ST. CLOUD — For former St. Cloud State University baseball coach Denny Lorsung’s players, his death has hit them hard.
The loss stings not only because of the wisdom Lorsung passed along to them as their coach, but also the dedication he showed them away from the diamond.
Lorsung, 78, died unexpectedly on Saturday, Sept. 12.
“I called him a week before this happened,” said Gary Frericks, who played for Lorsung with
“We tried to play golf once a summer. We hadn’t played yet, so I called him and said, ‘We have to get together and play golf.’ He said, ‘We’ve got time.’ That didn’t happen. I regret that. I feel bad about that.
“I’ve struggled with that (since it happened) on how easy it is to make a phone call.”
Hank Fohrenbacher was an assistant baseball coach for Lorsung for two seasons at
from 1976-77. He shared Frericks’ remorse.
“I feel bad because I was going to call him to go fishing and it didn’t happen,” Fohrenbacher said. “He was one of those guys who you thought would live forever. I was pretty shocked when I got a message from (Lorsung’s wife) Anne (Abicht).”
Lorsung was an assistant baseball coach for the 1978 season under SCSU head coach Jim Stanek before he retired. The Huskies then went 542-555-4 under Lorsung from 1979-2006. SCSU won the 1980 Northern Intercollegiate Conference and 1991 North Central Conference tournament championships. The Huskies also made their first NCAA Division II Tournament appearance in 1991, and Lorsung was named the 2001 NCC Coach of the Year after the Huskies went 19-13.
St. Cloud State University baseball baseball coach Denny Lorsung fills out a lineup card before a game against Augsburg College in April 1980.
Contributed / St. Cloud State University Athletics
Fohrenbacher was instrumental in getting Lorsung into college baseball. Fohrenbacher and Jerry Haugen were the St. John’s University baseball captains and Elmer Kohorst was the head coach, but he was stepping down.
“Jim Smith was the athletic director at the time and he said to me, ‘I’m kind of struggling with baseball candidates; do you know anybody?'” Fohrenbacher said. “I said, ‘Well, all I know is the smartest baseball player I ever played against was a guy by the name of Denny Lorsung in Alexandria.’ Jim Stanek coached him at St. Cloud State. Jim Smith called Stanek. I think Denny was teaching junior high in Burnsville. Long story short, he resigned from his teaching job and took the baseball job at St. John’s. I was the assistant coach. He was just a heck of a mentor. He didn’t just coach. He wanted to make sure that I understood what you do, the physics behind it.
“I learned more that year coaching with Denny than I think I did the rest of my baseball career.”
After two seasons, Lorsung left to become an assistant coach for Stanek. Lorsung was also still playing amateur baseball and played on a St. Cloud Rec team that included Frericks and Jim Eisenreich.
Eisenreich, who played for the Minnesota Twins, Kansas City Royals, Philadelphia Phillies, Florida Marlins and Los Angeles Dodgers during a 15-year major league career, remembers Lorsung’s savvy way of looking at the game.
“It was funny because he could almost tell you what he was going to do,” Jim Eisenreich said. “He didn’t play a whole lot because he mostly coached. He didn’t run very well. He was saying that if he ever got on base that he’d steal one. So, he gets on. He was so smart and stole the base. He almost could’ve stole it standing up. That was Denny.”
Frericks and Fohrenbacher also fondly remembered a game that St. Cloud Rec team played against Clearwater.
“We were taking infield practice,” Fohrenbacher said. “The ball took an absolute terrible hop and it came up and busted his nose. He was bleeding like a stuck pig. Everyone was all worried about him and I came over to him. He said, ‘What are you all doing? Go back to your positions?’ He’s got a towel inside his nose to stop the blood. The average guy would have gone to the emergency room.”
Frericks said the team carried on.
“We continued to do infield with blood all over the place and then we fixed him up,” he said.
St. Cloud State University baseball coach Denny Lorsung talks to a player at third base during a game in 2005.
Contributed / St. Cloud State University Athletics
Charlie Eisenreich, Jim’s younger brother, played second base for the Huskies from 1983-86. Interestingly, Charlie said that he hadn’t talked with Lorsung much before he enrolled at SCSU.
“One of the first days for school, I walked into his office and had a conversation with him,” Charlie Eisenreich said. “He said, “I don’t know much about you or have any scholarship money for you, but you’ll probably play JV to begin with. We’ll probably see you in there (on varsity) after that first year.’ He knew about me, but I wasn’t really recruited by him.”
Charlie Eisenreich played junior varsity his first season and then ended up being the North Central Conference Most Valuable Player as a senior. He remembers Lorsung’s passion for the game.
“I think he was one of those who ate and slept it,” Charlie Eisenreich said. “It was basically his life. I know he did some other jobs for St. Cloud State. I don’t know another guy who was as dedicated to baseball. He just loved being around baseball. I’ve had lots of coaches and he’s probably No. 1 on that list of loving baseball and being around it. I think that rubbed off on us. He was a great baseball mind and knew the game inside and out. I think he also knew his players, which I really appreciated. He was committed to us. I could go 0-for-4 on the first game of a doubleheader on a Saturday and I’m in there the next game.”
Fohrenbacher also remembers that Lorsung would adapt to the team that he had on the field.
“When I was at St. John’s, we had the top three base stealers in the conference,” he said. “That’s because we didn’t hit a lot of three-run (home runs). We could run and bunt and that’s how we won a lot of games. As a coach, he adapted to the strengths of his players. As a catcher, he was very particular about catcher’s techniques. You had to block the ball the right way. You didn’t reach. The other thing was he was a good hitting coach. Playing against him, it just seemed like he was on the base all the time. He hit a lot of line drives up the middle. He wasn’t that fast, but we never could throw him out. He just knew how to read a pitcher.”
Former St. Cloud State head baseball coach Denny Lorsung coaches from third base during a North Central Conference game in May 1992 at Dick Putz Field in St. Cloud.
Contributed / St. Cloud State University Archives
Besides coaching, Lorsung was also in charge of security and the concession stands for basketball and football games at SCSU. He would typically have players from the baseball team help out at the events. At one of the events Charlie Eisenreich was working, Lorsung helped him make a life-changing decision.
“The beginning of my sophomore year, I was working one of those games and we were talking about the degree I was going to pursue,” Charlie said. “At that time, I was looking at computer science. I was starting to take some of those classes and it wasn’t hitting home with me. He just said, ‘Hey, have you ever thought about going into teaching?’ We started talking about that and that’s what I ended up going into, because of that conversation with him. That was one of his strong suits — developing those relationships with his players.”
Lorsung also gave honest assessments of play on the field.
“Skip was a straight shooter.; he wasn’t going to sugarcoat anything,” Charlie Eisenreich said. “That was another thing I really appreciated. When you had a good game, he let you know. When you had a bad game, he let you know what you could have done better.”
Denny Lorsung was St. Cloud State University’s head baseball coach from 1979-2006.
Contributed / St. Cloud State University Athletics
Lorsung had connections to some major league scouts. Jim Eisenreich and Bob Hegman were both drafted in 1980 — Eisenreich in the 16th round by the Twins and Hegman in the 15th round by the Royals.
“That was a big deal,” said Jim Eisenreich, an outfielder for the Huskies. “My junior year was our best year. That year, we won the conference tournament in Bemidji and Bob Hegman was our shortstop. I think the fact that we won (the title) really helped us get noticed by the scouts. The scouts in those days asked us, ‘Would you be in interested in playing professional baseball?’ I said, ‘Ah, yes.'”
And now, there’s just the sadness of not being able to share those memories with Lorsung anymore.
“He was one of my closest friends,” Fohrenbacher said. “He was probably the most generous guy I ever knew. If he had a nickel, you had a nickel. That’s just the way he was.”