognized.

“He always remembered to ask about you… he never forgot that he knew you,” Reis said. 

This extended well to his players too, who he made sure to keep up with even once they were out of Carbondale.

“He was as concerned about what they were able to accomplish after they left the Saluki baseball program as when they were there,” Lyons said. 

While mild-mannered may not be the way to describe it, Itchy was also known for being a stand-up gentleman, with this even extending to the umpires. 

“Southern had a home run to take the lead in a weekday game, two man umpiring crew, and they muffed the call. It was clear to everyone that it was a foul ball, but they called it fair for Southern,” Reis said.

“The other team just goes nuts, the head coach is going ballistic. Itch goes out and tells the umpires they got it wrong, it was a foul ball. And they change the call to a foul ball because of his opinion,” Reis said. 

Itchy, Missouri Valley Conference hall of famer, made it nearly through his first 17 seasons as head coach without being thrown out of a game, according to Reis. Even in his days as a standout baseball player in Legion ball, at SIU and in the Baltimore Orioles minor league system, Itchy was thrown out only once. And it was by his dad, in a sixth grade softball game. 

That 17-year streak almost didn’t exist though. Reis said that Itchy was more on course to work in basketball, another sport that he excelled in, to the point that he even was a letterman at SIU his freshman year.  Itchy is also a member of the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

“He was headed on a basketball coaching career course when Joe Lutz got him to be his assistant coach… in 1969,” Reis said. “And then Itch was taking a look at an Eastern Illinois assistant basketball job when Lutz was fired or resigned, or whatever they ended up calling it.” 

If he had taken that Eastern Illinois job, he, a licensed pilot, wouldn’t have been around to coach Lyons and even fly the team to a game.

“We had our usual pilots for the game, but Itch went up to the cockpit, and then all of a sudden we see the pilot walking back down the aisle,” Lyons said. “We’re like, ‘Hold on, wait a minute, what’s going on here?’”

“Itch was flying the plane. And I think a lot of guys thought, ‘There’s no way this can happen.’ But it was kind of funny to see the look on their face, to see that he was flying the plane,” Lyons said. 

And if Itchy had taken that EIU job, he never would’ve become the winningest baseball coach in SIU history with 738. He also never would have been able to make what was arguably his largest impact, and what truly made him the embodiment of Saluki baseball: how he gave back to the program.

“One of his values, his importance to Southern today is he always told his players that they should donate back to the university,” Reis said. “Historically at every school, athletes are poor donors. But at Southern, its baseball alums have been good in terms of the number of them that contribute.”

This includes helping renovate and build what was eventually named the Itchy Jones Stadium. “The Itch,” which opened in 2014, cost nearly $4 million to build, and about $1.8 million of that money was from baseball alums.

“The stadium is named for Itchy and it would be named for Itchy if he didn’t do anything financially with it because of his record,” Reis said. “But he made the lead contribution on it… this was a person who did the same thing he asked his players to do.”

Despite leaving SIU to go to the University of Illinois in 1990, Jones never stopped caring about SIU and southern Illinois.

“He always cared. He always listened. He always watched. He followed the team no matter who was the head coach, and he stayed in touch,” Reis said.

“The people who’ve worked at Southern, played at Southern, are attached to Southern… How many really have done for Southern as much as Southern has done for them? This guy did. I don’t know that there have been many people who helped raise SIU’s profile in their area of expertise better than Itchy Jones,” Reis said. 

Sports reporter Ryan Grieser can be reached at rgrieser@dailyegyptian.com. To stay up to date on all your southern Illinois news, be sure to follow The Daily Egyptian on Facebook.

Advertisement